The Natchez Trace Parkway is a limited-access national parkway in the

Southeastern United States The Southeastern United States, also known as the American Southeast or simply the Southeast, is a geographical List of regions in the United States, region of the United States located in the eastern portion of the Southern United States and t ...

that commemorates the historic

Natchez Trace The Natchez Trace, also known as the Old Natchez Trace, is a historic forest trail within the United States which extends roughly from Nashville, Tennessee, to Natchez, Mississippi, linking the Cumberland River, Cumberland, Tennessee River, ...

and preserves sections of that original trail. Its central feature is a two-lane road that extends 444 miles (715 km) from

Natchez, Mississippi Natchez ( ) is the only city in and the county seat of Adams County, Mississippi, United States. The population was 14,520 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. Located on the Mississippi River across from Vidalia, Louisiana, Natchez was ...

, to

Nashville, Tennessee Nashville, often known as Music City, is the capital and List of municipalities in Tennessee, most populous city in the U.S. state of Tennessee. It is the county seat, seat of Davidson County, Tennessee, Davidson County in Middle Tennessee, locat ...

. Access to the

parkway A parkway is a landscaped thoroughfare. The term is particularly used for a roadway in a park or connecting to a park from which trucks and other heavy vehicles are excluded. Over the years, many different types of roads have been labeled p ...

is limited, with more than 50 access points in

Mississippi Mississippi ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Deep South regions of the United States. It borders Tennessee to the north, Alabama to the east, the Gulf of Mexico to the south, Louisiana to the s ...

Alabama Alabama ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Deep South, Deep Southern regions of the United States. It borders Tennessee to the north, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gu ...

, and

Tennessee Tennessee (, ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders Kentucky to the north, Virginia to the northeast, North Carolina t ...

. The southern end of the route is in Natchez at its intersection with Liberty Road, and the northern end is northeast of Fairview, Tennessee, in the

suburban A suburb (more broadly suburban area) is an area within a metropolitan area. They are oftentimes where most of a metropolitan areas jobs are located with some being predominantly residential. They can either be denser or less densely populated ...

community of Pasquo, at an intersection with

Tennessee State Route 100 State Route 100 (SR 100) is a west–east state highway in both West Tennessee and Middle Tennessee that connects Whiteville with Nashville. It is long. Route description Hardeman County SR 100 begins as a primary highway in West ...

. In addition to Natchez and Nashville, larger cities along the route include Jackson and Tupelo, Mississippi, and

Florence, Alabama Florence is a city in, and the county seat of, Lauderdale County, Alabama, Lauderdale County, Alabama, United States, in the state's northwestern corner, and had a population of 40,184 in the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. Florence is l ...

.''The National Parks: Index 2001-2003''. Washington: U.S. Department of the InteriorNational Park Service
Natchez Trace Parkway Fact Sheet
February 25, 2010

Maintenance

The road is maintained by the

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an List of federal agencies in the United States, agency of the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government, within the US Department of the Interior. The service manages all List ...

and has been designated an All-American Road. Commercial traffic is prohibited along the entire route, and the speed limit is , except north of Leiper's Fork, Tennessee, and Ridgeland, Mississippi, where the speed limit is reduced to . The total area of the parkway is , of which are federal and are not. Unlike the older

Blue Ridge Parkway The Blue Ridge Parkway is a National Parkway and National Scenic Byway, All-American Road in the United States, noted for its scenic beauty. The parkway, which is the longest linear park in the U.S., runs for through 29 counties in Virginia and ...

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States between the East Coast of the United States ...

and

North Carolina North Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, South Carolina to the south, Georgia (U.S. stat ...

, the Natchez Trace Parkway does feature direct interchanges with

Interstate Highway The Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways, commonly known as the Interstate Highway System, or the Eisenhower Interstate System, is a network of controlled-access highways that forms part of the National Hi ...

s. The parkway is headquartered in Tupelo and has nine district offices: Leipers Fork, Meriwether Lewis, Cherokee, Tupelo, Dancy, Kosciusko, Ridgeland, Port Gibson, and Natchez. The parkway also manages two battlefields: Brices Cross Roads National Battlefield Site and Tupelo National Battlefield.

History

Footpath

The gentle sloping and curving alignment of the current route closely follows the original foot passage. Its design harkens back to the way the original interweaving trails aligned as an ancient salt lick-to-grazing pasture migratory route of the American

bison A bison (: bison) is a large bovine in the genus ''Bison'' (from Greek, meaning 'wild ox') within the tribe Bovini. Two extant taxon, extant and numerous extinction, extinct species are recognised. Of the two surviving species, the American ...

and other game that moved between grazing the pastures of central and western Mississippi and the salt and other mineral surface deposits of the

Cumberland Plateau The Cumberland Plateau is the southern part of the Appalachian Plateau in the Appalachian Mountains of the United States. It includes much of eastern Kentucky and Tennessee, and portions of northern Alabama and northwest Georgia. The terms " Al ...

