The Lake Blue Ridge of Yesterday

Go back before 1925, and you'd have a hard time finding lake front property around Blue Ridge!  That's because there wasn't any!  It wasn't until that time that work started on the dam.  Prior to that time, the Toccoa River flowed from one end of Fannin County to the other completely uninterrupted.  The lake was built with the primary reason of generating hydroelectric power for what was then known as theTennesee Electric Power Company.

Building the dam was a massive project, especially for something of this scale, 80 years ago!  Special quarries were created to provide large rocks for the dam.  Small rail lines were built that extended for miles upon miles to carry not only rock and soil to the site,  but also heavy equipment that was delivered from the full size cargo trains that would offload them near Blue Ridge.

Although specialized engineers were brought in for the project, most of the workers were local residents of the Blue Ridge area. Even today many local families of this area can probably name a relative of theirs that worked on this project.   For six years crews worked on building this giant pile of earth, that would eventually become the Lake Blue Ridge Dam.  It would eventually reach a height of 165 feet and 1000 feet wide at it's base!  A spillway was also added to allow additional overfow during times of extremely high water.

Building the original 5 floodgates, it eventually was widened to allow for 3 more additional gates

The area that is covered by the lake also had to be prepared.  Homes were all bought up and torn down, even their foundations were removed.  Every tree was cut down that covered the thousands and thousands of acres that would become Lake Blue Ridge.  The common method used during that time was the two handled hand saw with one man on each end.   This was decades before the invention of the chainsaw!  What would eventually be the lake bottom was stripped virtually bare.  These loggers were so efficient that decades later, large brush piles, also known as fish attractors would have to be put in place to help give fish a better place to spawn and thrive.       During the planning stage of the lake, a second dam was concieved to be closer to the headwaters to help control the level of the lake.  As the depression of 1929 came about, the second dam idea was abandoned leaving all of us with the ability to drive our boats right up to where the Toccoa River flows directly into the lake with absolutely no obstructions.

After the water had risen and the newly formed lake was now open, people immediately headed out for a swim or to row their boat around the lake.  Your options were pretty limited back then. There were no personal watercraft, no ski boats, no pontoon boats.  Most of the "toys" we associate with the lake didn't exist back then.  People with lakefront property didn't move to the lake, the lake had come to them.  The lake was as it is today, 70 percent US Forest Service, but the remaining 30 percent was still mostly vacant.

This view is from the location of the present day Lake Blue Ridge Marina, taken soon after the lake opened.

At first, the lake was named Lake Toccoa after the Toccoa River that flowed in and back out of it.  This led to so much confusion that in 1934, Governor Eugene Talmadge signed an order to change the name to Lake Blue Ridge!  Five years later, in 1939, Lake Blue Ridge was bought by the Tennesee Valley Authority and is maintained still to this day by the TVA.    As outboard motors became more available to the public, more and more people began to tour and explore lake blue ridge with their small wooden boats with the motors strapped on the back.  This eventually gave way to ski boats which really began to attract people during the 1950's.  As people began to have more and more ways to have fun on the lake, lakefront homes began to be constructed.  Most were tiny cabins or even just well constructed shacks to camp in.  The idea of an actual second home was not nearly as common as it is today.     After Hwy 515 was completed in the mid 1980's, people from Atlanta and other outlying areas began to realize that this lake was now only a little over an hours drive away.  It soon became a great location for a weekend getaway for people who wanted out of the city!  Supply and Demand kicked in and soon prices rose beyond what anyone in their home made cabins of the 50's could ever have imagined!  It's easy to see why.  With Lake Blue Ridge being 70 percent USFS, only 30 percent remains for private use.  This also leaves much of the lake in the same pristine condition as when it was first built.  Coves you can fish in without houses looking down on you from every angle,   just you and nature.     Although the shorelines have changed a small bit over time with years and years of waves and wind, you can still be in many places on the lake that look exactly the same as they did 80 years ago and hopefully will look 80 years from now!

Although 80 years old and a little weathered, the Lake Blue Ridge Pinstock is still in active use and pulls water from it's base daily to feed the powerhouse below the Dam

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