“There is nothing more eloquent in nature than a mountain stream.”
— John Muir, describing the Emory River along the northern Cumberland Plateau as he journeyed to the Gulf of Mexico in 1867 — the first mountain stream he had ever encountered.
Hi, I’m Ben Garrett. I am a journalist from East Tennessee — publisher of the Independent Herald, a weekly newspaper serving the Big South Fork region of the Cumberland Plateau, with a sideline in website development and digital marketing. I am also an erstwhile blogger. Mainly, I’m just trying to see the world as John Muir saw it when he hiked across the Cumberland Plateau to the Gulf of Mexico in 1867.
The latest…
A few things that have been on my mind recently…
Victims of a shocking double-murder buried on a forgotten mountainside
The older I get, the more of a fan I become of old cemeteries. Not the well-kept and often-visited cemeteries so much as the forgotten…
The mountains are calling: Climbing to the top of Scott County, Tenn.
“The mountains are calling and I must go.” Well over 100 years since John Muir’s death, that famous quote by the great American conservationist still…
The Chimney Rocks fire fundamentally changed ‘The Leaners’ at Station Camp
It has been four years since the devastating 2016 wildfire season that left an indelible impact on much of East Tennessee. The deadly Chimney Tops…
A super rarity: Twin hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico?
The experts were calling for a strong finish to the 2020 hurricane season in the Atlantic basin, and it looks like things are about to…
America’s tightening presidential race
As a University of Tennessee football fan in the 2000s, “prevent defense” became feared terminology in my house. We ripped John Chavis (then the defensive…
The rest of the blog…
Featured Posts…
Some recent posts that I want to highlight…
Places I’ve left behind
The very first outdoors column I published in our weekly newspaper. I had published some pieces in various regional outdoors publications, but this was my…
The ins and outs of St. George Island
A few years ago, I wrote an in-depth guide on St. George Island. It was the most popular article ever posted on this blog. Each…