Photos of Tallulah Gorge in Habersham County Old Easy
Tallulah Falls history powered by dams, electric generating plants
Editor's note:
This is part one of a two-part story about the beginnings of today's Georgia Power Co. and the company's development of multiple dams, lakes and electric generating plants in Tallulah Gorge as well as above and below the gorge.
Tallulah Gorge and the town of Tallulah Falls, were probably the most profoundly affected areas along the Tallulah River that now are Georgia Power Co.'s North Georgia Hydro Group.
This relatively brief history is part of the celebration of Habersham County's Bicentennial which climaxes December 15, 2018. It is also a part of Tallulah Falls' Founder's Day celebration being held October 6.
By Donald Fraser
For the Habersham County Bicentennial Committee
For a small town Tallulah Falls has a big history, in large part due to present day Georgia Power Company's construction of Tallulah River dams and hydropower electric generating plants upstream and downstream of Tallulah Gorge.
In the beginning
Tallulah Falls, with Tallulah Gorge and its series of roaring waterfalls making it "the Niagara of the South," saw scant attention even up to the 1840s and 1850s. The mountains of northeast Georgia and its rough terrain made accessibility to the area difficult. According to "Images of America Tallulah Falls," by Margaret Calhoon and Lynn Speno the "…1820 census showed only 3,600 people living in all of Rabun and Habersham" counties.
Some seasonal tourists, during the 1840s and 1850s, including wealthy plantation owners and businessmen, had their summer homes in towns such as Clarkesville, visited the natural wonder that was the gorge.
It was construction of the Tallulah Falls Railroad in the 1880s from Cornelia, to points north, including Tallulah Falls, which caused a rush of hotel construction to accommodate tourists eager to visit the gorge, as well as businesses supporting the tourism boom.
Structure fires were a constant problem, with the wooden tourist hotels frequently burning, but they were rebuilt, bigger and better than ever, to meet the needs of the massive tourist trade. That came to an end in 1921.
While Tallulah Falls was having its heyday as a tourist attraction, the 1911 creation of Georgia Railway and Power Company in Atlanta, a company including Georgia Power, meant future development and construction of dams and powerhouses along the Tallulah River, including within Tallulah Gorge. The hydroelectric development project was the beginning of the end of the tourism boom for Tallulah Falls. The thunderous roar of five major waterfalls such as Hurricane Falls, Ladore Falls and Bridal Veil and a number of water cascades along the two miles of the gorge were virtually silenced when the dam in the upper end of the gorge was completed and Tallulah Lake began to fill.
It is notable that the hydro project did not receive universal acclaim. Gainesville's Helen Dortches Longstreet, widow of Confederate Army General James Longstreet,led opposition to the work in the gorge. According to the "About North Georgia" internet site, "…in what was one of the largest environmental battle [sic] to date in the United States, Ms. Longstreet used her name and money in an attempt to fend off the power barons of the state and nearly won. At a time when women were not allowed to vote in the state (or nationally), Longstreet waged a highly regarded effort invoking the will of the people, repeatedly pointing to the sweetheart deals some of the pols had cut themselves and conflicts of interest. Many of the tactics she employed would re-surface 60 years hence in the pitched environmental battles of the 1970s and early '80s."
Demand for electricity
In the late 1800s and early 1900s electricity was a relatively new invention, one which was facing increasingly popular demand, especially in metropolitan areas. The city of Atlanta was among the first southeastern cities to acquire electric lights, according to "Brightening Peoples' Lives for More Than 100 Years," a history of Georgia Power Company, published by the company in 1998."In 1890, an Atlanta banker named Henry Atkinson begins pulling together the foundation of what is to become Georgia Power Company," the book relates, by becoming a shareholder in the new Georgia Electric Light Company of Atlanta, then controlling the company by 1891.
Streetcars, at that time pulled along tracks by mules and horses, were a downtown form of transportation and soon became powered by electricity. Atkinson formed the Georgia Railway and Electric Company in 1902 to consolidate the electricity production and distribution business with the streetcar business he had been amassing.
The combination of businesses had then company president Preston S. Arkwright seeking new electric power sources to be used with an 11,000-kilowatt coal-fired plant on Davis Street in Atlanta. The company first bought power from, then in 1912, purchased the S. Morgan Smith hydroelectric plant at Morgan Falls, on the Chattahoochee River. It had a capacity of 17,000 kilowatts. It should be noted that many Georgia Railway and Electric Company employees installing electric power to homes drove electric powered vehicles.
According to "Brightening Peoples' Lives for More Than 100 Years," in 1910 a company named Blue Ridge Electric Company was scouting the Tallulah Gorge as a possible dam site for a power plant. In 1911, according to the company history, Georgia Railway and Electric merged with Atlanta Water and Electric Power, as well as with "a small firm named Georgia Power," creating Georgia Railway and Power Company. In 1911 construction began on the Tallulah Falls dam, as well as a powerhouse and switch house.
