History of Pigeon Forge

Considering the history of Pigeon Forge, it’s highly appropriate that one of the first businesses in this East Tennessee town was a furnace and iron forge. Appropriate because of the burning desire of hardworking visionaries who forged a town from what once was wilderness. When the pieces of the Pigeon Forge history puzzle are put together, the picture is one of a highly successful business community that that city patriots could never have imagined.

The land that is now Pigeon Forge and the surrouding area once was used as hunting grounds by the Cherokee and other eastern tribes of American Indians. A treaty signed in the late 1700s opened the fertile valley for settlement.

In 1820, Isaac Love established a furnace and iron forge, the community’s first business. The name Pigeon Forge is a combination of the iron works and the Little Pigeon River that flows through the town.

In the 1700s and early 1800s the river’s banks were lined with beech trees. Beechnuts were a mainstay in the diet of Passenger Pigeons, which made the river a natural stopping point for huge flocks of the now-extinct species.

As late as 1907, population records show Pigeon Forge with a mere 154 residents. However, the lure of the Smoky Mountains proved to be a siren’s song.

By the 1930s, visitors began to trickle into town, even though the only places one could stay as guests were private homes. The iron forge was still in operation and farming was the area’s primary business.

In 1946, a landmark sale of the first parcel of property smaller than a farm was negotiated. It was during that time that the main road through town, which ran along the river, became the hub of the community, complete with two general stores and two churches.

As growing pains set in, the town voted for incorporation in 1961. In the early 1980s, with a firmly established city government and a new Department of Tourism, Pigeon Forge began to make its voice heard in an expanding tourism market.

New business, primarily related to tourism, was recruited to the area. Newly created jobs brought an increase in the permanent population. As of June 1997, the most recent census indicated 3,975 permanent residents within the Pigeon Forge city limits.

A little more than a quarter of a century ago, Pigeon Forge was a small, peaceful community where cornfields were interrupted only by the occasional business venture and two traffic lights along Highway 441. That once two-lane, black-topped highway is now six lanes wide and known as the Parkway.

A major turning point in the city’s quest for a flourishing tourism industry occurred in 1986 when Dolly Parton applied her name, energy and talents to Dollywood, a theme park on the sits of the former Silver Dollar City. The facility was an immediate hit with visitors and continues to expand annually with an eye to entertainment for all ages.

Accommodations have undergone a startling change in Pigeon Forge. From a rather primitive row of stone cabins along the riverbanks in the early 1930s, the hotel and motel rooms numbered nearly 7,750 in mid-1999. There are more than 600 cottages, condos, cabins and villas. Fourteen campgrounds are equipped with features such as laundry rooms, swimming pools and arcades.

Fast food to family style to upscale dining are included in the mix of restaurants in Pigeon Forge. Locally owned and operated restaurants, regional chains and themed restaurants make up the choices available to hungry travelers.

Entertainment is a mushrooming industry in Pigeon Forge. A dozen theaters offer a variety of performances, all delivering family-style entertainment.

Complementing the entertainment of the theaters are more than 50 family attractions, more than 200 stores in the city’s six outlet malls and more than 140 craft, gift and specialty shops.

Just as Pigeon Forge today stands proudly on its legendary history, it also looks forward to the unfolding of its future as a lively, constantly growing tourism mecca for as long as the Smokies entice visitors to the natural beauty found in their peaks and valleys.