Lauren Harris

Dr. Alderman

Norris Dam

GEOG 499

1

Lauren Harris

Dr. Alderman

GEOG 499

12/8/16

Norris Dam

Every person has a place they call home. Whether it’s a big or small house, it is still the

place where people like to kick off their shoes and relax especially after a long day of work. A

home has many memories. For my parents, 537 Tennessee Circle is where I took my first steps.

Each home has a special memory that stays with you for years to come. Over time people change

and places change too. For the people of Norris lake that is just what happened to them. They

had a home that was gone when the dam was being built, but in return they gained electricity and

a new home. Each person has their own opinion of the environment and geography. Environment

and geography go hand in hand. In this paper, I want to discuss the environment and how it is

changing and also tie in Norris Dam to geography and how it affects the environment and the

people around them.

Many people agree that the environment is changing and countless people think the

environment is fine. Many people have different perceptions on climate change. Some people

believe that climate change is happening and some do not believe so. By using the term

environment, I am explaining the use of natural resources that are used in the world today. When

you look around in a certain place, for example your kitchen or bathroom, you can notice all the

different things that are made possible by the environment. For example, the water we drink

every day, the water we use to run our dishwasher or flush our toilet. Everything that we do can

produce waste. The waste we produce can have a lasting impact on the world in which we live.

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All the waste that is being produced has to go somewhere, and that somewhere is in the ocean.

As we have seen in many discussions, our trash can end up in the ocean. Everything leads to the

ocean. Most of our trash ends up in the ocean. There is a video from national geographic called

the great garbage patch. It explains that there is so much trash in the ocean, it almost looks as if

there is another continent. Some people do not realize that their everyday routine of throwing

their trash away can have a lasting impact on the world. Before I started thinking about the

effects on the environment, I did not think about the water I was using, leaving the water on

while brushing my teeth, or where my plastic water bottle is going. There are so many important

factors that can be discussed. When people begin looking at the bigger picture, they might begin

to change their ways for the better and start helping by protecting our planet. When I first started

at the University of Tennessee, I decided to major in anthropology. I decided that I could not see

me having a bright future solely with this degree, so I decided to minor in anthropology. My love

for geography leads me into majoring in this field. In this paper, I want to combine my love for

geography and my love for environmental anthropology. We might not think so at first, but

geography is a part of our everyday lives. When we need to go to a new place, we pull out our

phones and get on our GPS. The environment and geography can play a huge role together,

because some researchers say that humans are destroying our environment. Geographers can

look more into this by mapping certain locations and using soil patterns to look for changes in

the environment.

There are a number of ways geographers can provide useful tools. One way the

environment can be helped is by creating dams, because they provide a useful source of energy.

But, not everything in the world can be completely helpful to the environment. There are also

some negative impacts that can be affected by the dam. Tennessee Valley Authority in

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Tennessee has created many dams in the area, and surrounding states that are very useful for

creating the power we have today. The TVA is a very complicated company because of the

variety of different roles it has. TVA is not a company designed to help the environment by

building dams; they also do various tasks that are too complicated to describe. Before I spoke

with the employees of TVA, I did not realize how important the company actually is. They have

helped the community by creating these dams, which are designed to last a long time. To

understand the importance of the dams, we must first have some background into the TVA.

According to the article by Susie Hatmaker, she gives her readers background

information on the TVA. She states “Roosevelt amended to the TVA Act a broader, more

ideological vision that included social development to change rural life in the region” (Hatmaker

23). The reason why TVA was created was to improve the environment for east Tennessee and

surrounding areas because at that time east Tennessee was a poverty-stricken state. One dam in

particular that I focused my research on is the Norris Dam. The Norris Dam has created many

opportunities for East Tennessee. The dam has generated many jobs, and has helped the

community grow into what it is today, but there is also a downfall to creating the dam, because

Norris Dam was the first dam created by TVA and many people lost their homes. With my

research, I will discuss the positive and negative aspects on the environment and people of the

Norris Dam.

The construction of this dam helped the economy during the Great Depression.