An engineering marvel
The April 14, 1914 edition of "Engineering News," an industrial trade journal, had an article written by J. B. Weir Jr., the engineer in charge of the Penstock and Power House Division during Tallulah Falls dam and powerhouse construction.
Weir's article described the difficulties facing engineers and construction workers on the project.
Tallulah Gorge, Weir wrote, was "…a miniature reproduction of the Grand Cañon of the Colorado –a gorge two miles long and from 100 to 800 ft. deep, carved out of stratified rock." Broadly the work was "…briefly [to construct] a dam at the head of the gorge, a tunnel to carry water around the edge [of the gorge] to the lower end where it discharges into a surge tank from which five 5-ft. steel penstocks lead down the facing cliff with varying grades up to as high as 150 [percent], and at the foot of the cliff the powerhouse where each penstock supplies an individual turbine, discharging back into the river bed."
The enormity of the project meant supplying construction equipment power to many work areas scattered along the gorge. The decision was made to use compressed air using the energy of one of the existing waterfalls. "Water was carried from a temporary dam down a 71/2 ft. penstock to a turbine driving two 2,000 cu. ft. compressors; a 3-ft. penstock also led to a turbine which drove two 50-kW [kilowatt] generators for lighting the tunnel. A 10-in. trunk air line with takeoff feeders was run to all parts of the job."
Weir also noted a "concrete bridge, supported on piers above the dam and taking the place of the old county-road bridge had to be completed before the pond [Tallulah Lake] was filled." He also noted the new lake "…over topped the bridge of the Tallulah Falls RR about 1 ½ miles above the dam and a new high-level span had to be built." [While the Tallulah Falls Railroad ceased operation in March 1961, the piers constructed at that time for the railroad bridge can still be seen off Terrora Circle, north of Tallulah Falls.]
Naturally, building in a rocky gorge presented problems including "…the only really serious difficulty met with was the fact that it was impossible to keep stone from rolling from the penstock runs down upon the powerhouse site. Regardless of how careful they may be, frequently stones from 8-y[ar]d size down, would get loose at the top and with a start of 1,000 ft, or more down a 100 % grade, would play havoc with the work and equipment lower down," Weir wrote.
The penstocks which transported Tallulah Lake water from the 6,666-foot tunnel also presented challenges. Derricks were used to transport concrete a maximum distance of 700 feet from the inclined railway to each anchor block site. Because of the distance transported, the concrete often had to be remixed to because of separation of the aggregate and grout mixture. The penstocks were mounted on top of the concrete blocks, starting at the bottom of the gorge. The enormous pipes came in 32-foot lengths, according to Weir, and attached with a "double row of rivets."
"On account of the steepness of the grades on which the pipe was placed in some places, some difficulties was [sic] experienced in holding the sections together until they had been riveted and concreted in place. As there was an expansion joint in the pipes at each change of grade [and with a concrete block at each change of grade] just below the anchor blocks, it was absolutely necessary to concrete the blocks around the pipes before many sections of pipe could be placed above them, or else the weight of the pipe itself would cause it to slide down the hill."
Putting pipe sections together was brutal work because of summer sun bearing down on the pipe, making "… the inside of the pipes almost unbearably hot. This was especially troublesome as the completed length of penstock became longer and acted more and more like a tall chimney. The rising air left the upper end at a temperature of about 140 [degrees] and blowing a fair rate of speed."
The solution became placing pipe by day "…and joints left ready for final riveting at night."
Tallulah Falls work included two buildings, "a powerhouse approximately 50 by 200 ft. and just behind it a transformer and switch house 50 x 250." Difficulties with constructing the two buildings included creating a sufficiently flat building site. "The difficulty was overcome to some degree by encroaching on the river bed in a comparatively wide place at the upstream end of the site, just enough to get a footing and then banking the stone up against the hillside," Weir wrote.
"One of the great troubles encountered was the record high waters which came during construction. On account of the narrowness of the gorge, the waters rose rapidly and traveled at a tremendous rate. Their carrying power was almost beyond belief –they easily swept 4- and 5 [yard] stones down the river bed. The destruction of coffer dams was a source of many delay," Weir wrote.
Tallulah Falls history powered by dams, electric generating plants
Editor's note:
This is part two of a two-part story about the beginnings of today's Georgia Power Co. and the company's development of multiple dams, lakes and electric generating plants in Tallulah Gorge as well as above and below the gorge. Tallulah Gorge and the town of Tallulah Falls, were probably the most profoundly affected areas along the Tallulah River that now are Georgia Power Co.'s North Georgia Hydro Group. This relatively brief history is part of the celebration of Habersham County's Bicentennial which climaxes December 15, 2018. It is also a part of Tallulah Falls' Founder's Day celebration being held October 6. Part one provided a brief history of Tallulah Falls and its popularity in the late 1800s and early 1900s as a tourism destination because of Tallulah Gorge being "the Niagara of the south." Plans to construct a series of electric power generation plants along the Tallulah River, including within the gorge itself, meant the inevitable end to the thunderous roar of five major waterfalls such as Hurricane Falls, Ladore Falls and Bridal Veil and a number of water cascades along the two miles of the gorge. Part one also described the burgeoning need for electric power in Atlanta, especially for the city's streetcars. Included was a description of the construction of Tallulah Dam and Tallulah Falls Power Plant.
