Fontana Dam is a hydroelectric dam on the Little Tennessee River in Swain and Graham counties, North Carolina, United States. The dam is operated by the Tennessee Valley Authority, which built the dam in the early 1940s to satisfy the skyrocketing electricity demands in the Tennessee Valley to support the aluminum industry at the height of World War II; it also provided electricity to a formerly rural area.
Fontana Dam and powerhouse (aerial view)
Fontana's spillway in operation
Design plan for Fontana Dam, circa 1941
"Fontana Dam. Power to win." World War II poster
The Little Tennessee River is a 135-mile (217 km) tributary of the Tennessee River that flows through the Blue Ridge Mountains from Georgia, into North Carolina, and then into Tennessee, in the southeastern United States. It drains portions of three national forests— Chattahoochee, Nantahala, and Cherokee— and provides the southwestern boundary of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
Little Tennessee River in North Carolina
Henry Timberlake's 1765 Draught of the Cherokee Country, showing several Cherokee villages and towns located along the lower Little Tennessee River
Montreat College students explore the Little Tennessee River
Fort Loudoun