Every noun holds a potential avenue for investigation with each noun connecting to other nouns in a web or a word cloud. Reconstructing history is like a game of deductive reasoning via such noun webs. Each noun, sometimes proper, takes you to a new set of facts. And from there, all knowledge is assembled under each noun, like the heading of a chapter. Each chapter contains new nouns that radiate in different directions. Some nouns define space (a name, a place – assigning specificity and location) and other times they are indicator of time (a day, month, or year) Each noun presents a face value clue and then ancillary hints. Once nouns reveal everything they can and all secondary and tertiary nouns are exhausted, you can assemble the sequence of events to build a timeline. Frequently, there are gaps in the puzzle, some of which may be filled in by aligning the parts in a fashion similar to a logic puzzle.
For example:
beginning with a primary search of a single noun:
Tate Mountain Estates
led to the following nouns to search with:
Jasper, Georgia
Colonel Sam Tate
1930
Professor E.C. Perrow
Searching online, within books and newspapers for the above nouns lead to these nouns:
Camp Tate
Camp 1449/P-77
Appalachian Trail
Mt. Oglethorpe
Abandoned Dude Ranch
Charles Whittington
And thus pieces come together as:
Professor E.C. Perrow was listed on a 1933 report as being the camp superintendent of CCC / Camp 1449.
A newspaper article from 1934 says that men moved from Camp 1449 near Tate to a Butler County in 1934.
An article from Charles Faircloth says the men from Camp 1449/P-77 came from Fort Benning in 1933.
An excerpt from a Georgia Forestry book mentions that the camp was in Pickens County.
The Southern Guide to the Appalachians mention that the CCC camp site was located about six miles from Tate and that it was the site of a Dude Ranch. – measuring distances from Tate on Highway 53.
An article from a journalist in 1931 says the Dude Ranch was located at 1800 feet elevation.
The Tate Mountain Estates pamphlet from 1930 mentions a Dude Ranch being owned by Col. Sam Tate.
The P in P77 indicates that the camp was on private land.
A newspaper article mentions that the CCC camp was located on the former property of Charles H. Whittington.
A newspaper from Butler County mentions that the men were taught by a Harvard graduate
Roads and home sites are shown on the 1926, 1928, 1940, 1950 topographic and census maps.
From these facts you can deduce Professor Perrow was in charge of the camp and it was located within Tate Mountain Estates about one mile north from the Champion house (located on what is now Bent Tree Dr.) There are only so many places one mile from the Champion House around 1800 feet elevation that follow the path of old roads.
Running down the Professor Perrow path you find out that he was Colonel Tate’s private surveyor and the surveyor Pickens County. You discover he hand drew a map that matched the approximate location of the Dude Ranch on the Southern Guide to the Appalachians. You find that he was fluent in several languages and graduated from Harvard University.
Researching the CCC you learn that forestry camps built roads, fire brakes and firetowers. Each camp had over 100 men. Each camp offered recreation and educational classes on a multitude of subjects like math, foreign languages, forestry work, road grading and building, fire suppression techniques, mechanical engineering. From this (and the hint from the newspaper from Butler County) you deduce that Professor Perrow was the educational facilitator.
You realize that the camp was in Pickens County long enough (one year) to allow the men time to build roads and fire brakes up to Mt. Oglethorpe from Tate and Tate Mountain Estates needed roads for people to travel on and a reason to visit.
From Professor Perrow’s connections to Colonel Sam Tate you learn that Col. Tate bought 10,000 acres of land in 1929 to build his Tate Mountain Estates. You deduce that Colonel Sam Tate used the CCC men that he housed on his private land for a year to help construct the beginning of the Appalachian Trail atop Mt. Oglethorpe as a way to draw interest to his new land development project.
Facts are like pieces of filament with each strand intricately linked to another, moving in all directions, but connected to various centers, like a cluster of spider webs in an abandoned house. Each new fact only contains so many subsets of facts. But with enough assembled strands the web fleshes itself out. Every assembled fact pulls you just a little closer to the edge of the unknown - which is really all we can ever hope to know.
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