Hooper Bald – This mile-high peak in the Great Smokies in one of nature’s unsolved mysteries. It is a botanical puzzle that has baffled the minds of scientists for centuries. Trees refuse to grow on its summit, and no one really knows why. This peculiarity, however, is not confined to Hooper Bald alone. There are other peaks in the Great Smokies and elsewhere in Western North Carolina that are treeless too. They are bald because of some strange whim of nature, and not because of fire or the lumberman’s ax. They have probably been bald ever since the world suffered the travail and spasms of its youth. Strangely enough, the mountain balds are found only in the Southern Appalachians. This tends to make the mystery more mysterious, rarer and stranger still.
Through the years, theory after theory has been advanced to explain the “bald mountain” mystery. Scientists have pondered the question and cannot agree on an answer. No one has come up with an acceptable reason why certain mountain tops ranging from 2,000 to 6,000 feet in this neck of the highlands will not support trees. Altitude or timber line is not the answer, for Clingman’s Dome and Mountain Mitchell are almost 7,000 feet and timbered to the top. “These balds,” said Arthur Stupka, a retired park naturalist, “do not indicate timber line conditions, for nearby forested summits stand as high or higher. One is tempted to think of them as relics of some former climatic period, now partly engulfed in the prevailing forest but their true explanation remains elusive.”
Dr. B.W. Wells, a retired botanist from North Carolina State College, advance a theory that the Cherokee has created these bald summits. He pointed out the certain mountain tops were favored camping grounds of the Cherokee and that they continually burned off the tops to furnish space for the villages, and also to provide unobstructed lookout points. This, however, is contrary to the findings of anthropologists and archeologists. Their findings show that the Cherokee always built their villages in the valleys and beside streams, never on mountain tops.
The answer may still lie with the Cherokee. They had a few myths to explain these balds. It seems that in the ancient days, Cherokee villages were subject to the incursions of a mythical monster, Ulagu, resembling a gigantic hornet that would swoop down, snatch up a child in its claws and vanish so swiftly that pursuit was impossible. Every possible method of defense and offense was tried with no avail. Meantime, the raids continued, and the villages were fast being depopulated. Finally, sentinels were posted on the mountain tops and were able to trace Ulagu to its lair, an inaccessible cavern high on a sheer precipitous mountain side. While they had found its retreat, the Cherokee were little better off than before. They gathered in a great council and implored for Divine assistance. The Great Spirit heard their pleas and sent to their aid the lightning that split off the whole side of the mountain. When the smoke and dust cleared away, there lay the Ulagu, dazed but still alive. Quickly the warriors feel upon it with spear and ax, ridding themselves of the great scourge. So pleased was the Great Spirit with their initiative in uncovering its hiding place, their piety in appealing for Divine aid in the extremity, and their bravery in the final combat, that it was His decree that in the future the tops of the highest mountains be bare of timber, to better serve as stations for sentries should another such visitation occur.
It is as good an answer as any. But the mystery still remains to taunt the imagination. And no one really knows why trees refuse to grow on Hooper Bald or other similar mountain tops in the Southern Appalachians.