[♪♪♪] [Narrator] The year is 1671.

Two men set out on a month-long journey from Fort Henry, Virginia, near the present-day city of Petersburg.

Thomas Batte and Robert Hallam, al so known as Batts and Fallam, due to a transcription error dating back centuries, are commissioned by Colonel Abraham Wood to head westward to comb the mountains, valleys, and waterways in search of a tidal river and easy access route to the Pacific.

Few things about the journey are clear, but it is thought that guided by a member of the Appamatuck tribe, the three transverse the Blue Ridge and Appalachian Mountains, passing through the present-day Roanoke and New River Valleys.

Thirteen days into their expedition, they stumble upon an otherwise unknown and undocumented body of water.

They name it Woods River, in honor of their benefactor, and claim it for England's King Charles II.

[upbeat music] More than 300 years later, the New River, as it is now known, is still a rugged, whitewater and flat-water river.

A slow and shallow creek at it s beginning in North Carolina, the New grows stronger as it rolls north and west through Virginia and deep into West Virginia.

Join us for a 320-mile journey through this ancient river system where triumph, loss, tragedy, fear, wonder, and joy all transpire in The Story of the New River.

We begin our New River journey in North Carolina, where two smaller streams, each stretching more than 60 miles, converge to form one mighty river.

This isn't the New as it roars through its gorge two states away.

North Carolina's section of the New River is a broad, slow-moving thing, am bling along a wandering path.

The North Fork is the more rural and agrarian tributary, but it's a section of the more developed South Fork that's been designated Wild and Scenic by the federal government.

[George Santucci] The New River st arts in two different places.

One is really close to Blowing Rock, North Carolina, and some would argue that is the start of New River because it is the southernmost fork, part of our watershed.

But then, the north fork of the New River starts on the summit of Elk Knob, and that is actually one of the highest points in the entire watershed.

So, some would argue that's the start of the New River, because it's higher than an y other part of the watershed.

[Narrator] The forks of the New River join on the Ashe County and Alleghany County line, about five miles south of Virginia, and continue on their journey north.

[Philip Prince] Around the world, there's plenty of rivers that flow due north, so that just happens to be, it happens to be downhill.

The sources of the New River, in the vicinity of Boone, would be over 4,000 feet above sea level, possibly as high as about 5,000 feet at some of the mountain tops.

Right here, we're probably on the river ah, a little bit above 2,000 feet above sea level.

And by the time you are in the New River Gorge, for example, in the vicinity of Fayetteville, the river itself is only about 1,000 feet above sea level, if not, just a little bit below.

And of course, its mouth is even lower than that.

So the river descends thousands of feet along its entire course, and that good path downhill just happens to go roughly north from where it starts to where it ends up in, in the Ohio.

[Narrator] A highly debated issue regarding the New River is whether it is in fact the second oldest river in the world.

Countless sources list the river as the second oldest, the first being the Nile River in Africa.

[Philip Prince] Really, at the end of the day, geologically, there's no way to know if it really is the oldest, second oldest.

And I think that really obscures the nature of rivers, which is change.

Rivers are always shaping the landscape and making it look different, and it's definitely unreasonable to think about the New River that you see today having been here, as you see it now, for potentially hundreds of millions of years.

There is geologic evidence that a river or rivers may have followed roughly this course for a pretty long period of time, but there's also geologic evidence that suggests that the New River has established this course much more recently.

So it's not the best way to think about river systems and fundamentally, it's a question that no one will ever be able to answer.

[Narrator] From North Carolina and meandering in and out of the Commonwealth before finally flowing northwestward, you'll find 46 miles of th e New River in Grayson County.

The first of seven dams on the New River is located near Mouth of Wilson.

A fairly small dam compared to the other six, Fields Dam was built in 1930 by W.C Fields, to generate power for an existing woolen mill built in 1884.

[Daved Sandefur] Fields Dam was a dam that was built by Mr. Fields.

He owned Mouth of Wilson.

He had a mill there, a fairly large mill, quite a few people lived there an d worked, post office, store, quite a little community right there at the time.

[Narrator] The dam also introduced electricity to the rural mountain community.

[Daved Sandefur] And then, early 1900s, they added an electrical generation plant to the dam and it's still - that's still there, although it doesn't generate electricity anymore, as far as I know.

[Narrator] A bit further downstream, what might have been the biggest dam development on the New, never actually materialized.

The Blue Ridge Dam Project was an attempt by Appalachian Power Company, a subsidiary of American Electric Power or AEP, to build a hydroelectric pump storage facility on the New River, just a few miles southwest of the town of Independence.

[Daved Sandefur] Yeah, this is a project that was originally proposed in 1962, '63 time period.

It was supposed to build two dams on the New River for hydroelectric generation.

However in 1966, the government required an expansion of that project.

The dam would've still been two dams, but it would've been a much larger project.

[Narrator] An upper dam was proposed in the vicinity of Penitentiary and Molly Osborne Shoals, while a second and lower dam was planned closer to Independence.

[George Santucci] That would've flooded 42,000 acres of this area in Grayson County, Ashe County and Allegheny Counties - Grayson in Virginia, Ashe County and Allegheny County in North Carolina.

If you lived in that area, you were about to lose your home, you were about to lose your farm, you were about to lose your church, you were about to lose your community, and so the folks around here we ren't very excited about that.

[Narrator] But not everyone was against the project.

[Daved Sandefur] Even when I initially moved up here over 20 years ago, one of the first people I talked to, this subject came up, although it was old hat by then.

And I found that in talking to other people in the county that the - a lot of times, the emotions are still just almost as strong for and against.

Many saw it as an economic opportunity for the county, others saw it.

that it was going to destroy what we see behind me.

And there was no in between, it seemed.

[Narrator] Countless houses, commercial and industrial buildings, businesses, churches and cemeteries would've been destroyed and about 2,700 people would have been forced from their homes.

While Appalachian Power Company estimated the resulting lakes would generate more than three million tourist dollars each year, the Agricultural Extension Service projected the annual farm income loss at more than 13 million dollars.

The fight was a long and arduous one, involving local, state and national players, including President Gerald Ford.

[George Santucci] And so, it was a massive grassroots uprising.

And you're talking about a ten-, 15-year span of time where it's being brought to the court.

And the court is either denying or agreeing with the permit application wi th American Power at the time.

And then, the lawyers for the opposition would bring forth an argument and then the courts would deny that, and then it would go back-and-forth like this.

[on TV] We must change, if we're going to-- [Narrator] What's more, cu ts in overseas oil production in the '70s resulted in a worldwide energy crisis.

[George Santucci] And everybody is trying to find power sources that are local, and this dam was proposed as one of these local power sources.

But if you're the one that's in the way of that resource or you're the one that's about to lose your home or about to lose your river, you know, you only see that end of it.

[Narrator] In the end, those who had the most to lose won the fight.

