Walking the Walk: How 11 Students Researched the History of a Mountain

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In the Fall of 2019, these students researched the lives and writing of the three women writers, Rosa Pendleton Chiles, Frances Elizabeth Adair, and Corra Mae Harris, as well as the history of Pine Log Mountain. They went on numerous field trips, including a driving tour of the mountain, the Bennett Store and Salacoa Valley, several cemeteries, the Corra Harris Cave, the Sugar Hill ruins, the Etowah Valley Historical Society, the Etowah Bush School, the Bartow History Museum Archives, and an overnight trip to the University of Georgia Special Collections. They also had six guest speakers and conducted oral interviews of several community members. 

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In Spring 2020, the students continued to research in various archives and interview community members as they began to put together the materials for the exhibit. 

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We hiked a number of sites on and around Pine Log Mountain, looking at everything from mines to caves to ruins to cemeteries to fire towers. We explored several creeks that flow off of the mountain, including Pine Log Creek and Stamp Creek. The water is impossibly clear. ​

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We visited Lake Arrowhead, a man-made lake in the mountain’s east valley. Underneath this lake are the ruins of Lost Town, a Cherokee village and later an Appalachian settler community. 

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Guided by a Native American petroglyph expert, we set out to find the cave that one of our forgotten women writers had discovered. It had originally been filled with Native American artifacts dating back over a thousand years. Most of us went into the cave. We did not find any artifacts, but it was a memorable experience.​

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We hiked to the ruins of the Sugar Hill convict labor camp, where over a hundred inmates had been interned from 1874-1909, working in the iron and manganese mines. The atrocities at this camp were one of the reasons the convict lease system in Georgia was abolished by the State Legislature. ​

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We hiked to a 19th-century mill site along Stamp Creek where it comes off of Pine Log Mountain. It was originally a grist mill, then it became a sawmill and later a carriage and coffin factory. ​

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We visited the only known still-existing slave cabin in Bartow County. Our guide, Alexis Carter-Callahan, director of the Etowah Bush School, helped us understand the African-American history in the area. ​

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We took an overnight trip to the University of Georgia in Athens to visit its Special Collections. By consensus, we ate that night at the Olive Garden. ​

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The University of Georgia is a lot bigger than Reinhardt, but we found our way. We were excited to discover that the UGA archives had an exhibit on the convict lease system in Georgia, one of the very things we had been researching. ​

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At UGA’s Hargrett Rare Book & Manuscript Room, each of us had requested that materials be pulled for the topics we were researching.  ​Abigail, Amber, and Branden were researching Corra Harris. Kimberlee was researching lynching in Georgia. Raynah was researching moonshining, and Jessica was researching convict laborers. ​

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It was amazing to touch historical handwritten documents by some of the authors we had studied, especially the original suicide note written by Lundy Harris, husband of writer Corra Harris.

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Among several other archives, we visited the Etowah Valley Historical Society in Cartersville, our community partner. Here, we looked at original letters by Corra Harris. ​

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We learned in our research that Reinhardt College students and faculty in the early 1900s had an annual Pine Log Mountain Day, when they would climb to the summit. We had several Pine Log Mountain Days that we will never forget. 

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