Tellico Dam

Tellico Dam is a concrete gravity and earthen embankment dam on the Little Tennessee River that was built by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) in Loudon County, Tennessee. Planning for a dam structure on the Little Tennessee was reported as early as 1936 but was deferred for development until 1942. Completed in 1979, the dam created the Tellico Reservoir and is the last dam to be built by the Tennessee Valley Authority. Unlike the agency's previous dams built for hydroelectric power and flood control, the Tellico Dam was primarily constructed as an economic development and tourism initiative through the planned city concept of Timberlake, Tennessee. The development project aimed to support a population of 42,000 in a rural region in poor economic conditions. Referred to as a pork barrel, the Tellico Dam is the subject of several controversies regarding the need of its construction and the impacts the structure had on the surrounding environment. Inundation of the Little Tennessee required the acquisition of thousands of acres, predominantly multi-generational farmland and historic sites such as the Fort Loudoun settlement and several Cherokee tribal villages including Tanasi, the origin of Tennessee's name. Most of the acreage around the final lakeshore, originally seized through eminent domain, was sold to private developers to create retirement-oriented golf resort communities such as Tellico Village and Rarity Bay. The Tellico Dam project was also controversial because of the risk it was believed to pose to the endangered snail darter fish species. Environmentalist groups took the TVA to court as a means to halt the project and protect the snail darter. The court action delayed the final completion of the dam for over two years. In the 1978 case Tennessee Valley Authority v. Hill heard by the Supreme Court of the United States, the court ruled in favor of the environmental groups and declared that the completion of Tellico Dam was illegal.