<< Back 9/11/02 Another Sept. 11 legacy — the parkway By Bruce Steinbicker Nine-eleven. I am celebrating 9/11 this week, and it has nothing to do with the media circus in which we are all, like sheep, expected to march in line to as we observe the anniversary of the terrible events that occurred one year ago. Looking at the menu of articles to come in the local daily, one can look forward to a rehash ad nauseum of the events surrounding 9/11, including what the news was on 9/10, what they call the last normal day. I got news for them. I’ve had 365 normal days since 9/11. The local TV outlet has sent their shill who appears most obsessed with 9/ll to New York so she can report live from the “incredible” scene at Ground Zero. We can expect the appointed president to use this day to whip up support for his latest military adventure in Iraq. When I think of 9/ll, I think of a group of workmen at Cumberland Knob up near the North Carolina-Virginia border who, 67 years ago, began construction of a 469-mile road to connect the Shenandoah National Park with the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Congress would soon officially name it the Blue Ridge Parkway. The work that began Sept. 11, 1935, put 4,000 mountain men to work in the heart of the Great Depression. Not only was this an opportunity to put cash money in the pockets of families desperately in need, it was an opportunity to open up a remote mountain area so that all could enjoy it. The automobile was beginning to be a major factor in our lives. People were beginning to have more leisure time to travel. This project provided immediate employment and future recreational opportunities for everyone. The Roanoke newspaper called the parkway the most significant development in Southwestern Virginia since the coming of the railroad. Anyone who knows Roanoke knows that without the Norfolk and Western Railway, Roanoke would still be a sleepy mountain village. The original plan called for the parkway to run through the northwest corner of North Carolina and then turn toward Tennessee around Linville. It would have terminated at Gatlinburg instead of Cherokee. Thanks to astute actions by North Carolina’s political leaders, one nearing the Smokies on the parkway looks down on the valleys of Allens Creek, Jonathan Creek, and Scotts Creek instead of the carnival atmosphere of Pigeon Forge. Celebrate 9/11 by going to Soco Gap and heading north on the parkway. Enjoy the 360-degree view at Waterrock Knob. Climb from Balsam Gap to the parkway’s highest point at Richland Balsam. Look down on the Tuckaseegee watershed in Jackson County and the headwaters of the Pigeon River in Haywood County. America doesn’t get any better than this. There is no doubt that those attacks on our country a year ago rank among the most awful events in the history of the human race. But isn’t it time to put things in perspective and get over it? When I think of those guys who started turning dirt at Cumberland Knob 67 years ago, I see the goodness of man. I’d rather be obsessed with that. (Bruce Steinbicker is a retired CPA who lives in Asheville.)