By Donald Fraser
For the Habersham County Bicentennial Committee
For a small town Tallulah Falls has a big history, in large part due to present day Georgia Power Company's construction of Tallulah River dams and hydropower electric generating plants upstream and downstream of Tallulah Gorge.
The North Georgia Hydro Group
According to "Tallulah River 1911-1927," in the January 23, 1997 issue of Rabun County Remembrance in The Clayton Tribune, the Tallulah Falls dam, 126 foot high by 426 foot long, and its power plant were the first of six hydroelectric projects constructed over a 17 year time frame. The tunnel delivering water from Tallulah Lake to the plant at the bottom of the gorge is 11 feet wide at the base, 14 feet high and 6,666 feet long. The penstocks which receive the water from the tunnel, and deliver it to the powerhouse turbines have a fall of 600 feet. The plant originally had five 12,000 kilowatt generating units, with a sixth added in 1919.
The second plant constructed was the Tugalo plant, built at the confluence of the Tallulah and Chattooga rivers. Work started in 1917, but stopped during World War I. Work resumed in 1922. The dam is 155 feet high and 940 feet long. The plant's four generating units went on-line in 1923-24.
In 1923 work started on the Terrora plant in Rabun County and the Yonah plant downstream in Stephens County. [The Mathis Dam, which impounds Lake Rabun, was constructed in 1914-15.] Initial plans called for the Terrora Plant to be built at Mathis Dam, but instead the plant was built at the head of Tallulah Lake, with water to push the turbines delivered through a tunnel, similar to the Tallulah Falls project. The Terrora plant has two 8,ooo kilowatt generating units, with operation beginning in 1925. The Yonah plant was completed in 1925 and it has three, 7,500 kilowatt generating units.
The Burton Dam was completed in 1919 and while planning for the work was on the drawing boards in 1917, World War I also stalled this project. Originally the Lake Burton dam and lake was to be a water storage and regulating facility for the downstream lakes and power plants, but a powerhouse was built below the dam between 1926-27. Burton is the biggest of the North Hydro Group's dams, at 128 feet in height and 1,100 feet long. The town of Burton, on the banks of the Tallulah River and one of Rabun County's most prosperous towns had to be abandoned for the project.
The former LaPrade's Camp, off Highway 197 north at Wildcat Creek on the west side of Lake Burton, was originally a camp for men working on the Burton lake and dam. While no longer operating as a fish camp, there remains a few of the small cabins used in the 1910s by construction workers.
The Nacoochee Plant and dam, built between Burton and Mathis, was the last to be constructed. The dam impounds Lake Seed. The power plant has two 2,400 kilowatt generating units.
Tallulah Falls today
For quite a while after the tourism boom, Tallulah Falls was the image of a sleepy village. One event producing a temporary surge in notoriety occurred in July 1970, when Karl Wallenda walked across a 750 foot span of the gorge on a 2-inch diameter wire. Guy wire anchors at the bottom of the gorge and steel towers on both rims of the gorge are reminders of the feat.
Wallenda followed in the footsteps, so to speak, of J.A. St. John, "Professor Leon, who in July 1886 walked a 1,440 foot rope strung across the gorge.
Tallulah Falls School, the "Light of the Mountains," has been an unwavering presence in Tallulah Falls since 1909, when the first structures at the school were completed. In its early days as an industrial school, students were taught, in addition to standard fare such as literature and mathematics, such important crafts as weaving, sewing and basketry for the girls and gardening, woodworking and stone masonry for the boys.
TFS has vastly expanded and today its graduating students are invariably college bound.
Today Tallulah Gorge is celebrated through the 2,739 acre Tallulah Gorge State Park, which was developed, and is managed in tandem by Georgia state government and Georgia Power Co. There is a campground and the Jane Hurt Yarn Visitor Center, as well as hiking trails along the gorge rim. There is now a stairway to more easily access the gorge floor, but day permits are required.
People can be reminded of the former glory of the wild water flow through the gorge during scheduled water releases in spring and fall. Aesthetic and white water kayaking water releases are held in April and May, then September and October.
SOURCES: "Images of America Tallulah Falls" by Margaret Calhoon and Lynn Speno; "Brightening Peoples' Lives For More Than 100 Years, Georgia Power Company, A History in Pictures;" Rabun County Remembrance, "Tallulah River 1911-1927," January 23, 1997, The Clayton Tribune; "The electric generation, North Georgia Dams still play a key role," July 16, 1998, The Clayton Tribune; Engineering News, "Construction Difficulties of the Power Development at Tallulah Falls, GA., April 16, 1914; "About North Georgia" internet site; A student thesis "The Northeast Georgia Hydroelectric Plants" by Nancy Elizabeth Kelly, The University of Georgia.
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Source: http://habersham200.com/georgia-power-history/
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