Joyce Kilmer-Slickrock Wilderness

Infobox_protected_area | name = Joyce Kilmer-Slickrock Wilderness
iucn_category = Ib

---

caption =
locator_x = 214
locator_y = 105
location = North Carolina, USA
Tennessee, USA
nearest_city = Tapoco, North Carolina
lat_degrees = 35
lat_minutes = 22
lat_seconds = 25
lat_direction = N
long_degrees = 83
long_minutes = 58
long_seconds = 32
long_direction = W
area = convert|17394|acre|km2|0|sing=off
established = 1975
visitation_num =
visitation_year =
governing_body = U.S. Forest Service

Joyce Kilmer-Slickrock Wilderness, created in 1975, covers convert|17394|acre|km2|0|sing=off in the Nantahala National Forest in western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee, in the watersheds of the Slickrock and Little Santeetlah Creeks. It is named after Joyce Kilmer, author of "Trees." The Little Santeetlah watershed contains the largest old growth forest in the United States east of the Mississippi River, the Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest.

The Babcock Lumber Company logged roughly two-thirds of the Slickrock Creek watershed before the construction of Calderwood Dam in 1922 flooded the company's railroad access and put an end to logging operations in the area. In the 1930s, the U.S. Veterans of Foreign Wars asked the U.S. Forest Service to create a memorial forest for Kilmer, a poet and journalist who had been killed in World War I. After considering millions of acres of forest land throughout the U.S., the Forest Service chose an undisturbed convert|3800|acre|km2|sing=on patch along Little Santeetlah Creek, which it dedicated as the Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest in 1936. [Alberta Brewer and Carson Brewer, "Valley So Wild" (Knoxville, Tenn.: East Tennessee Historical Society, 1975), 350-351.]

The sources of both Slickrock Creek and Little Santeetlah Creek are located high in the Unicoi Mountains, on opposite slopes of Stratton Bald, a convert|5360|ft|m|sing=on grassy bald overlooking the southwest corner of the Joyce Kilmer-Slickrock Wilderness. Slickrock Creek rises on Stratton's northwestern slope and flows northeastward to its mouth along the Cheoah River. Little Santeetlah rises on Stratton's southeastern slope and flows southeastward to its mouth along Santeetlah Creek. The Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest along Little Santeetlah Creek is a rare example of an old growth cove hardwood forest, an extremely diverse forest type unique to the Appalachian Mountains. Although there are many types of trees in Joyce Kilmer, dominant species include poplar, hemlock, red and white oak, basswood, beech, and sycamore. Many of the trees in Joyce Kilmer are over 400 years old. The largest rise to heights of over convert|100|ft|m and have circumferences of up to convert|20|ft|m. The Slickrock Creek basin is coated primarily by a mature second-growth cove hardwood forest, although a substantial old growth stand still exists in its upper watershed. [United States Forest Service, "Joyce Kilmer-Slickrock Wilderness and Citico Creek Wilderness Map" (information on the reverse), 1996.] [Brewer and Brewer, 290, 350-351.]

The Joyce Kilmer-Slickrock Wilderness borders the Citico Creek Wilderness, which lies within the Cherokee National Forest in Tennessee.

ee also

*List of U.S. Wilderness Areas
*Wilderness Act

References

External links

* [http://www.wilderness.net/index.cfm?fuse=NWPS&sec=wildView&WID=280 Joyce Kilmer-Slickrock Wilderness] , Wilderness.net website
* [http://www.main.nc.us/graham/hiking/joycekil.html Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest] , Graham County, North Carolina
* [http://webcam.srs.fs.fed.us/joyce_kilmer/ Webcam View of Joyce Kilmer - Slickrock Wilderness]