A Whole Lotta Nothing (Part 3)

Tweet

Toodling along the road, I saw the Bud Ogle Farm sign. As with the other things I saw, I’ve seen that more times than I can count but had never stopped. But I did today! This is along the road that leads to the Roaring Fork Motor Nature Trail. It is a National Register of Historic Places land, maintained by the national park. The property belonged to Noah “Bud” Ogle, a 19th century settler in the area. (There are still a lot of things named “Ogle” in and around Gatlinburg, so he was part of a prominent family.). Amid the 3/4-mile loop on the property a tub mill, barn, and main house remain standing. You can be cynical and view log cabins the way you can view a Civil War battlefield or a covered bridge: seen one, seen ‘em all. To some degree that may be true; however, it is fascinating to see the variations that individuals put into building their homes back in the days when there weren’t any Jim Walter Homes or blueprints....or building codes. (You could have read a newspaper through the wall thanks to the spaces between some of the boards in this particular cabin.) The other thing I found fascinating is how this rather large cabin was relatively bare. If you’ve ever been to, or seen photos of, the log cabin at the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Monument in Kentucky you have seen how tiny some of the buildings were. It seemed to be a case of get a shelter up that’ll hold the family. In the Ogle house, there were two rooms, each with a fireplace. That would have allowed multiple purposes. There was no indication which room served as the kitchen and which as the living/sleeping quarters. I guess either they don’t know that, or it’s possible that which room served which purpose could have depended on which way the wind was blowing or if the roof was leaking. An informational sign said that the forest is winning the battle to reclaim the land, so in a few decades it probably won’t be there anymore. That makes me even happier I finally stopped.