Thanks to a last-minute designation of 26 miles of the North Carolina section of the South Fork as part of the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act of 1976.

That essentially ended any chance of a dam ever being built on that section of the river.

-It's a story you don't hear a lot.

You don't hear the little person beating the big powerful power company.

And in this case, it was - it did happen.

I'm hard pressed to - I like to hope and think that even in today's day and age, that that's possible, but it does seem a lot harder now than even it was back then.

-If this had gone in, we would need scuba gear because we'd be over 60 feet under water at the moment.

Ten percent of the county would've been inundated.

[George Santucci] I am grateful to the folks who fought to preserve this the way it is now, and for folks to be able to go out and canoe and enjoy and fish.

And the river is really healthy through that section where this dam would've been.

[Narrator] Head northeast about 15 miles or so in Grayson County, and we find the first major dam built on the New River, still standing, at the town of Fries.

Incorporated in 1902, Fries was named after cotton mill industrialist, Francis Henry Fries, who one year earlier began construction of a hydroelectric dam to power his next industrial venture, the Washington Mills.

By March of 1904, the mill was in full operation, manufacturing a variety of cotton goods, employing hundreds of people.

And so, the town was flourishing.

[Denny Brooms] There were about 300 houses built in the next two years.

So, all of the houses were cookie cutter.

They were put up as quickly as possible and the mill owned everything.

[Narrator] Thanks to the mill and the power it generated, just like Mouth of Wilson, Fries was one of the first rural communities in Southwest Virginia to benefit from the "modern-at-the-time" conveniences.

[Denny Brooms] They were actually able to start a grid in town.

And so, the people here had power when a lot of the other areas didn't.

Likewise, with the money that came in, they were able to put in indoor plumbing which was something that was unheard of in a lot of regions for many years.

[Narrator] At its peak, the mill employed nearly 2,000 workers, and continued to operate successfully, until economic downturns in the US and the textile industry, and the growing dependence on foreign imports led to its closure in 1989.

But for the resilient residents of Fries, the mill may be gone, but the river still remains.

[Denny Brooms] Well, the river, it was important for the dam and for the mill and for the town because it started everything.

But the New River has always been not only a source of pride for the community, but it's also been a source of income.

The New River is a source of recreation for the people here, to this day.

And we're hoping th at the New River in this area will be a source for tourism.

Because the town of Fries has a lot to offer - boating, kayaking, fishing, just the different species of fish that are in the river between this dam and the bridge two miles down the river.

It's unbelievable what can be here, and kayaking rafting throughout the summer is a very popular pastime.

[Narrator] From Grayson County, we head to Carroll County where we find another popular pastime location.

New River Trail State Park follows a similar, if not parallel, path to the New River.

The trail meanders through Grayson, Carroll, Wythe, and Pulaski counties.

It originates in the town of Pulaski and ends at two locations - the town of Fries and the city of Galax.

Sam Sweeney manages the nearly 58 miles of trail.

[Sam Sweeney] It is a full-fledged park, but it is a linear park which is different from your traditional park where you go into one large land track, and you just ride around the roads, so to speak.

When N & W closed down and abandoned the old railroad bed, the concept and idea of converting it into a rail trail occurred.

A grassroots approach occurred, and so it quickly morphed within just a matter of a couple of years into reality.

And so we are a rails-to-trail park, and we provide opportunities for recreation to the public.

[Narrator] The four-county stretch of scenic trail includes many access points.

For those who like to get wet, numerous entry points into the river provide opportunities for canoeing, tubing, fishing, and boating.

For those who'd rather stay dry, there's plenty of trail for horseback riding, walking, running, hiking, and biking.

With so many recreational options and its magnificent views, it's no surprise that the New River Trail is a popular destination.

[Sam Sweeney] We are the third largest visited park in Virginia State parks.

So to think that a park in the far southwest Virginia, so to speak, could be one of the largest visited parks in Virginia is very unique, and of course, we are proud of that unique feature.

[Narrator] Next on our journey downriver, we find two dams in fairly close proximity to each other.

Byllesby Dam sits about nine miles north of Galax; Buck Dam just two miles farther downstream.

The Byllesby and Buck Hydroelectric Project was constructed in 1912, and has been operated by American Electric Power since 1926.

Originally built to provide power to southern West Virginia coalfields, these days, the plant provides power to AEP customers.

Head north about ni ne-and-a-half miles downriver out of Carroll County into Wythe County, and you'll find one of the most hi storical spots on this river.

Dating back to the days of wagon trains and pioneers heading west, the Shot Tower was an important operation producing ammunition for early settlers.

Local miner and business owner, Thomas Jackson, built the structure in 1807.

[Sam Sweeney] And he utilized the technology that was learned in England on how to drop shot a certain amount of distance, in this case, 150 feet, in order to create a round ball.

And they would use sieves and melt down the iron ore, pour it into the sieve into different size units where it would drip down in various size shots - anything from like buck shot or bird shot up to a round ball.

And that 150-foot allowed the ball, that ore to basically round itself.

And when it landed in the bottom of the shot tower, there was a kettle full of water and it would allow it to harden when it hit the water.

[Narrator] The water needed for the cooling phase of the shot production was supplied by the New River.

[Sam Sweeney] Well, there was a tunnel there at the bottom of shot tower.

It was again, a hundred - it was 75 feet above ground, 75 feet down to the kettle underground, and then there was a tunnel out to the edge of the river.

[Narrator] The lead shot of varying sizes would then be shipped down river where it would be sold to hunters, traders, and merchants.

Today, Shot Tower is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and Shot Tower State Park is open seasonally for guests to ascend the tower and explore the park.

Just about a mile down river from the Shot Tower, we find one of the most rugged spots along this waterway at the New River Trail State Park Foster Falls location.

[Sam Sweeney] Well, Foster Falls is named after William Foster who owned the land.

It is a series of rapids where in a quarter of a mile, the New River drops 30 feet in elevation as the river kind of cuts around in a bend and continues on its path towards West Virginia.

-Well, the New River is actively cutting into the landscape.

Um, it is carrying little bits of the mountains down through the rivers to the ocean.

Of course, it's doing that right now with the flow a little bit high.

And in some places, it has obvious bedrock exposure in the riverbed that the water is tumbling across to make Rapids and Shoals.

But the rapids themselves tend to form where the river is having a little bit more trouble cutting through harder exposures of rock in the riverbed.

So like, just about every aspect of the river's course, its shape, what the landscape looks like, these rapids are also an expression of the types of rock that the river is flowing across and cutting into.

[Narrator] The Foster Falls access point location offers campsite, boat, tube, and bike rentals, picnic shelters, and hiking trails amidst a background of rugged limestone cliffs.

And speaking of limestone, the river travels through a region rich in mineral resources - including iron, lead and zinc in Carroll, Wythe, and Pulaski Counties.

