Mode of Program Participation
Academic Scholarship
Participation Type
Paper
Presentation #1 Title
PRESIDENT FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT AND THE 1940 DEDICATION OF THE CHICKAMAUGA DAM
Presentation #1 Abstract or Summary
On September 2, 1940 President Franklin D. Roosevelt presided over the dedication of the Chickamauga Dam on the Tennessee River. The Tennessee Valley Act of 1933 had provided for expediting flood control, eliminating soil erosion, improving navigation, and constructing dams and power plants to furnish low-cost electric power over parts of seven states. The eastern two-thirds of the Tennessee Valley was within Appalachia, extending from the Great Smoky Mountains National Park to the Natchez Trace Parkway in northwest Alabama. The Appalachian portion of the Valley included nine congressional districts, seventy-nine counties, sixteen of the eighteen dams, nineteen of the twenty-two power plants, and served a population slightly more than two and one half million residents. President Roosevelt's dedication of the Chickamauga Dam, located halfway between knoxville, Tennessee and Huntsville, Alabama, marked a significant development in the quest for economic revitalization of Appalachia.
At-A-Glance Bio- Presenter #1
Professor of History, Pace University
PRESIDENT FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT AND THE 1940 DEDICATION OF THE CHICKAMAUGA DAM
On September 2, 1940 President Franklin D. Roosevelt presided over the dedication of the Chickamauga Dam on the Tennessee River. The Tennessee Valley Act of 1933 had provided for expediting flood control, eliminating soil erosion, improving navigation, and constructing dams and power plants to furnish low-cost electric power over parts of seven states. The eastern two-thirds of the Tennessee Valley was within Appalachia, extending from the Great Smoky Mountains National Park to the Natchez Trace Parkway in northwest Alabama. The Appalachian portion of the Valley included nine congressional districts, seventy-nine counties, sixteen of the eighteen dams, nineteen of the twenty-two power plants, and served a population slightly more than two and one half million residents. President Roosevelt's dedication of the Chickamauga Dam, located halfway between knoxville, Tennessee and Huntsville, Alabama, marked a significant development in the quest for economic revitalization of Appalachia.
