Dolly Parton & the Roots of Country Music

Locust Ridge, Tennessee

In my Tennessee mountain home
Life is as peaceful as a baby's sigh
In my Tennessee mountain home
Crickets sing in the fields near by

from "My Tennessee Mountain Home"
by Dolly Parton

Parton's childhood home was in Locust Ridge, nestled in the Great Smoky Mountains of East Tennessee. A photograph of the house was featured on her album My Tennessee Mountain Home in 1973, and the song of the same title celebrated her memories of it. The location was isolated and rural, and as Parton noted in her autobiography, "I grew up poor - very poor."

Finding Locust Ridge on the Original Map

The complete map of Great Smoky Mountains National Park and vicinity is substantially larger than the section shown above. If you are interested in locating Locust Ridge for yourself, the section outlined in red on the map to the left is the part detailed above. On the map, Locust Ridge is northeast of Gatlinburg and southeast of Sevierville, the two closest cities, and north of the northernmost boundaries of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, near the Webb Mountains. This map was created in 1953 and shows what the area was like when Parton was a child.

Additional Maps of Great Smoky Mountains National Park

Through the online collections of Geography and Map Reading Room of the Library of Congress, it is possible to view additional maps of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee. Please use the links below to explore further:

• List of additional maps of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park
  select "Gallery View" to see thumbnail image of all the maps
• Special Presentation on the Great Smoky Mountains National Park
  from "Mapping the National Parks" (American Memory)