[Sam Sweeney] All up and down the trail here, whether we're talking Hiawassee, Pulaski, Foster Falls, Ivanhoe, Galax, all of them had iron ore mines that were operating and bringing the material to the railroad to be hauled out.

And from there, it was being transferred to the major cities al l up and down the East Coast, Wilmington, North Carolina, Cincinnati, Baltimore, St. Louis, and again, it all was a part of that growth of America at that time in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

[Narrator] Just as it is today, the livelihood of numerous families was tied to the mines that were dotted along the New at the turn of the last century.

And while the communities may be lost to time, traces of them can still be seen along the New River Trail.

One such place was Bertha, located between Fosters Falls and Barren Springs, where zinc, with a world-wide reputation of "exceptional purity" was mined and sent to be processed in Pulaski.

Considered the heart of the New River Valley, Pulaski County is where you'll find some rather historical sites and stories that only the New River can claim.

The Revolutionary War ended in 1783 after eight long years of battle, effectively liberating colonists from British rule.

This newly found independence drove masses of people south and west in search of new land and new beginnings.

[♪♪♪] The Great Road followed a path of least resistance via old animal and Indian traces down various valley systems.

From the Great Road branched other routes such as Pepper's Ferry Road and the Wilderness Road, serving other parts of the frontier.

Yet, more than any of the others, the Great Road was the most commonly used road, carrying people south and west from Philadelphia through Virginia.

-But it relates to the New River because it crosses the New River.

And if there's a big obstacle like a large river, that's gonna create areas for commerce.

Some of those first areas for commerce were the ferries, Ingles Ferry, Peppers Ferry, there's ferries all up and down the river.

[Narrator] Probably the most po pular ferry on the New River, Ingles Ferry, was established in 1762 to carry people and goods across the river.

Flat bottom boats were the most commonly used type of ferry.

Their design made navigating the rocky and shallow waters easier, although they were also used to navigate significant rapids on the river.

[Tal Stanley] Ingles Ferry is one of the most important points on the map.

But far and away, it was the - it was the most widely used crossing of the New River.

It offered the most direct route, the easiest route.

It would be impossible to tell just how many people crossed there, ah, over, you know, several hundred years.

But in the early days of settlement in this country, nearly every person, both free and enslaved, men and women and children, crossed that way when coming down this road.

[Narrator] In fact, there is documented evidence that slaves did cross the New River at Ingles Ferry.

[Sarah Carter] There was an article written by a gentleman describing how he had come from one river to the other, and then he came to the New River and saw the coffle of slaves.

But that gave more evidence that slavery did come across the river.

[Narrator] In an 1844 essay entitled "Excursions Through the Slave States", British-American geologist and geographer, George William Featherstonhaugh, documents what he describes as "a revolting spectacle of about 300 chained slaves" being drovered to Louisiana to work the sugar plantations.

[April Martin] There's an observation of them crossing in Ingles Ferry, but the enslaved didn't cross on the ferry.

The enslaved crossed coffled together, tied to each other, crossing the water.

And there was a banjo player that was supposedly playing, and the slave drovers were making the slaves - not only try to walk through the water there, and the New River is a treacherous river.

Being chained to someone, so if someone stumbled in the first, everybody's going to have to stumble and make adjustments.

But now they're being told they have to sing along with it.

it's terrifying.

And there were two lines of them together crossing that river, from the observation.

[bagpipe music] [Narrator] At the site of Ingles Ferry, you'll find what remains of th e colonial era Ingles Tavern.

Built around 1771, the tavern was licensed in 1773 to service travelers along the Wilderness Road.

[Tal Stanley] But at Ingles ferry, it was a significant place not just on the road, but in the local community.

A store was operated there.

There was a tavern.

And in some store records, there are records of some of my ancestors going to that store.

It was located on, on what we now know is the Pulaski County side.

[April Martin] The 1773 part of that tavern on the western landing of th e New River does still stand.

There is an 1840 section of it that was built on when the business continued.

What's also still standing on the site of where the tavern, Ingles Tavern would've been, is part of the Great Road.

You can plainly see it.

It goes right in front from the ferry landing.

There was an area where they would have the winches that would help pull the ferries across.

[Narrator] Today, the structures sit on a 325-acre site owned by Mary Draper Ingles' fifth-great-granddaughter, Mary Ingles Barbour and her husband Mike.

Tours are offered and can be arranged through the Wilderness Road Regional Museum in Newbern.

Some very early settlers, who undoubtedly traveled the Great Road and Wilderness Road to settle in the region in the mid-1700s, were the Dunkers.

The newly created community later became known as Dunkard's Bottom.

-The people who first settled here, like many of the first settlers in the New River Valley, came down from Pennsylvania.

They came because they were members of a German church.

They called themselves the Brethren, but it was called the Dunkers by their neighbors because they rejected the idea of baptism for children and believed in adult baptism.

So they walked people out into a stream, and they'd dunk them in the stream, and they were known as dunkers.

This particular group had broken from the main dunkers and had established a community at Ephrata, Pennsylvania as a Hasidic monastic community.

They believed in celibacy.

They believed in a life of work and prayer, and of limited comfort.

They slept on boards with wooden blocks for pillows.

They woke at midnight.

They would sleep for three hours, wake at midnight to pray for two hours, then sleep for three more hours, get up and work.

That was their life in Pennsylvania at Ephrata.

[Narrator] But within the ti ght-knit religious community, one family, the Echarlins, found themselves in conflict with their leader.

[Dan Thorp] So in 1745, the Echarlins came down here to try to create their own version of Ephrata.

They tried to create a celibate, monastic, hard-working community in what they described as "beyond all Christian government."

They were amongst the first to settle here.

So there was no government, there was no society.

There was just the New River.

[Narrator] The Echarlins did not succeed in creating their perfect Dunkard "community".

And so the land was sold in 1753 and many of the settlers moved back to Pennsylvania.

The name Dunkard's Bottom stuck, and eventually other German, English, and Scots-Irish families would settle in the "bottom" and give rise to present day Montgomery County.

-It was then bought eventually by the Christian family, for whom Christiansburg is named, and later by the Cloyd family.

The Cloyd family lived here for generations before selling it to the government for the - when the dam was constructed.

[Narrator] Built by Appalachian Power Company in 1939, Claytor Lake Dam in Dublin is a concrete gravity dam whose primary purpose is to generate hydroelectric power.

[Jeff Worrell] It took two years to build it, 750 workers.

The dam is 1,150 feet long.

It is 130 feet high.

At the base, it is 106 feet wide.

It is almost as wide as it is tall.

And the lake itself is 21 miles long.

It has over 100 miles of shoreline.

And the lake itself covers 4,500 acres.

[Narrator] It is at the bottom of Claytor Lake that you'll find Dunkard's Bottom and all that was left behind by the families who were forced to leave to make way for the dam.

-They actually begin acquisition of property 14 years before they started construction in 1923.

And even then, as today, it was controversial.

