Reinterpreting Cultural History:

Visualizing a Former Appalachian Landscape Using GIS

Joel M. StaubThe Pennsylvania State University

jms837@psu.edu

West Virginia GIS ConferenceMay 10, 2004

Visualizing an Appalachian Landscape

• Background• Study Region• Spatial Data• Settlement Patterns

– Spatial Relationships to Rivers/Streams– Spatial Relationships to Schools

• Land-Use Activities

Blue Ridge Mountains…

…Shenandoah Homesteads

…Shenandoah Homesteads

Study Region

• Shenandoah NP• The Old Rag Hollows

– Corbin, Nicholson, and Weakley

Shenandoah NP and the Old Rag Region

Corbin, Nicholson, and Weakley Hollows

Spatial Data

• 1934 U.S.G.S. Topographic Map

• Five Aerial Photographs, October 1937

• 31 Stitched DEMs– 27 at 10 meters– 4 at 30 meters

Settlement Patterns

Settlement Patterns

Dendritic/Fan-Shaped

Linear Shaped

Settlement Patterns

Settlement PatternsProximity of Homes to Rivers:

#Homes 0-250 ft. 250-500 ft.

500-750 ft.

750-1,000 ft.

1,000+ ft.

Corbin 9 5 0 1 1 2

Nicholson 29 24 4 1 0 0

Weakley 20 5 9 5 1 0

Totals(%)

58(100%)

34(59%)

13(22%)

7(12%)

2(3%)

2(3%)

-- Average distances:* • Corbin = 527 ft.• Nicholson = 186 ft.• Weakley = 507 ft. • Total = 350 ft.* 1/16th of a mile = 330 ft.

Spatial Relationships to Schools

• Low educational attainment despite the number of schools present in hollows– Intermittent school

terms– Children kept at

home to do chores– Location!

The Hull School in the 1930s

Location of Schools

Travel Distances to Schools

• Transportation routes to two different schools:– “A” = ~1.8 miles– “B” = ~1.5 miles– “C” = ~1.7 miles

• Topography determined distances to school

• Educational attainment?

Land-Use Activities

• Agriculture• Orcharding• Pasture

Land-Use Activities

Land-Use Activities

3 acres27 rows266 trees

2 acres14 rows166 trees

1 acre7 rows68 trees

Land-Use ActivitiesLand-Use Activities

Land-Use Activities

Pasture

Agriculture

Orchards

Conclusions

• Interpreting cultural landscapes that park officials until the 1990s neglected to acknowledge

• Used GIS to re-create the mountain hollows• Compared this cultural landscape to patterns

of the new resettlement communities

“…within another decade a new era will have begun

in these mountains and the day of the Blue Ridge

mountaineer will have passed.”

--Margaret Hitch, 1931