According to Ronald Reed Boyce’s article, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt stood before the

U.S. Congress and explained the entire Tennessee Valley drainage would be a great help for the

Great Depression (Boyce 23). I do agree with this because, the construction of this dam created

thousands of jobs for unemployed people. These people could now provide for their families,

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although this project did cause uproar within the area. According to the article: “When a New

Deal is Actually an Old Deal: The Role of TVA in Engineering a Jim Crow Racialized

Landscape” states that TVA was “one of the first in a long line of government programs and

agencies intended to provide relief and recovery from the Great Depression” (Alderman Brown

103). During the Great Depression, many people were poverty stricken. They had nothing. My

Grandma was born during this time and she told me that this was the worst experience she has

ever went through. She said that they did not have much of anything. My Grandma would keep

everything after the Great Depression, because she was used to having nothing. She would

collect butter containers and save them. The TVA was created to help people through these

already hard times. People also had to face other problems. According to Alderman and Brown

article they state “Nevertheless, by the time that the TVA was founded in the 1930s, Jim Crow

was firmly established and African Americans in the South were suffering from separate (and

unequal) schools, transportation and public accommodations; deprivation of political and

economic rights; and frequent instances of lynching and false imprisonment” (104). These

people were already going through an extremely hard time they did not need to have any more

trouble on their hands. This did not stop it from happening. It helps knowing other important

events that were going on in this time because it paints a bigger picture. Things are not always as

great as they seem to be but the TVA did provide some hope that things could begin to look up.

“When President Roosevelt signed the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) Act on May 18th,

1933, he launched the largest, most ambitious, and unquestionably most controversial regional

development planning project in U.S. history-and the only such project ever undertaken in the

nation” (Boyce 23). This project of creating TVA was a hard decision for the president to decide

on whether to move forward and create the TVA because the country was in a depression and

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money was scarce, but Roosevelt took a huge leap of faith and the Dam is still a huge success to

the area and the nation today. Norris Dam is

located in Anderson and Campbell County

on the Clinch River, which is twenty-five

miles northwest of Knoxville (Norris Dam

2).

http://jerrybryan.com/hiking/

norrisdamriverbluff.html

https://www.tva.gov/Environment/Environmental-Stewardship/Water-Quality/Reservoir-Health-Ratings/Norris-Reservoir

https://www.tva.gov/Environment/Environmental-Stewardship/Water-Quality/Reservoir-Health-Ratings/Norris-Reservoir

According to the book “Norris Dam:

Tennessee Valley Authority” the author

relates how in 1933 work on building the

Norris Dam began. The authors also

comment on the way the dam was built. The

construction of the Norris Dam would take four years to build such an extravagant structure.

(Norris Dam: Tennessee Valley Authority 4). To create a dam, it takes a lot of labor and different

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people specialized in different elements. Many people have to work hard to get the job done at

the right time for the project to move forward. Geographers had a huge influence on the project.

According to the article “Geographers and the Tennessee Valley Authority” Boyce states “The

geographers in the Division of Land Planning and Housing undertook five major tasks: data

gathering and mapmaking, regional analyses and syntheses, farming and farmstead analyses,

town economic- based and trade-area analyses, and recreational studies” (25-26). Geographers

had an important role in map making and helping to use data for TVA. Most of the workers

lived around the dam, but others had a commute to get there. According to the “Norris Dam:

Tennessee Valley Authority” the author informs us how special roads and homes were needed to

be built due to the influx of people coming into the area to work on the dam. (Norris Dam:

Tennessee Valley Authority 7). This gives an excellent example of the magnitude of planning

that this kind of project requires. This project was so important to a number of people, they had

to make it assessable for people to get in to work. The advantages to this monumental task are

many. According to Barton M. Jones’s article, he says that it will develop power during certain

months of the year; it will help with navigation and water flow and it will help power hydro-

electric plants down the Tennessee River (Jones 24). Jones describes that the dam can have a

multitude of different uses for the environment, which is helpful when building a large structure

like this because it is not taking up a lot of space and money for one special purpose. The dam is

very resourceful with abundance of purposes for the area. When first researching the dam, I did

not realize that dams were very resourceful and performed various tasks. I thought they were

solely used for power purposes and not storage purposes. One of the most important purposes for

the dam is to create power. Before TVA was created many east Tennesseans did not have power.

When I talked to the TVA employees they mentioned that people, in the area, were very poor,

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and they did not have electricity. TVA helped create power to improve the community.