There was people here that had owned land and farms since the 1700s.

And they lost their property, and it went underwater.

There were roads and bridges that had to be abandoned and relocated, so just as it would be today, it was controversial even then.

[April Martin] I mean, the houses, the cabins, the cemeteries, they're still all underwater.

Some of the ferries, taverns and everything that we know in this area, all underwater now.

So, it was done in the best interest of, obviously, the community, but when they were doing it in 1930s, it wasn't high priority to move everything.

Now they did move some, but a lot of that history is still in the shallows of the waters under Claytor Lake right now.

-The farms, um, which my family had and which they operated are all now under Claytor Lake.

[Narrator] Tal Stanley grew up in Dublin, a small town in Pulaski County.

His deep-rooted ties to the New River date back to the 1700s when his family first settled here along the river.

-And while I never actually remember my great grandmother saying, I remember it being related to me secondhand when she would talk about the Farmer place, the Godby place, the Woolwine place.

And she would - up here on the hill, she'd point off and say, "Well, of course, all that's gone now."

But as I've grown older, there are deeper questions for me.

I'm overwhelmed by the idea that a hundred feet down is land that, you know, my forbearers farmed.

[Narrator] As a professor and the Resident Scholar for the Citizenship of Place at Emory and Henry College in Emory, Virginia, Stanley's interest in preserving family history coincides with his interest in researching history of place, finding the deeper stories of another time and place.

-The older I've gotten, the more I've become, um, fascinated with the question of what happens to memory when you, when the people are gone.

What happens to memory when the place is gone, when you can't see the place?

And the more I dwelt on that, the more I thought about it, I came into awareness that I had a particular responsibility to those stories about places that I had never seen.

[Narrator] These days however, Claytor Lake is a successful economic engine and very much a thriving community with lakeside residential housing and plenty of recreational opportunities.

Claytor Lake State Park offers hiking trails, a swimming beach, cabin and camping rentals, plus plenty of boating and fishing options.

Another thriving community, but much lesser known, is the Pulaski County riverside Community of New River.

With less than 300 residents, the area is now a quiet and undisturbed large neighborhood.

But back in the day, it was a hustling and bustling railroad town of about 3,000, mostly African-American, residents.

-Well, originally it was called New River Depot, which grew up around the train that stopped here.

It's originated in like the mid-1850s, and the town grew around the railroad.

So, we had hotels.

We had stores.

We had about three or four different stores here.

It was a lot of industry in the town of New River.

[Narrator] These days, there are no passenger trains, no traffic, and not many visitors to speak of, but residents still gather for church and social events, pretty much as they did back then.

[Clidia H. Lewis] Well, it's nice and quiet and peaceful still, but you know, I don't think it's as close a community as it was at one time.

You probably are more familiar with people that you go to church with.

Now, I don't know all the residents of New River.

And I can tell you right now, I don't know who some of my neighbors are right now.

But back then, everyone knew who their neighbors were.

That's the difference.

[Narrator] From Pulaski County, we continue northeast along the river into modern-day Montgomery County, where we find more than 20 miles of the New River.

It is in this region that perhaps the greatest true story of survival originates.

To understand the role the river played in the life of Mary Draper Ingles, we have to go back to a time of great conflict during the early days of our country's history.

The French and Indian War lasted seven years, from 1756 to 1763, and was the product of an imperial struggle between the French and the British over control of the Ohio River Valley.

The Shawnee were a se mi-migratory indigenous nation primarily inhabiting the valley.

[Dan Thorp] We know that indigenous peoples lived in this region lo ng before the Europeans came.

As far as archaeologists can tell, most had moved out of the area because the Shawnee Indians regarded this as their territory.

They didn't want other natives living here and they certainly didn't want Europeans living here.

And so, when Europeans did begin settling here in the 1740s, 1750s, they almost immediately had minor levels of conflict that then eventually grew into what became known as the French and Indian War.

[Narrator] The Shawnee's way of life was disrupted by encroaching settlers, and they were often forced to leave their lands.

Colonial militias destroyed their villages and crops.

The Shawnee would retaliate by sending raiding parties to destroy colonial settlements, hoping to drive settlers off their land.

Such was likely the case in 1755 at Draper's Meadow, a sparsely populated settlement at the present-day location of Virginia Tech in Blacksburg.

[drama being enacted] For many years, the long-running-outdoor drama "The Long Way Home" depicted the tragic, yet triumphant story of Mary Draper Ingles.

[April Martin] Again, at the outbreak of the French and Indian War, there was an incident.

It's recorded as a massacre.

It was an act of war and there were people killed.

Young people killed, old people killed, and two well-known people taken hostages with their children.

That's Mary Draper Ingles and her sister-in-law Bettie Draper.

[Narrator] Several people were brutally murdered, including Bettie's infant child.

Mary's husband, William Ingles, survived the attack.

Meanwhile, Mary and Bettie were taken west.

-And they took her into Ohio in the vicinity of where Portsmouth, Ohio, now is.

And then from there, they took her down, down the Ohio River a 140 miles more to a place called Big Bone Lick, and her children were taken from her.

[Narrator] Three months later, and without her sister-in-law or two sons, Mary and another captured woman, escaped the Shawnees and embarked on a journey through the rugged Appalachian Mountains in a desperate attempt to get back home.

Mary would eventually become separated from her companion and head towards Draper's Meadow alone.

[April Martin] She is able to tell from the river that she's at then, which is in the Ohio Valley, how she can reverse course.

And if she can stay close enough to that river and reverse course, she knew she could make her way back here.

Now the disadvantage to that is that she could not swim.

So if you came to a small creek, you had to go up it a little ways until you could cross it safely an d then back down to the river.

But she knew if she stayed as close as she could to the river, it would eventually bring her back to the New River here and her home.

[Narrator] More than 800 miles later, weak, hungry, exhausted, and white-haired at the age of 23, due to traumatic shock, Mary arrived at the vicinity of Draper's Meadow.

A neighbor made the startling discovery.

-And she got back and was found on the land that Adam Harman owned.

And that was two farms away from where she was, and William lived.

She recognized the land as Adam Harman's and started calling for him.

-Her voice is heard, and Adam Harman recognizes it.

[actor playing Adam Harman] Mary!

Mary!

It is Adam, Adam Harman, your old neighbor.

Boys, come here!

Quickly!

Bless you, you're a woman.

You were in your death, and you are to life.

But you are alive.

Where did you go?

[April Martin] I mean, think of that.

I mean, the craziness of those circumstances happening, and goes to her and finds her.

-"Surely, that must be Mrs. Ingles' voice.

"Just then, she too, recognized Harman "when she was overwhelmed with emotions of joy and relief.

Four--" [Narrator] Jim Connell is a direct descendant of Adam Harman.

He recalls his younger days when he first learned of his family legacy.

[Jim Connell] Underneath the steps, I found the Harman genealogy and I read it, and it didn't impress me at all because I was having too good of a time doing other things.

