Mountain lakes, by virtue of their terrain and formation backgrounds, are often home to both fun and quirky history.
Beneath glistening, glassy surfaces, stories and legends unfold of lost relics, graveyards and secrets. Here we go into the depths—and on the surfaces—of four lakes in the mountains of Virginia, Tennessee and the Carolinas.
SOUTH CAROLINA: Lake Jocassee
Brooks Wade skims the surface of Lake Jocassee in the mountains of Oconee County, South Carolina, stopping at waterfalls and pointing out beautiful vistas, where green mountains melt into bluish-green water.
And then comes “Deliverance.”
Wade and his wife, Kay, like to spin stories of that eerie and controversial movie, made in 1972 as the lake was being made—with bodies exhumed from graves and buildings torn down.
“The history stands alone,” Brooks Wade says. “But I think it’s not just the history but the awesome physical beauty of the place.”
The Wades operate Jocassee Lake Tours (864-280-5501), launching at the Devils Fork State Park, which, according to Kay Wade, takes its name from how creeks come together in the shape of a pitchfork.
Besides “Deliverance,” the Wades also share the story of Attakulla Lodge—a 19th-century structure still standing, about 300 feet below the surface. “It’s the only significant structure at the bottom of the lake,” says Brooks Wade.
Kay Wade delivers her “Deliverance” goods with gusto, reeling how you can see graves moved in the movie, as well as how the construction of the lake in 1972 was captured on film.
“I seriously tell people more than they ever want to know,” Kay Wade says with a laugh. “When we go out, we normally just kind of go to a mid-lake rundown of what people are looking at, and I point out the quarry that was shown in the first few minutes of ‘Deliverance,’ being blown up, and look at that buoy that marks the diving spot for the old cemetery.”
That old Mount Carmel Baptist Church Cemetery is now a favorite spot for divers to go down below the surface—and look at gravestones, still in place.
“And there’s a scene at the end of the movie that one of the guys goes back to get the car that they left and he peers through some shrubbery—and there’s a scene of the men exhuming the graves,” Kay Wade says. “I don’t think that was staged.”
Hearing about that movie is a point where folks aboard the couple’s pontoon boat tend to drop their jaws, Kay Wade says. “Everybody has seen that movie. And that’s a conversation that really goes on for a while.”
TENNESSEE: South Holston Lake
Alan Linkous often tells the tale of five-foot-long catfish when asked what lies below the surface of South Holston Lake near Bristol, Tennessee.
For sure, Linkous has experience with big cats below South Holston’s surface, as he’s now been diving for half a century into this lake, built by the Tennessee Valley Authority during the late 1940s and completed in 1950.
“They actually get spooked. They’re like deer when you spotlight ‘em,” Linkous says. “They just lay there. You can get inches from their face. You get a bright light in front of their face. And if you tap one of them, they’ll come forward and just about knock your mask off your face.”
As the owner of Adventure Diving (423-878-3483), Linkous has recovered bodies for the sheriff’s office in Sullivan County, Tennessee, sometimes in as little as 13 minutes.
He’s also reached into the depths to find a sunken schoolbus with round port holes, seen back when the lake was drawn down considerably lower than usual during the late 1970s.
Curiously, too, the 69-year-old Linkous answers questions about the lost graves and vampires on the lake—but what is actually a plot in a novel called “Dawn of the Vampire” by William Hill.
But that novel was accurate in its history, according to Linkous.
“Graves were moved at an underwater hill,” he says. “And I’ve seen the little dimples where the graves were dug up.”
VIRGINIA: Smith Mountain Lake
On board the Virginia Dare on the surface of Smith Mountain Lake, Captain Gary Fisher laughs as lunch is served on an October day.
“People enjoy the food,” says Fisher. “And they enjoy the narration—what the boat is all about and what the lake is all about.”
Offering 525 miles of shoreline, Smith Mountain Lake touches into three Virginia counties: Franklin, Bedford and Pittsylvania. A stop on the lake cruise, Smith Mountain Dam, was completed in 1963.
Efforts had begun as early as the 1920s to dam the Roanoke River at Smith Mountain, but construction did not begin until 1960. Full pond was reached in 1966, and the lake area has, over the years since, built its identity as a mountain playground and residential destination.
Today, the lake has become a popular place for boating and fishing plus thousands of both full-time and part-time residents along its shoreline.
The Virginia Dare (540-297-7100) is a paddle-wheeler that spans 63 feet and was constructed about 30 years ago in LaCrosse, Wisconsin. The cruising vessel was shipped on the Tennessee River system, according to Fisher, but was then disassembled and sent by truck to a marina, where it was rebuilt and launched on this lake.
“It’s an icon here at the lake,” says Fisher. “It’s the only one of its kind.”
NORTH CAROLINA: Lake James
Brit Josa pays tribute to the lost community beneath the surface of North Carolina’s Lake James when she plans events for the Fonta Flora Brewery (828-475-0153) of Morganton, North Carolina.
“That’s the name of the community at the bottom of the lake,” says Josa, the brewery’s events coordinator. “Fonta Flora was a sharecropping community, and it was essentially flooded to create Lake James.”
Built in the 1920s, the lake spans 6,510 acres in both Burke and McDowell counties and takes its name from tobacco tycoon James Buchanan Duke.
“I really like that it’s just right next to the mountains,” says Josa, “and it’s really beautiful. It’s really clean and clear.”
In turn, the brewery “pays tribute to the surrounding community,” says Josa. “A lot of what we do as a brewery is to use local ingredients in the creation of our beers and tie in to the local community and pay tribute to the past.”