. The route generally traverses the tops of the low hills and ridges of the watershed divides from northeast to southwest. Native Americans, following the "traces" of bison and other game, further improved this walking trail for foot-borne commerce between major villages located in central Mississippi and middle Tennessee. The route is locally circuitous, but by traversing this route, the bison, and later humans, avoided the endless, energy-taxing climbing and descending of the many hills along the way. Also avoided was the danger to a herd (or groups of human travelers) of being caught ''en masse'' at the bottom of a hollow or valley if attacked by predators. The nature of the route, to this day, affords good all-around visibility for those who travel it. At all times, the road is on the high ground of the ridge dividing the watersheds and provides a view to either see or catch the scent of danger, from a distance great enough to afford the time to flee to safety, if necessary. By the time of European exploration and settlement, the route had become well known and established as the fastest means of communication between the

, the

Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the main stem, primary river of the largest drainage basin in the United States. It is the second-longest river in the United States, behind only the Missouri River, Missouri. From its traditional source of Lake Ita ...

, and the

Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico () is an oceanic basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, mostly surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north, and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United States; on the southw ...

settlements of

Pensacola Pensacola ( ) is a city in the Florida panhandle in the United States. It is the county seat and only city in Escambia County. The population was 54,312 at the 2020 census. It is the principal city of the Pensacola metropolitan area, which ha ...

, Mobile, and

New Orleans New Orleans (commonly known as NOLA or The Big Easy among other nicknames) is a Consolidated city-county, consolidated city-parish located along the Mississippi River in the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 383,997 at the 2020 ...

. In the early post-

American Revolutionary War The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was the armed conflict that comprised the final eight years of the broader American Revolution, in which Am ...

period of America's (south) westward expansion, the trace was the return route for American flat-boat commerce between the territories of the upper and lower

Ohio Ohio ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Erie to the north, Pennsylvania to the east, West Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Indiana to the ...

, and

Cumberland River The Cumberland River is a major waterway of the Southern United States. The U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed June 8, 2011 river drains almost of southern Kentucky and ...

valleys. The Americans constructed flat boats, loaded their commerce therein, and drifted upon those rivers, one-way south-southwestward to New Orleans, Louisiana. They would then sell their goods (including the salvageable logs of the flat boats and including enslaved people), and return home via the trace (for the middle section of their return trip), to as far away as

Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States, and its county seat. It is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, second-most populous city in Pennsylvania (after Philadelphia) and the List of Un ...

, Pennsylvania. Improved communications (steam boats,

stagecoach A stagecoach (also: stage coach, stage, road coach, ) is a four-wheeled public transport coach used to carry paying passengers and light packages on journeys long enough to need a change of horses. It is strongly sprung and generally drawn by ...

lines, and

railroads Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport using wheeled vehicles running in tracks, which usually consist of two parallel steel rails. Rail transport is one of the two primary means of land transport, next to road ...

) and the development of ports along the rivers named above (e.g., Natchez;

Memphis, Tennessee Memphis is a city in Shelby County, Tennessee, United States, and its county seat. Situated along the Mississippi River, it had a population of 633,104 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the List of municipalities in Tenne ...

;

Paducah, Kentucky Paducah ( ) is a List of cities in Kentucky, home rule-class city in the Upland South, and the county seat of McCracken County, Kentucky, United States. The most populous city in the Jackson Purchase region, it is located in the Southeastern Unit ...

;

; and

Louisville, Kentucky Louisville is the List of cities in Kentucky, most populous city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky, sixth-most populous city in the Southeastern United States, Southeast, and the list of United States cities by population, 27th-most-populous city ...

) made the route obsolete as a means of passenger and freight commerce. As a result, no major population centers developed along the trace, because of its alignment, between its termini in Nashville and Natchez. The two cities of note, near or on the trace's alignment (Jackson and Tupelo, Mississippi), developed only as a result of their alignment along axes of communication different from the trace. Thus, the trace and its alignment are today almost entirely undeveloped and unspoiled along its whole route. Many sections of the original footpath are visible today for observing and hiking the parkway's right-of-way. The Natchez Trace National Scenic Trail includes five sections of hiking and horse-riding trails.

Civilian Conservation Corps

Construction of the parkway was begun by the federal government in the 1930s, one of the many projects of the

Civilian Conservation Corps The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was a voluntary government unemployment, work relief program that ran from 1933 to 1942 in the United States for unemployed, unmarried men ages 18–25 and eventually expanded to ages 17–28. The CCC was ...

during the

Great Depression The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...

. The road was the proposal of U.S. Congressman T. Jeff Busby of Mississippi, who proposed it as a way to give tribute to the original Natchez Trace. Inspired by the proposal, the

Daughters of the American Revolution The National Society Daughters of the American Revolution (often abbreviated as DAR or NSDAR) is a lineage-based membership service organization for women who are directly descended from a patriot of the American Revolutionary War. A non-p ...

began planting markers and monuments along the trace. In 1934, the

Franklin Delano Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt (January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), also known as FDR, was the 32nd president of the United States, serving from 1933 until his death in 1945. He is the longest-serving U.S. president, and the only one to have served ...

administration ordered a survey. President Roosevelt signed the legislation to create the parkway on May 18, 1938. Construction on the Parkway began in 1939, and the route was to be overseen by the National Park Service. Its length includes more than 45,000 acres (182 km²) and the towering Natchez Trace Parkway Bridge in Williamson County, Tennessee, completed in 1994 and one of only two post-tensioned, segmental concrete-arch bridges in the world. The Emergency Appropriations Act of June 19, 1934, allocated initial construction funds and established it as a parkway under National Park Service by the act of May 18, 1938.