So I put it back under the steps and forgot it.

Many years later, I started reading the Harman genealogy, and lo and behold, I read the story about Mary Ingles.

And it hit me right between the eyes and I haven't been the same since.

It really impressed me.

[Narrator] Since that find, his tireless efforts to keep the Mary Ingles story alive have kept him quite busy over the years, promoting re-enactments, speaking publicly, and sharing stories.

The same is true for Bud Jeffries, a direct descendant of Mary and William Ingles who still lives on Ingles Farm in Radford.

There you'll find an exact Ingles cabin reproduction on the foundation of the original cabin where Mary lived from 1763 until her death in 1815.

[Bud Jeffries] Mary Draper Ingles is my great, great, great, great-grandmother.

And she lived here on this property sometime after her return from Indian captivity.

And she lived here about the last 55 years and is buried here on this farm.

And so, I grew up here, and then I came back here to live.

It meant a lot to me to preserve the history which I've tried to do, to include reconstruction of her cabin, the original part of her home.

[Narrator] Ingles Farm is open to the public on a limited basis and tours can be arranged via the Radford Visitor's Center.

The City of Radford is surrounded by the New River on three sides.

In fact, locals still refer to it as the River City, and both the river and the city share a deep connection.

Sarah Carter is a life-long resident of Radford.

A descendant of slaves on her father's side and Cherokee natives on her mother's side, she's very proud of her heritage and the deep ties she has to Radford.

[Sarah Carter] My families were slaves during the slavery days.

My father's father were from Glade Springs and my father's mother was from Blacksburg.

And they moved here after her father died.

So, from then on, they were just ex-slaves and they just stayed here.

My mother's great grandmother, and she would be my great, great-grandmother, Paulina Fields, was full-blooded Cherokee, and she had my great grandmother.

[Narrator] An active member of th e Radford Heritage Foundation, Carter works hard to document not only her family history, but the history of Radford as well, a history that very much includes the New River.

Rivers have historically played a major role in where indigenous communities would settle.

With so much river surrounding Radford, it's no surprise that 31 Indian village sites are known to have existed in the area.

One of the most historic sites once existed on a 57-acre area of riverfront land, now known as Bisset Park.

But long before it became a park, it was the site of a major, and very important, archeological discovery.

-Let me just say before they found the village and the burial ground, when I was growing up, there was nothing but a cornfield.

It was just used for farming and growing corn.

[Scott Gardner] Farmland for many years, down here, people had discovered arrowheads, shards, evidence of Native American habitation down here.

And in the 1970s, when they were getting ready to build this park, they knew they needed to do some excavation work.

Uhm, and in the mid-'70s, they actually completed two seasons of digs and encountered over 15 tons of artifacts, and basically found that for millennia, Native Americans had called this area home.

[Narrator] Some of those artifacts can be found at Glencoe Mansion Museum and Gallery in Radford, although Sarah Carter wishes for a more public memorial.

[Sarah Carter] But I would've loved to have seen a vault made into the park, and the bones be reburied, and then put a cover, a concrete cover over them with a statue, so that they could be back into the park because that's Native American land.

Because the Native Americans always follow the water, they always generally are by the river.

But they want that water source and they want the fishing because that's a source of food for them.

[Narrator] In fact, you can still find the centuries-old fish traps built by Native Americans, in the New River, to this day.

One near the Town of Fries in Grayson County, the second at the Pulaski and Montgomery County line near Ingles Tavern and Ferry.

-The Indians would make these traps of rocks basically that would funnel fish.

And they would, you know, it's like, ah, I don't know, like chasing rabbits out towards the hunters.

They would essentially drive the fish down there and, you know, lots of supper.

-And then they would weave fishing weirs and put those fishing weirs, these nets, these loose nets at the base of them.

And anytime you wanted fish, just go out there and get your net out, and it was a natural funnel.

There was always plenty of fish that could get by so it wasn't like they were taking every fish that came down the New River.

And the New River was exceptionally rich in fish habitat, and it's still a very rich fishery now, even today.

[lively flute music] -♪ I'm riding on That New River Train ♪ ♪ I'm riding on That New River Train ♪ ♪ That same old train That brought me here ♪ ♪ Is gonna carry me away again ♪ [Narrator] Modern-day Radford is a product of the railroad era, that began when the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad laid tracks through the city in the mid-1800s.

Once the railroad depot was added, Radford's population exploded, along with the amount of trade and business that was conducted.

Radford became a proper railroad town.

The New River played a major role in that development.

[Ken Miller] The railroads are graded along the easiest course for the geography, rather than going over mountains, building tunnels through mountains.

They try to stay with what is the easier gradient.

Rivers were always - and streams were always the easiest gradients which meant the most efficient, cheapest shipping cost of operations, which was very critical to these folks.

[Narrator] Another reason railroad tracks were often built along rivers is because of the need for water in order to keep the steam engines running.

[Ken Miller] Well, with the end of the steam era in 1959, the railroads no longer needed as much of a water supply as they once did.

But prior to that, steam locomotives consumed a considerable quantity of water, and you would have water stations located along the river so that you could have water for your steam locomotives that they could get to fairly easily at any case.

[Narrator] However, the cost of maintaining the water stations led to their demise in the 1950s when railroads began using auxiliary water tenders, an extra car carrying water, allowing for long-distance trips.

Norfolk & Western was the last American railroad to use steam engines.

You'll find 37 miles of the New River firmly entrenched in Giles County, where its depth ranges from a few inches to an estimated 100 feet at the base of the geologically stunning Palisades Cliffs at the community of Eggleston.

[Philip Prince] The rock exposed th ere is limestone and dolomite.

It can be a very strong rock that can support those steep cliffs.

It also developed cave systems over time.

And that's a rock type that you see a lot of between Eggleston and Pearisburg.

The reason the cliffs are there is that the river is actually cutting into the landscape now more quickly than it has been th rough recent geologic history.

[loud splash] [Narrator] For Ann Goette, swimming in the New River with the cliffs overhead, is somewhat of a spiritual experience.

[Ann Goette] It's okay to be on water, but I really love to be in water.

And oceans are fine, and lakes are fine, but a river, you know, that's why people get baptized in rivers because the river just keeps on flowing.

It just takes everything.

So no matter how complicated life can become, if I walk down that hill and plunge into the river, by the time I'm halfway across the river, I can't even remember what I was worried about.

So, I think for some people, me ditation or prayer does that.

For me, being in the river does that.

[Narrator] These Palisades Cliffs are the same cliffs that Mary Draper Ingles climbed on her desperate journey back to her homestead.

Back then, the cliffs jutted out of the water quite dramatically.

And because she couldn't swim, her only option was to climb.

German landscape painter Ed Beyer painted the Palisades in the mid-1800s, as Mary might have seen them.