According to the book “Norris Dam: Tennessee Valley Authority” the author tells us that water

power converts to electrical energy in two steps- the turbines transform it into mechanical

energy, which the generators apply to electricity (Norris Dam: Tennessee Valley Authority 23).

There is a lot of work that goes into the water being converted into energy.

If it was not for geographers, it would take TVA longer to build the dam. “The Tennessee

Valley Authority (TVA) was the largest, most comprehensive, and most controversial regional

development and planning project in U.S. history. Geographers were involved from its inception

and made impressive contributions” (Boyce 23). TVA relied on the geographers to help construct

the dam. They needed to know how this would affect the environment in the area. TVA had

goals for this dam, “The goals of the TVA were to improve agriculture, industry, and commerce

and to elevate the general standard of living in the region. Farming, the primary activity, was

especially depressed, and TVA legislation required that fertilizer and power be available to

farmers at the lowest possible prices” (Boyce 23-25). The geographers had multiple tasks to help

prepare the dam for the area. According to the article by Ronald Reed Boyce, “Geographers and

the Tennessee Valley Authority,” Boyce states, “The geographers in the Division of Land

Planning and Housing undertook five major tasks: data gathering and mapmaking, regional

analyses and syntheses, farming and farmstead analyses, town economic-base and trade-area

analyses, and recreational studies” (Boyce 25-26). I believe that the roles of the geographers

were essential to creating the Norris Dam. TVA would have planned accordingly, of course, but

if the geographers were not there to assist, they could have miscalculated measurements or all

sorts of possibilities could occur. There is a possibility that the TVA could have destroyed the

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area if it was not for the geographers and their experience with variables such as the type of soil

and terrain in the area.

 Current Year Observed Midnight Elevations Previous Year Observed Midnight Elevations Balancing Guide Flood Guide Expected Elevation Range

https://www.tva.gov/Environment/Lake-Levels/Norris/Norris-Operating-Guide

This operating guide shows us an insight on what else the Norris Dam is used for. One

place that holds many different sources of information about the dam is the Norris Dam

Museum. I went to the Norris Dam Museum, in Norris, Tennessee and I was greeted by a sweet

lady, who was a volunteer for the museum. The museum is only opened two days a week, so it is

operated by volunteers. When I entered the room, I was greeted by a kind smile and a sweet

introduction into the museum. She was kind enough to explain to me that she was a previous

employee at Norris Dam, from where she had retired from working there for 50 years. She loved

working for an important company. She described the feeling of walking around, being held by

the love of your life, on top of the dam. She explained how it was every woman’s dream, in her

time period to walk across the dam. She said that the dam had to be big because of all the power

it was producing for the surrounding areas. According to the book “Norris Dam: Tennessee

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Valley Authority” the author states the specifications of Norris Dam, “maximum height 265 feet,

length 1,872 feet, thickness at base 204 feet, reservoir area 34,200 acres, and power installation

132,000 horsepower” (Norris Dam: Tennessee Valley Authority 5). She went into detail about

the admirable company she worked for called TVA. She said that they produced a multitude of

jobs for people in the community. The museum is a wonderful place to obtain information about

the Norris Dam from people who are touched by the dam personally. An important aspect of

geographers, is getting to meet different people who have been touched by a project. In

geography, you can interview people and get connected with their past. As a geographer, you can

learn the concepts of the community. You are not just involved or work for yourself, you are

there to help the community. Talking to this woman, who had so much passion for this project,

made me feel passionate about the project too. When you walk through the museum you will

notice all the pictures on the walls and the little sign in book that the lady will ask you to sign.

The sign in book is only filled with a few signatures, because a lot of people are unaware of the

museum. As you begin your tour of the 3 rooms, it begins to tell the story of Norris Dam. There

is a picture of Franklin D. Roosevelt signing the paperwork for the TVA. This was a monumental

feat during the 1930s. There are also various pictures of the dam being built. It was also an ample

process of creating the dam because they had to direct the water in another direction, so they

could build the dam without the disturbance of the water and cut out some of the river. The

museum also holds several maps that are effective for looking at the places the dam has helped

create. There was also a newsletter that was produced by a member in the town and it describes

how the community felt about the dam. There were mixed emotions from the community

members, happy and sad ones. They liked the fact that many people would be getting jobs in a

community that needed the jobs, but they were also focused on the fact of moving.

