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The wrong gap
For decades the lowest pass was thought to be Indian Gap
Indian Gap Road, an unpaved and arduous trail used by traders, farmers and even the Confederate Army, was completed in 1839. Newfound Gap lay two miles east of it, undiscovered. It was not recognized as the lowest gap until 1872, when Arnold Guyot measured many of the mountains.
The road
A highway over the new gap was completed in 1932
With the park came a highway from Tennessee to North Carolina, completed in 1932. It crossed Newfound Gap and replaced the defunct Indian Gap Road. It now overlaps U.S. Route 441 through the park and ends at the boundaries near Gatlinburg and Cherokee.
The dedication
President Roosevelt dedicated the park here on September 2, 1940
The Rockefeller Memorial stands at the gap, and Franklin D. Roosevelt formally dedicated the park from it on September 2, 1940. Congress had chartered the park in 1934. It was the first national park with land and other costs paid in part with federal funds.
The snow
Five feet of snow closed the road for days in 1993
Newfound Gap has around 19 snowy days a year, and the Tennessee side typically gets heavier snow. The road is treated only with snowplows and a gravel-sand mix, because no chemicals can be used in a national park. After the Great Blizzard of 1993, when five feet of snow fell, it was closed for days.
Day 2, morning
Next is Kuwohi (Clingmans Dome).
More stories from this trip idea
The words are a retelling of the Wikipedia article Newfound Gap and the Wikipedia article Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and are shared under CC BY-SA 4.0. They are checked against those articles, and a fact that is not in them is left out.