[Ann Goette] When she was traveling along, she recognized these cliffs an d knew she was close to home.

So she climbed these cliffs.

We have other cliffs along the New River that are also quite beautiful.

But because of Mary Draper Ingles' courageous climb, these are our most famous cliffs.

[Narrator] Blasting of the cliffs by railroad companies in the 1800s would forever change the physical characteristics of these cliffs, but they remain magical, nonetheless.

[Ann Goette] All these years, I' ve lived here almost 17 years and never ever - my bedroom is all windows fa cing the cliffs and the river, and never ever get up and look out and take it for granted, not once.

[Narrator] Ann Goette isn't the only person captured by the New River's magic.

Locals and tourists flock to the river and keep outfitters busy du ring the warm weather months.

Shawn Hash is the owner and op erator of Tangent Outfitters, one of the many business owners relying on the New River for their livelihood.

-Well, kind of the New River gives us our, kind of our basis for our business.

We, ah, we started years ago doing just canoeing and mountain biking, and then grew that into a guide service, and which eventually grew into brick-and-mortar location here in Pembroke.

And now we are a full-service outfitter, fly shop, gas station.

We call it the Red Neck one-stop.

[Narrator] Rafting, kayaking, canoeing, and paddle boarding are just a few of the activities you can experience on the New, but it's the fishing that attracts anglers from around the world to the New River.

[John Copeland] One reason that angling is important is that it brings economic activity to an area that does not have a lot of options for producing economics or economic output.

So, fishing is just another aspect of the recreation that brings people to this area.

And while they're here, they spend money on other things.

[Shawn Hash] And of course, the mid-Atlantic is a lot of our clientele.

But we've had people from Australia, New Zealand, um, I had a group from England, um, you know, we get people from out in California.

We have our regular clientele.

And they come in, wh at the New River is known for is it's one of the best fisheries in North America.

It has the state record smallmouth, state record walleye, state record muskies.

All come from this fishery, which is pretty incredible.

So it's truly known for fishing.

-The endemic species of fish in the New River, there are eight of them.

Two are sculpins, which exist, they're cold water-adapted fish only in tributaries.

Three are minnows, the Kanawha Minnow, the New River Shiner, and the Bigmouth Chub.

And then the others are darters, the Appalachia Darter, the Kanawha Darter, and the Candy Darter.

[man] Oh!

Look at that candy darter-- [Narrator ] In fact, the candy darter is a protected species under the Endangered Species Act, and much research has been done to make sure this darter doesn't become extinct.

[Mike Pinder] The candy darter is very important to the New River.

If you think about different countries around the world have a unique species.

If you go to Africa, they have, they have giraffes.

If you go to China, they have pandas.

Well, right here in the New River drainage, the candy darter is our unique species found only in this drainage.

The candy darter is a small bottom-dwelling fish that is native and endemic to the New River drainage.

It is pretty remarkable because it lives on the stream bottom its entire life.

And it's fast flowing waters that most fish try to avoid, it's there.

It's feeding on small aquatic insects.

And what makes it really special is its coloration.

During the spawning season, the males become incredibly beautiful - reds, whites, and blues.

It's really, um, it's actually considered one of the prettiest freshwater fishes in North America.

And I would say it rivals anything you see on the coral reefs or in tropical parts of the world.

[Narrator] Another species found in the New that may not be as attractive, but is no less important, is the Hellbender, the largest salamander in North America.

[Dr. Don Orth] The hellbender has been called by some people a kind of an aquatic dragon, and it has this loose skin that is an adaptation for getting oxygen into the bloodstream.

It's got a big flat head and a big mouth and a long tail so, you know, when people encounter them for the first time, they are really flummoxed.

They've never seen anything quite like this.

[Narrator] The hellbender that you'll find in the New River is called the Eastern Hellbender.

While it may not be the best-looking salamander, it is a biologically significant species that makes this river so unique and diverse.

But it is human interaction that threatens the hellbender's survival.

-So, the angler who catches this thing at the end of its line, they don't know what it is.

They may be afraid of it and so, they often don't know what to do.

And historically, they would, they would kill it just because of the fear that it's some monster.

Uh, and that's one of the principal threats to the hellbender from the past, and it persists today.

And so, there's efforts to ed ucate the recreational angler.

If you catch this thing, just release it and don't handle it, and it will survive.

[Narrator] Survival is very much the name of the game for those who desperately try to protect this river.

That is why a number of co nservancy organizations exist specifically to help preserve and conserve the New River watershed.

In Giles County, the ReNew the New Oganization launched 16 years ago as a local effort to clean up the 37-mile stretch of river that flows through the county.

-We got together to talk about how we could clean up the river, 'cause it was really - it's a beautiful river, but it had a lot of debris in it.

And the first few years, I mean, the things that we pulled out of the river, we had volunteers out in canoes, and they didn't even need to paddle, they just sit in one place, pulling tires, pulling tires and.

Not only is the river more clean, but I think so many people ha ve participated in the cleanup that there's a real awareness.

I think a real commitment, not just from people who volunteer but from people who've lived al ong the river for generations.

There's a new sense of, you know, ownership and pride in the river.

[Narrator] Another organization, The New River Conservancy, is a group of volunteers and paid staff whose mission is to protect the waters, woodlands, and wildlife in all three states where the river flows.

[Chelsea Blount] We work on all aspects of the river, from water quality to land protection, to educating our communities and working with our municipalities, to engage people in actions that will improve our water quality, our habitat, our environment, and just the awareness of what's going on and what threats might face the New River.

[Narrator] The River does, in fact, face many threats.

Most of those are man-made.

[Chelsea Blount] The biggest threat that I deal with on a daily basis is something called non-point source pollution.

Things like sediment, things like trash, things that can't be traced back to one direct location, such as, you know, a pipe outfall from a factory or something like that.

It's the things that nobody can really trace that come from all over, that really have a big impact.

[Narrator] Here again, as with th e ReNew the New Organization, trash is perhaps the biggest issue.

Staff and volunteers in all three states, regularly scour the river, picking up an alarming amount of trash and debris, including tires.

The New River flows swiftly and quickly through Mercer and Monroe Counties, West Virginia before arriving in Summers County.

There are six state park sites in West Virginia.

In December of 2020, the New River Gorge National River was re-designated as New River Gorge National Park and Preserve, and it protects more than 70,000 acres of land.

Since becoming a national park, attendance has increased significantly.

[Eve West] The New River Gorge National Park and Preserve is 53 miles of river that is on the lower part of the New River.

It starts actually at Bluestone Dam and then it flows 53 miles north to Hawks Nest Dam.

The river really is the center of the National Park and Preserve, or you might call it the backbone of the National Park and Preserve.

It's really the thread that ties everything together.

Um, you know, there's land on either side of the river and in some places, the borders, the boundaries of the national river are fairly narrow.

But in other places, for instance, Grandview is a real good example of the boundaries, are quite a ways out.