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With the construction of the Dam, many people would have to be moved because they

were located near the river. For many people, the land they owned had been in the family for

many generations. It was home for them. When researching, I stumbled across a newspaper

article dated April 29th, 2012. The newspaper article first starts out discussing the heart

wrenching feeling it is to hear a knock on your door and being asked to leave (Fowler 1). John

Rice Irwin describes how he felt when his family has learned about the eviction. He was a

toddler at the time, in 2012 he was 81, and he is still devastated by the loss of his family home

(Fowler 1). He states that he still remembers “how the eviction shook family members to the

core” (Fowler 1). TVA relocated his family to a new location, but that does not replace the

feeling of having a home that has been in the family for many generations. Hearing that news has

to be very devastating, especially if he still remembers it from when he was a toddler. The land

that his family lost is irreplaceable. It could have been the last thing that was received from a

dying family member and holds a special memory in their hearts forever. It is also hard to learn

that you will no longer have a “home” that is yours. According to the book “Norris Dam:

Tennessee Valley Authority” the author states “The clearing line now marks the level of Norris

Reservoir, Roads and railroads were relocated, new bridges were built, more than a hundred

thousand acres of land were purchased, and 4,000 families were aided in reestablishing

themselves elsewhere. Almost a hundred cemeteries with 5,219 graves were removed, while

1,200 men were employed 2 years in clearing timber from the land to be flooded” (Norris Dam:

Tennessee Valley Authority 30). Quite a few people did not realize that some citizens lost their

homes; cemeteries were also moved to a new location. This can also have an effect on people

because many people go visit their families buried in cemeteries. For example, my grandfather

passed away this May and my grandmother goes to visit him every day. If the cemetery were to

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be moved my grandma would have such a hard time with this, because that is where she is used

to going to visit him. Archaeologists did come into the area and carefully remove the bodies and

took them to a safe place and the artifacts found were preserved in state universities’ (Norris

Dam: Tennessee Valley Authority 31). It would still be hard on families to have their loved ones

relocated. They have already lost so much; they do not need the stress of something else.

Kenneth E. Hendrickson Jr’s article states,” The 2,700 families living in the five-county area of

Tennessee affected by the construction of the Norris Dam were characterized by President

Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933 as “forgotten Americans” whose lives were to be enhanced. They

were to be given better farms, homes, and schools; they were to receive the benefits of

electricity; and new industries were to improve the general economic conditions of their region”

(Hendrickson 457). The people that were affected by the dam building were promised many

things, but this does not replace the fact that they lost so much. It gives a better example knowing

that President Roosevelt called them “forgotten Americans” because he knew that they were

losing all that they had, in hopes that TVA would provide them a better life in the future. The

article explains how these people’s homes had become a “TVA suburb” because many

employees’ homes were being built (Hendrickson 457). It does not seem right that the family

home they had were becoming homes for TVA employees.

People have also voiced an opinion of the negative impacts that dams create. There is not

just one concern that people are faced with. Susie Hatmaker, in her article, describes the negative

opinions that she faces with TVA. In her article, she describes the Kingston coal ash spill that

occurred in 2008 (Hatmaker 23). She explains that TVA is responsible for this. This was the

worst coal ash spill in the history, and it occurred in Tennessee. People were displaced from their

homes because of the careless acts of the TVA employees. She describes one person that had

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furniture floating in the coal ash filled river (Hatmaker 22). She also discusses the reasoning

behind the construction of the TVA, because people needed a place to store “material excess”

left behind from the war (Hatmaker 23). She also goes as far to say that the construction of the

Norris Dam left plenty of citizens homeless (Hatmaker 25). Susi Hatmaker leaves her readers

with a negative opinion about the work TVA has done.

