The Sugarlands Stone House is one of those mysteries that occasionally arises in the Smokies backcountry to captivate off trail explorers. I first heard of it from Clyde who had found it while bushwhacking through the Sugarlands to access the mouth of Ramp Creek on 12-11-05. His goal for the day was to climb Ramp Creek to the Bullhead Trail, then complete a loop by hiking the trail back to the cars at Cherokee Orchard. With a tough off trail ahead, his group just took a few photos of the building and moved on.
Ironically,
I had tried to join that hike, but arrived at Cherokee Orchard just moments
after the group had left to complete their car shuttle. Nan, who was my
passenger, and I, were left to hike to Rainbow Falls, and missed the discovery
of the Stone House and the climb up Ramp Creek.
Clyde's picture from his Ramp Creek Trip.
Not
too long after Clyde’s discovery, others found the Stone House, and all of
sudden after 70 years of neglect it became the place to go for easy off trail
hiking. The story behind the house went through several revisions as more
research was done. The cottage was built to house teachers at the nearby Pi
Beta Phi School, and then became the park naturalist’s office according to
photographic records that Ed had located.
One of the images that Ed had found 2020.
As expected, Ed was one of the early visitors to the house and was happy to go again with Jean and I on the 7.5 mile hike. Most of the hike is fairly easy. The route starts with a walk south on the Old Sugarlands Trail to the point where it turns east. A good road continues ahead to a side trail leading east and uphill to a maintained cemetery. The trail to the house deteriorated after that, but eventually leads to the bank of Big Branch. The crossing can be tricky, but the reward is that the house is hidden in the rhodo just above the opposite bank.
With Ed inside the house.
On
our first visit part of the near side wall of the house had collapsed, but
otherwise the house was in remarkable condition. Some of the rock work looks
remarkably delicate to have survived for so long. The rest of the walls of what
appeared to be a two story structure were intact. There is a large front porch,
and a kitchen in the back.
Ed and the windows.
We
ate our lunch at the house and also spent some time at the Pi Phi School. We
also explored a bit to the south of the house, looking unsuccessfully for more
artifacts. We then made a wide loop back on the east side of the Sugarlands,
also just to be exploring. We saw a bear and two cubs cross the trail ahead of
us. I got a GPS track of the route and Jean took pictures. Total distance was
about 7.5 miles.
Hiram at the house.
We would repeat this hike two more times. On 1-25-20 we hiked in with Ed, Clyde, and Mike H to explore a number of old homesites, including some along the Old Sugarlands Trail and further towards the east side of the Sugarlands. We didn’t visit the house itself as Big Branch looked too full to cross. We learned from other hikers that there was some damage from a fallen tree, that the NPS rangers were now helping hikers with directions to the house, and that there was a well beaten path to the edge of Big Branch. Ed had pictures of the house, but also said that new research showed that it was a private summer residence.
 |
| Double chimney at the old CCC camp 2020. |
On
2-21-21 we made the standard trip into the house with the David Smith group. This
time we made it all the way to the house, courtesy of log we could use to scoot
across Big Branch. A bright sunny day led to shadowy pictures, but we could
tell there had been some wall damage since our earlier visit.
Remains of the kitchen area 2021.
 |
| View into the interior of the house. |