[Narrator] Bluestone Lake is our first stop into the New River Gorge region.

The lake is formed by Bluestone Dam, a concrete gravity dam near Hinton.

[George Santucci] Th e Bluestone Dam is interesting because it was never really originally built to be a power generating dam.

It's an Army Corps project th at was meant for flood control to protect downstream, to protect the Mississippi River basin and the Ohio River basin from flooding.

So that dam was there to hold water back during big events, to not increase the flood pressure downstream.

-It was begun in the years before World War II.

And like so many civilian projects, it was discontinued during the war to divert the materials, the manpower, into the war effort.

But it was taken up after the war, completed in 1949.

And since that time, it served to protect the area downstream from floods.

[George Santucci] The Army Corps is right now retrofitting that dam to add turbines to it.

So, I mean, if you're gonna impede the flow of the river, let's generate some power.

I mean, right?

[laughs] So, kudos to them for adding those turbines to that dam.

So, that's ongoing right now, that project is active.

[Narrator] Just a few miles downstream from Bluestone Dam, we find one of the most unique botanical communities on the New River watershed.

Bryan Wender is the Chief of Natural Resources for the New River Gorge National Park and Preserve.

His job is to maintain a team of biologists, ecologists, and natural resource technicians.

Together, they ensure the well-being of the plants, animals, natural communities, and natural resources within the park.

[Bryan Wender] The river is a very productive aquatic ecosystem, but it also supports a very high diversity of plant life.

There are around 1,500 plant species in the park, but it's these communities supported by the river in the flood plains and in what we call the riparian area, that really contribute the most to biological diversity in the park.

There's a rare plant that grows here, it's called Baptisia australis or Blue Wild Indigo.

It's in the pea or bean family.

And it's adapted to these very harsh cobble bar communities.

It grows in river systems throughout the southeast.

There's another rare plant community that grows along the river, and that's called the Eastern Redcedar Vi rginia Pine flatrock Woodland.

And it is unlike anything else that grows along the river.

It's dominated by redcedar and Virginia pine, two species that don't normally grow along the river.

It's perched up on some rock that in the past would've been severely scoured by flood events.

But with the creation of the Bluestone Dam in the late 1940s, that regulated the flow, and we no longer see those kinds of flood events that used to clear off that rock and keep it in an open woodland environment.

[violin music] [Narrator] West Virginia's motto, Wild and Wonderful West Virginia, very much suits our next stop on the New River.

Just ten miles south of Hinton, Sandstone Falls spans 1,500 feet across and is the largest waterfall on the New River.

[Philip Prince] Well, Sandstone Falls, again, like really any of the rapids in the New River system, it's developed on a zone of hard rock that's able to support the high energy of the river crashing 15 or 20 feet down over it.

Those are layers of sandstone that, of course, are very common through the Appalachian plateau.

But Sandstone Falls, and particularly its great height and size, is a very good evidence that the river is aggressively cutting into the landscape in that area.

[Narrator] Sandstone Falls is the dramatic starting line for the New River's final rush through the New River Gorge.

From Sandstone Falls, we head northwest through Raleigh County and into Fayette County for our next stop on the New River.

The small town of Thurmond was a classic boomtown during the first two decades of the 1900s.

With the huge amounts of coal brought in from area mines, Thurmond had the largest revenue and freight tonnage on the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway, and 75,000 passengers passed through Thurmond in 1910 alone.

-Well, Thurmond was a railroad town.

It's located in the heart of a really important coalfield, but it never was a coal-mining town.

Thurmond's purpose was to ship coal out from the mines and to ship in goods and services to the coalfields.

[Narrator] The town was established by Captain W. D. Thurmond, who received the 73-acre tract of land as payment for a surveying assignment in 1873.

In 1900, the town was incorporated, and about 500 people once lived in the small rocky river valley.

-It's not a favorable site for farming.

It's certainly not a favorable site for an awful lot of things you'd want to do.

It's steep and rugged, but it's strategically located on the New River.

And Thurmond knew that as those coalfields developed, the town of Thurmond wo uld become the shipping point.

The coal starts pouring down from the coalfields and it's a strategic point for the shipping out of coal and the shipping in of goods and services in this area.

[Narrator] At its peak, Thurmond had two hotels, two banks, restaurants, clothing stores, a jewelry store, movie theater, several dry-good stores, and many business offices.

Thurmond's banks were the richest in the state.

Fifteen passenger trains a day came through town, its depot is serving as many as 95,000 passengers a year.

With that many people in and out of Thurmond, it didn't take long for things to get a bit out of hand.

-Well, Thurmond developed a bad reputation.

It was, as I said, a railroad town.

It was not a coal company town, so the coal companies couldn't manage what happened here.

Thurmond was a place you can come to to let off steam.

Now, when I speak of Thurmond, I'm speaking of Greater Thurmond.

Thurmond itself was established by and run by a strict teetotaling Baptist, W.D.

Thurmond.

There was no misbehavior within the corporate limits of Thurmond.

But in the immediate surrounding areas, there were houses of ill repute, there were bars, there were saloons, there was extensive gambling.

Supposedly, a poker game went on here for 14 years straight, uninterrupted, in the hotel across the river from Thurmond proper.

So, it was a place with a reputation, and that contributed to its popularity, and eventually, to its decline.

[Narrator] These days, Thurmond is much calmer and quieter, and only a handful of people remain within the town limits.

Amtrak still provides passenger rail service to Thurmond, although it is the second least-used rail station behind Sanderson, Texas.

The depot is now a visitor center for New River Gorge National Park and Preserve.

[mellow music] It is in Victor, West Virginia, just north of Fayetteville, that we find the New River Gorge Bridge, the 876-foot-high steel arch bridge spanning 3,030 feet over the New River Gorge.

More than 16,000 vehicles cross over the structure on a daily basis.

[Eve West] So, the bridge was completed in 1977, and prior to that, it took about 45 minutes to get from one side of the gorge to the other side.

So, when the bridge was done, it changed all that.

It became about a 45-second trip.

[Narrator] But the New River Gorge is so much more than just a great location for a time-saving bridge.

It is a recreation hotspot.

And thousands travel to the river annually to enjoy the waterway in a variety of ways.

[people shouting] Unfortunately, there are a variety of dangers on this river as well.

And no one knows that better than the river rangers who risk their lives to protect those who don't take river threats seriously.

[Kathy Zerkle] So the New River, in this stretch or this area within the park, is a white water river.

It has anything from Class Two to Class Four or Five rapids.

And it can be deceiving because a lot of the access points, it's a flat pool, and the rapids are down below.

We're a pool drop river.

We have big flat stretches and then there's a big rapid, so people are often deceived by that.

We get a lot of people th at wanna swim across the river when it's placid in those spots, but they don't realize th ere's quite a bit of current.

If there's one thing I can ask people, any time you get in the river, especially New River, make sure you're wearing a life jacket.

