great scott county

Hale's Plantation and Springs

Captain Drayton Hale, who died in 1915, was a remarkable man. It is said that he was one of only two men in Scott County who voted for Abraham Lincoln in 1860 (the other being C. D. Vermillion, a cousin of Captain Hale.) He was a well read, well educated man for his day --- a man of vision interested in public affairs throughout his long life.

Captain Hale operated a corn mill using the water from the large spring branch on his property by Copper Creek to turn the wheel. He operated this mill for years, but in 1897 he decided to build a bigger mill and to divert Copper Creek to get the extra water power he would need. To do so he would have to dig a tunnel through the dogtail, a hill of limestone about 300 feet wide, extending to Copper Creek.

The tunnel digging was all done by hand. Using picks, shovels, dynamite and black powder, the project took about seven years to complete. A dam was then built across Copper Creek to divert the raging waters through Captain Hale's tunnel. With the additional water power, the captain operated a sawmill, a corn and wheat mill, and a rock crusher.

The Hale home, located near the big spring, was torn down some years ago and taken to Lynn Garden, a suburb of Kingsport, Tennessee. The old mill houses are gone without a trace. Nothing is left of the dam of Copper Creek except the bottom log – which can still be seen today through the clear water of that fine mountain stream.