The Cumberland Gap from the overlook. Daniel Boone would have loved these freeways to travel through the Gap. |
From Maine to Georgia the Appalachian Mountains rose like a giant wall, protecting the American colonies from their enemies: the French in Canada and American Indians to the west. Land transportation was primitive, and the nearly trackless mountains that offered security to the colonists also kept the growing population confined along the eastern seaboard. In 1750 the first white explorers came upon the gap. Thomas Walker had an 800,000 acre grant beyond the mountains of the Blue Ridge. They returned after two months of searching. They had not found the Kentucky bluegrass. In 1775 after the Treaty of Sycamore Shoals, Daniel Boone and 30 men marked out the Wilderness Trail from Cumberland Gap into Kentucky. This started the immigration and by 1792 the population was more than 100,000 and Kentucky was then admitted to the Union. 1820's and 1830's engineering overcame the mountain wall. The west could be reached via the Erie and Pennsylvania Main Line canals, or on steamboats up the Mississippi River, Cumberland Gap declined in importance, but it had overseen the opening of the first American West.
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