Another example about a negative impact dams give on the environment is written in

Timothy Mitchell’s article. He explains the hardship that people in Egypt went through in 1942

and that there were many factors that effected Egypt. The war, mosquitoes, and the Aswan Dam

played important roles with the disaster in Egypt (20). The dam was built to help the land, but it

harmed the land more by not providing the rich soil it needed. Rich soil provides farmers with

the needed essentials to grow fruits and vegetables, without this they could not produce many

crops. Also, the dam made way for chemicals that also hurt the community (31). Mitchell states

“The war had increased river traffic with Sudan, and the building and rising of the Aswan Dam

had created new breeding places for the insect along the route” (Mitchell 22). The mosquitoes

were benefiting from the dam. They were then spreading a harmful virus called malaria, which

took the lives of many people. Since the water was being dammed, this caused more harm

because it was disturbing the flow of water (Mitchell 24). The level of the water being raised and

lowered also causes problems related to the dam. Mitchel also states that “The TVA, the child of

earlier technical and political failures, came to epitomize the new possibilities of development

and planning, especially in arid regions such as the Middle East” (Mitchell 44). The TVA wanted

to build another larger dam above the Aswan Dam (Mitchell 45). This only resulted in

complications because they ignored the problems that were already occurring with the Aswan

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Dam. It only made the environment in that area worse. Mitchell is trying to explain that the TVA

is not a perfect company and they do make mistakes.

There are many different environmental aspects that can help create the world in which

we live. Most of these factors can be pleasant or unpleasant. We have learned in class that the

environment is in serious trouble, because of many different factors. According to one article

“The Anthropocene: Are Humans Now Overwhelming the Great Forces of Nature?” the authors

inform us that with global warming and other harmful effects, made by humans, raises a concern

for the future of the Earth (Steffen: 614). This article describes that the time we are living in

today is called the Anthropocene. Numerous people have their own opinions on if we are living

in this time, but people need to understand that the world is changing to accommodate the

growing population it is not accustomed to. This article argues that humans are changing the

world, because we are experiencing climate change which is causing warmer weather. One key

factor that can help the environment is to be familiar with the ways that are harmful to the

environment. Water is a major concern in the world today. There are people throughout the

world who do not have clean drinking water. In the article “The medical Anthropology of

Water” the authors state “In 2002, 1.1 billion people or 17% of the global population, lacked

access to improved water sources (Whiteford: Padros 1). This is a major concern because people

need to have water in order to survive. There are abounding issues that are arising today that

concern the environment. Another issue we see today concerning water in California is that they

are in a massive drought. This means people have to limit the amount of water they are using, but

the farmers are not. According to the “New York Times” article “California farmers produce

more than a third of the nation’s vegetables and two-thirds of its fruits and nuts” (New York

Times 3). This does not seem fair that Californians are in a major drought and people are still

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eating many foods that come from California. You may be wondering how all this information

ties into the Norris Dam. The Norris Dam is an important piece of the environment because it

helps use the water that is provided by the environment and turning it into a product that is used

to help people not only in this area, but in other states as they eat the food we produce here.

Because we are in a declining environment, everything that is produced in the world that helps

the environment is imperative. The world may be in a water crisis or in a drought, but if we all

use the resources we have, the world would be a better place. On the negative side, in 2008 there

was a major ash spill that was caused from a dam operated by TVA. Knowing about events that

have caused problems can help to fix future problems from occurring. According to the article

“Kingston coal ash spill: 5 years, $1 billion cleanup tab and no regulations later” the authors

state “When a dike failed at TVA’s Kingston Fossil Plant, 5.4 million cubic yards of coal ash

cascaded into the Emory and Clinch rivers and smothered some 300 acres of land” (Kingston

Ash Spill 2). We have to consider both the positive and negative impacts on the environment

with every project we engage in.

These people who lived where Norris Lake is today had to give up these life styles when

they were evicted from their homes. Some of these items they worked really hard to get and they

earned them. They could get these items in their new location, but this area was home to over

3,000 families. People work hard to make a house a home and it can take time. I can only

imagine how devastating it was for these families to be forced out of their homes and start all

over. I am sure that these homes were full of memories as well as the are itself. I constructed this

graph to show you what these families lost in the comfort of their homes. According to the

article, TVA: Electricity for All, there were a lot of families flooded by the Dam. The article

states:

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The 3,500 families in the area to be flooded by the Norris Dam included property owners

and tenant farmers (families who grow cash crops on other people’s lands so they could

have a place to live). Conditions in the valley were difficult for both groups. Even during

the best of times there was not enough money raised by local taxes to support adequate

schools, public health services, hospitals, and road construction. Data collected on 2,841

in the Norris Basin—including 1864 property owners and 977 tenants—revealed that:

no electrici

ty

outhouse

trave

l for w

ater

battery operated ra

dios

photographs

read newspaper

automobiles

owned trucks

0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.6

0.7

0.8

0.9

1

People of Norris Dam

Home Owners Tenants

This graph shows what the people had and did not have before the dam was build. Many people

lost their homes when the dam was built, but they got electricity and a new house when the dam

was built.

