Recently, I was giving a tour of Kingsport to a group of ladies from Richmond, Virginia. It was their first visit to East Tennessee. They were very much “Old Virginia” in the sense that their roots went back to ancestors who had discovered the new world and never saw a reason to venture any further. They revered Colonial Williamsburg and seemed to view Tennessee as a country cousin. It’s an age-old scenario. They were more English, while we were more Scots-Irish hillbillies and rednecks (in the most complimentary sense of those words).

We met at Riverfront Seafood and their eyes naturally gravitated towards the white capping water as it cascaded across the Reedy Creek shoals. As if on cue, a speedboat came rushing downriver past the restaurant. They almost giggled with delight. As with most of my guests from further downstream in Tennessee or across the Blue Ridge towards the Atlantic, they seemed fascinated with the movement of the water, which isn’t as evident in those deeper streams.

We drove west toward Rotherwood and they had a visceral reaction when they first saw the antebellum mansion prominently perched on the west bank overlooking the river and Bays Mountain in the distance. We turned east and drove through downtown, looping back across Eden’s Ridge to return to our starting place. As we passed the historic Exchange Place and saw Clinch Mountain and Moccasin Gap, they had a hard time comprehending that the latter two were actually in Virginia. I explained that the Greenbelt began near Exchange Place and ended roughly 9 miles later at Rotherwood.

I learn a lot from first time newcomers. Their reaction is raw and full of wonder at the things I take for granted.

Then I stumbled upon the autobiography of Dr. Frederick A. Ross, who built Rotherwood. He, too, was from Richmond and inherited his wealthy father’s estate which included thousands of acres in today’s Kingsport.

In the eloquent words of a well-educated theologian, he described what he witnessed in 1818. It was a familiar description of the views our latest guests from Richmond experienced in 2023–more than two centuries later.

I’ve often searched for words to describe the view of Clinch Mountain to the north and Bays Mountain to the south. Clinch is still very much like “the undulations of a vast serpent” and Bays is still very much like a “beautiful mass of verdure” akin to “Milton’s Wall” in the epic poem, “Paradise Lost.”

While we often fixate on the “Model City” of 1917, Kingsport’s European history dates back to 1761 when the British built Fort Robinson (later Fort Patrick Henry). It has always been considered the head of navigation on the Holston River (hence King’s Port) and, thus, the Tennessee Valley. Upstream was too shallow for boats. Daniel Boone’s axmen departed here to forge the Wilderness Road west through Cumberland Gap (despite the geographically inaccurate lyrics of the popular song, Wagon Wheel). Virtually every settler who followed passed through this place on their way to Middle Tennessee, Kentucky, and eventually Arkansas, Missouri and points west–including the parents of future president Abraham Lincoln.

Even before the Europeans arrived, the Great Indian Warpath was used for trading between the tribes spanning from Alabama to New York. Long Island was a sacred meeting ground along the way. Southern Spirit Guide explained, “Had this four mile long, half mile wide island been located in any other river in Tennessee it would not possess the significance that it has. This spit of land could be called the birthplace of Tennessee and even Kentucky for the treaties signed with the Cherokee that opened their lands to settlements by the white man. One possible origin for the name for the state of Tennessee, from the language of the Yuchi Indians, “Tana-see,” possibly meaning “the meeting place,” may be derived from this island. It is no wonder that the Federal government named Long Island a National Historic Landmark in 1960.”

Kingsport has a nationally significant role in American history. We should be more mindful of that fact.