Gaps and completion

Natchez Trace Parkway seen from Twentymile Bottom Overlook

For many years in the later 20th century, most of the trace had been complete, but owing to a lack of funds, two gaps remained, both in Mississippi. One was a several-mile-long bypass of Jackson, between

Interstate 55 Interstate 55 (I-55) is a major Interstate Highway in the central United States. As with most primary Interstates that end in a five, it is a major cross-country, north–south route, connecting the Gulf of Mexico to the Great Lakes. The ...

at Ridgeland and Interstate 20 at Clinton. The other was between Liberty Road in the city of Natchez and U.S. Highway 61 near Washington. These final two segments were finally completed and opened on May 21, 2005. In 2013, a new law required the National Park Service (NPS) to convey about 67 acres of property in the Natchez Trace Parkway to the State of Mississippi. It also adjusted the boundaries of the parkway to include 10 additional acres. The two pieces of land in question originally belonged to Mississippi and were donated to the NPS when it was trying to determine where to end the Natchez Trace Parkway.

Historical sites

Numerous historical sites on the Parkway include the Meriwether Lewis Museum, the refurbished Mount Locust stand
Historic French Camp, MS
and the Mississippi Craft Center in Ridgeland, Mississippi, which focuses on promoting Mississippi's native art. Between the Parkway and Old Port Gibson Road is the ghost town of Rocky Springs that thrived in the late 19th century. The old Rocky Springs Methodist Church, the cemetery, and several building sites still exist and are accessible from the parkway. Cypress Swamp is located at mile post 122. Also, several cascading waterfalls can be viewed; for access, some require a bit of hiking from the parkway. Besides, parts of the original trail are still accessible. The history of the Natchez Trace, including the parkway, is summarized at the Natchez Trace Visitor Center in Tupelo. Emerald Mound, the second-largest Native American ceremonial mound in the United States, is located just west of the trace and north of Highway 61 near Natchez. It offers a unique look at the ingenuity and industry of native culture. Two smaller mounds rise from the top of the main mound and rise above treetops, offering a wide view. Travelers can reach Emerald Mound with a five-minute detour from the main trace highway. Emerald Mound measures by at the base and is in height. The mound was built by depositing earth along the sides of a natural hill, thus reshaping it and creating an enormous artificial plateau. The Ackia Battleground National Monument (established August 27, 1935, and now called Chickasaw Village) and Meriwether Lewis Park (proclaimed as Meriwether Lewis National Monument February 6, 1925, and transferred from the War Department August 10, 1933) were added to the parkway by the act of August 10, 1961.

Parkway highlights

Highlights include:

Natchez to Jackson

*Milepost 10.3 Emerald Mound *15.5 Mount Locust *41.5 Sunken Trace *54.8 Abandoned Town of Rocky Springs

Jackson to Tupelo

*Milepost 105.6 Ross Barnett Reservoir Overlook *107.9 West Florida Boundary *122.0 Cypress Swamp *203.5 Historic settlement of Pigeon Roost *232.4 Bynum Mounds *261.8 Chickasaw Village Site

Tupelo to Tennessee state line

*Milepost 266 Natchez Trace Parkway Visitor Center *269.4 Old Trace *286.7 Pharr Mounds *327.3 Colbert Ferry, also site #12 on the North Alabama Birding Trail *330.2 Rock Spring Nature Trail, also site #10 on the North Alabama Birding Trail

Tennessee

*Milepost 385.9

Meriwether Lewis Meriwether Lewis (August 18, 1774 – October 11, 1809) was an American explorer, soldier, politician, and public administrator, best known for his role as the leader of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, also known as the Corps of Discovery, with ...

Monument and Grave Site *391.9 Fall Hallow Trail *401.4 Tobacco Farm and Old Trace Drive *404.7 Trail to Jackson Falls and Baker Bluff Overlook *438 Bridge at Birdsong Hollow

Exit list

Mileage based on physical mileposts along the parkway.

Gallery

File:Natchez Trace Parkway bridge.jpg, Natchez Trace Parkway Bridge over SR 96 in Tennessee File:Biketrip2005 0038a.jpg, Rocky Springs Methodist Church File:biketrip2005 0036a.jpg, Rocky Springs Cemetery File:biketrip2005 0044a.jpg, Cypress Swamp File:biketrip2005 0070.jpg, Scenic waterfall File:Meriwether Lewis National Monument and Gravesite.jpg,

National Monument and gravesite at Grinder's Stand File:Mount Locust 537.jpg, Mount Locust

References

External links

* * * *

Federal Highway Administration The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) is a division of the United States Department of Transportation that specializes in highway transportation. The agency's major activities are grouped into two programs, the Federal-aid Highway Program a ...