Alpine Helen, Georgia was originally called Tula Cho’te or Mouse People Town!
Nineteenth century Cherokees described encounters with “Mouse People,” who were Mound Builders in the area around present-day Franklin, NC. Most folks today assume that such things as the Mouse People were folkloric children’s tales. However, the Mouse People still live in the heart of the Yucatan Peninsula and remote mountainous areas of Guatemala.
by Richard L. Thornton. Architect & City Planner
The lady above was the INAH* Site Manager for the Maya city ruins of Labna. It is on the boundary between the states of Yucatan and Campeche. She was about 4′-8″ (142 cm) tall.
*INAH = Instituto Nacional de Antropologia E Historia
The site manager was a very nice person. She thought that Ana Rojas and I were INAH VIP’s on our honeymoon and so she and her brothers cooked a wedding fest for us and local tribal members.
Ana told me the (at least in that era) the Mayas working at sites, not popular with foreign tourists, received pathetic salaries from the government. After everyone left, Ana and I reimbursed her, but did not explain that that we were actually unmarried college kids, exploring the southern Yucatan and eastern Campeche jungles.
At the time in the 1690s, when Charleston-based traders began reaching the Appalachians, there were Cho’te or hybrid Cho’te-Uchee villages on the Hiwassee River, Upper Nottely River, Chestatee River and at the headwaters of the Chattahoochee River. Their past presence survives as geographic place names.
The Americas Revealed 
I hope I’m fortunate enough to travel to see this beautiful country one day!
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wow very interesting ,interesting
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Richard,
You should definitely ride the Hiawassee Loop train out of Delano, TN sometime.
Took the family today, and my goodness, it is so understandable and incredibly gorgeous. The natural beauty surrounding that area, with a lot of it very well preserved, is astonishing.
This is the first time Ive ridden this train, but the scenery of the Hiawassee is beautiful, and where the Tennessee River and the Hiawassee converge near Highway 60, is truly sacred ground.
There is a reason the Sandhill Cranes and Whooping Cranes continually and migrationally flock to this area and also Northern Alabama, for very much the same reasons these people have found these lands favorable for empires and trade.
R/,
Zac
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I did didn’t know that those types of cranes congregated there. What most people don’t now know was that the Upper Tennessee River Valley was one of the worst places for malaria prior to TVA. At least a third of the residents of eastern Tennessee were infected with malaria protozoa in 1932! In fact, the reason that the CDC is in at Atlanta was that it was originally the base of the federal agency fighting malaria and yellow fever. Atlanta’s train connections enabled to them to reach east Tennessee quickly, but also head south to the Gulf Coast where malaria, typhoid, cholera and yellow fever were also a big problem
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Richard,
There is one TVA complex called Apalachia Power Station along the Hiawassee Loop Train railway. There was another complex near Farend, TN near the turnaround point for the ride.
The Loop starts at Bald Mountain and you can see the water from North Carolina that is diverted 8.6 miles down river and through mountains via an 8 ft wide pipe to the TVA Apalachia power facility. It is the primary reason the Hiawassee downstream of the power station barely reaches over 50 degrees Fahrenheit, even on a 100 degree day.
The Hiawasee is also one of the few places the Hellbender salamander still lives. Definitely, a lot of small towns dotted along the railway have turned to ghost towns, which makes the river better preserved and more naturalistic.
It was a great train ride for Mother’s day, a lot of history is explained on the ride, but not nearly as far back as you explain, to see the curves bends and rocks eaten away by time on the Hiawassee is pretty rich in its own natural history as well.
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