People do drown every year.

Unfortunately, very few of them that drown are wearing life jackets.

Most people are really out there without jackets.

[Narrator] Saving lives is also ve ry much on the minds of those who strive to conserve and protect this waterway.

The New River, in all three states, faces a multitude of threats that affect the water quality and ecosystem.

And West Virginia is not immune to any of those threats.

-And we have our own, our own unique issues in the sense that our feeder streams traditionally did not have adequate sewage treatment or stormwater runoff, and that has been much improved over the years.

But we're not quite where we need to be yet.

And that's why we're actively engaged in doing monitoring streams up and down the West Virginia part of the watershed.

And those are our problems.

Those didn't get handed to us by North Carolina or Virginia.

So it's up to us to fix those as well.

[Narrator] But what does get handed to the New River Gorge, and beyond, is whatever goes into the river system in North Carolina and Virginia.

[Philip Prince] By the time you get to the New River Gorge in West Virginia, you see mountains around you, and you say, "Wow, I'm on this river here in the wild mountains."

In reality, it's draining so much developed and populated area that water quality is a real issue there.

And that's something that I think people tend to forget.

That what's happening on farms or in towns here in Southwest Virginia is ultimately what you're rafting and playing in in West Virginia.

And to me, that's actually a significant thought and it's something that doesn't get much, much credit.

-Well, if you think of it, gravity makes everything flow downhill.

And that means that rivers flow downhill as well.

And that's why the river flows from North Carolina to us.

So anything that anyone puts in the water in North Carolina will end up down here.

[Narrator] The Clean Water Alliance is a collaborative effort between state and federal agencies, non-profit organizations and municipalities, to protect the water quality within the New River Gorge watershed.

Together, they are working on creative solutions to protect the river, the wildlife, and the communities the river supports.

Hawks Nest is where you'll find the cliffs once inhabited by fish hawks until the railroad blasted through in the late 1800s.

Hawks Nest State Park encompasses 276 acres bordering a rugged section of the New River Gorge National Park and Preserve.

And at the edge of Gauley Mountain, is where you'll find the historic Hawks Nest Lake, Hawks Nest Dam, and Hawks Nest Tunnel.

In March of 1930, construction began on Hawks Nest Dam and Tunnel, a tunnel that would divert much of the water flow of the New River, more than 160 feet, more than three miles under Gauley Mountain, to a Union Carbide hydro-electric plant some three miles away in Alloy, West Virginia.

Thousands of workers, mostly migrant and African-American, were hired to work on the project.

The Great Depression was in full swing, and jobs were scarce.

Those desperate for work took whatever jobs were available.

And for this project, the work involved digging of the tunnel that would carry the water to its destination.

-They sent two teams to work from opposite sides of the mountain.

And they just dug towards each other, eventually creating the tunnel that carries the water.

And they were digging part of the time through solid rock, through silica, and that was the problem.

They worked in ten-hour shifts.

Part of what was supposed to happen there is the drills were supposed to be run wet and so that would not only make the drill work better, but it would also keep down the dust.

That wasn't always done.

And there was supposed to be a two-hour period between each shift to allow all the dust to settle.

That wasn't always done.

And that's - you know, it was a dangerous job anyway, and it was made much more dangerous because these guys were doing it with no.

no protection at all.

[Narrator] Within a year, it is believed that between 400 and 1,000 workers died from acute silicosis, and that an additional 600-plus workers were affected by the toxic dust and died later in life, although after a number of legal proceedings, the company admitted to only 109 deaths.

-My name is Charlie Jones.

I live in [indistinct].

I lost three sons from working in a tunnel to silicosis.

One is 18, one 23, and one 21.

And I have silicosis myself, and it's impossible for me to get a job anywhere.

Nobody wanna hire me out, and the only help that I have at all is two dollars a week on federal relief.

-My husband, Cecil Jones, died of working in the Hawks Nest Tunnel, contracted silicosis and died.

I was paid a thousand dollars for his death.

And after the death, the doctor's bills was paid out of it, and I was left destitute, with two little children to take care of, and no means whatever to support them, only two dollars a week that I get from the federal government.

And I hope that Congress will make investigations that I might have something to live on.

[birds chirping] [Narrator] Today, several dozen grave markers are all that remain of the unidentified hundreds, mostly African-Americans, who died tragically due to inadequate safety measures.

The Hawks Nest Worker Memorial and Grave Site in Mount Lookout, West Virginia, honors the lives lost and brings awareness to one of the worst industrial tragedies in the history of the United States.

[somber music] The Hawks Nest Dam was completed in 1933, creating a 250-acre lake that allowed for more recreation in the region.

Because a portion of the flow of the New would be diverted through the tunnel, a five-mile stretch of river would remain fairly dry due to low water flows during much of the year.

This stretch of river is referred to as "The Dries" and remains true to its name during periods of normal water flow conditions.

Despite the Dries, and the unfortunate events of Hawks Nest Tunnel, Hawks Nest State Park offers fantastic views and plenty of recreational opportunities, including boating, swimming, rafting and hiking.

The last leg of our New River journey stretches from Hawks Nest State Park to the small town of Gauley Bridge, its name derived from the wooden-covered bridge that once carried traffic across the Gauley River.

Gauley Bridge is also the town where many of the Hawks Nest Tunnel construction workers settled while working on the tunnel project.

-When that project began in the depths of the Great Depression, Gauley Bridge was very popular with itinerant workers because this is th e closest town to the tunnel.

And from 1930 roughly to '35, there were thousands of workers wh o came through Gauley Bridge.

-But the town is called either a ghost town or the Town of the Living Dead.

And it was because the guys coming off their shift, they were covered in silica dust.

They looked like ghosts.

[Narrator] These days, with a population of about 600 people, Gauley Bridge is home to new generations of families and workers, most now employed by the Alloy Electrometallurgical Plant just a few miles away.

But most importantly, Gauley Bridge is where our story ends, as does the New River.

Joining the Gauley River, to form the Kanawha River, this newly formed waterway flows swiftly for 97 miles to the Ohio River.

On September 12, 1901, Ja mes, Robert and Newton Ballou left their home on the North Fork of the New River in North Carolina and embarked on one last summer adventure before heading back to their respective colleges.

In their homemade rowboat, the three set out to travel the majority of the New River with their sights set on Hinton, West Virginia, 200 miles away.

The Great Ballou Expedition was a success, but not without incident.

It was likely the last ever journey on the fully navigable river before dams and impediments were added.

Such an adventure would be impossible today, but there are many more equally exciting adventures to be had on the New River, and undoubtedly, many more stories to be told.

-But I can imagine that if the river could talk, it could say that, "God created me and crafted me.

I've been here for millions of years, so I can tell you stories."

I think the river would talk.

a lot, and tell you things that went on, the good, the bad, the ugly, you know, or whatever.

But I think if the river could talk, it could tell you some stories.