Eleanor Creekmore Dickinson, my mother, turned 80 this week. My husband and I have been putting together a video of her life to show at the big party next weekend. Rummaging around in thousands of old family photographs has been a time-consuming and moving experience. The pictures can be sorted in many ways: by family line, by age, by geography, by topic. I was surprised at how many pictures I have of family members visiting the Grand Canyon since 1941, how many photos feature animals (especially cats), and how many were taken at Elkmont.
Elmont was a vacation community near Gatlinburg in the Great Smoky Mountains of Tennessee. My great grandparents built a cabin there before the the Great Smoky Mountains became a national park in 1934. Later, the Elkmont camp ground was built across Jake’s Creek behind our cabin. In 1994, my mother helped to create the Great Smoky Mountains Elkmont Historic District that preserves some of the cabins from destruction. She developed a book about Elkmont in 2006.
You can tour Elkmont by video on Ghost Town Elkmont Houses – Smoky Mountains Tennessee (2007) and National Park – Great Smoky Mountains Elkmont Historic District Update (2008). Here are some of our family pictures of Elkmont and “Dear Lodge”, cabin number six also called the Creekmore Cabin.
1925 Elkmont swimming hole
| 1915 Walter and Ellen Van Gilder (my great grandparents)  |
. | 1915 Hanging Bridge Over Jake’s Creek  |
| 1916 Appalachian Club Members at the Wonderland Hotel  |
. | 1965 Elkmont Cabin 6  |
| 1965 Uncle Richard, Aunt Mary, Aunt Louise at Jake’s Creek  |
. | 1967 my mother Eleanor  |
| 1977 my brother Peter with Grandma on the cabin porch  |
. | 1980 Inside Cabin 6: Grandma, Aunt Mary, J.T. Higdon  |
| 1991 My Mother’s Trophy for Elkmont’s Most Original HorsDoeuvres  |
. | 2008 J.R. and Midge Higdon – Elkmont Cemetery  |
2008 Elkmont – Creekmore Cabin |
. | 2008 Elkmont – Cabin 6 |
2008 Great Smoky Mountains
Images Copyright 2008-2011 by Katy Dickinson and Jessica Dickinson Goodman
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