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Numbers from http://newdeal.feri.org/tva/tva06.htm

While researching the Norris Dam, I came across some positive and negative effects. The

construction of the dam was an excellent source of improvement to the economy during the

times of the Great Depression. It provided a great source of power and energy to the area. Of

course, the fact that people were uprooted from their homes is devastating, but it was a great way

for people to work and provide for their families. A helpful resource on learning more

information about Norris Dam is from the Museum. By going to the museum, one is able to

understand the complicated process of constructing a dam. The TVA, I also learned, is a very

complicated company because they do perform a variety of tasks that can be helpful and harmful

to the environment. It was sad to read about the fact that graves were moved and homes were

destroyed. The home is where we lay our foundation and create memories that we cherish for

years. Of course, the grave site is where we lay our loved ones to rest for eternity. Moving these

sacred areas are difficult for the families involved. It does make me feel grateful of all the

sacrifices people made in order to help us and the economy. When researching other aspects of

the environment I came across two writers that voice their opinion of the negative contribution of

the TVA dams. We are obligated to our future generations to carefully evaluate large projects

like the TVA dam and make educated decisions to protect what we have left and preserve as

much as we can from the environment.

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Photos of Norris Dam

http://www.easttnvacations.com/lib/image/upload/NorrisDam.JPG

http://norrislaketennessee.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/620120426145233001_t607.jpg

http://newdeal.feri.org/images/p56.gif

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Works Cited

Alderman, H Derek and Brown, N Robert. “ When a New Deal is Actually an Old Deal: The Role of TVA in Engineering a Jim Crow Racialized Landscape.” Chapter 105.

Boyce, Ronald Reed. "Geographers and the Tennessee Valley Authority*." Geographers and the Tennessee Valley Authority 2004. Accessed November 18, 2015. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1931-0846.2004.tb00156.x/abstract.

Fowler, Bob. "Norris Dam: Families Uprooted, Jobs Created." Knoxville News-Sentinel, 2012.

Hatmaker, Susie. On Mattering: A Coal Ash Flood and the Limits of Environmental Knowldge. Vol. 4. Envirmental Humanities, 2014. 19-39.

Hendickon, Kenneth E. Accessed November 18, 2015. http://www.jstor.org.proxy.lib.utk.edu:90/stable/pdf/1900288.pdf?acceptTC=true.

Jones, Barton M. "Norris Dam: Storage and Flood Control…Link in Tennessee Valley Program…Will Produce Power…Unique Engineering Problems… Economic Significance." http://www.nature.com.proxy.lib.utk.edu:90/scientificamerican/journal/v152/n1/pdf/scientificamerican0135-24.pdf.

"Kingston Coal Ash Spill: 5 Years, $1 Billion Cleanup Tab and No Regulations Later." December 22, 2013. Accessed November 29, 2015.

Mitchell, Timothy. "Rule of Experts Egypt, Techno-Politics, Modernity." 19-53.

Norris Dam. (Washington: Gov. Print. Off.), 1936. 1-45.

Steffen, Will, Paul J Crutzen, and John R McNeil. "The Anthropocene: Are Humans Now Overwhelming the Great ..." BioOne. 2007. Accessed November 29, 2015. http://www.bioone.org/doi/abs/10.1579/0044-7447(2007)36[614:TAAHNO]2.0.CO;2.

Whiteford PhD MPH, Linda M, and Cecilia Vindrola Padros MA. "The Water Crisis and Health:The Role of Medical Anthoropology." The Medical Anthropology of Water. Accessed November 29, 2015.

"Your Contribution to the California Drought." Your Contribution to the California Drought. Accessed November 29, 2015. http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/05/21/us/your-contribution-to-the-california-drought.html.

“TVA: Elecetricity for All.” http://newdeal.feri.org/tva/tva06.htm

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