This Geocache is part of an annual Geocache Challenge put on by the Heritage Program at Land Between the Lakes National Recreation Area as part of our outreach to the public, to get people to explore their forest and their history, and to share the unique heritage of the families from Between the Rivers.
This Geocache is part of the “2023 Land Between the Lakes Heritage Geocache Challenge: Communities Between the Rivers”. There are 6 geocaches placed across Land Between the Lakes related to the history of some of the historic communities. If you locate each geocache, and collect a numbered aluminum tree tag from each cache, you can turn them in at the Golden Pond Visitor Center for one of 100 Challenge Coins created for this event.
The Geocache is a 6” x 6” orange watertight plastic box marked “Heritage Geocache” on the top. The geocache is placed at the base of an old tree.
Once called "Fungo," Golden Pond got it's first post office in
1848. Its first postmaster was Ed Spiceland, a soldier in the
Union Army and the post office was first built about 1.5 miles
west of Fungo next to a pond known as "Golden Pond."
Why Fungo? Local lore has it that during the early days of
the iron and timber industries, workers needed a place to
unwind, so they headed to the saloon built in a settlement
that would eventually be called "Fungo" since this is where
all the after-work "fun" was.
A Golden Pond? Local lore gets a bit muddled here. One thought is that the pond next to the post office often had a golden sheen as it reflected the light. Perhaps due to pollen floating on the surface. Another story suggests that a man who failed to make his fortune looking for gold in the West salted the pond to encourage a real estate boon and renamed the settlement Golden Pond. Then again, some people claim the fish had a gold color in the pond!
StyleThe settlement at Golden Pond became the largest town between the Tennessee and Cumberland Rivers. It was an important trade center, with a vibrant and active downtown center and a port on the Cumberland River at Devil's Elbow. The stile blocks, once used for mounting horses or carriages, remained in place from the 1800s when horse and buggy was the primary mode of transportation. You can still sit on them today at the Golden Pond Overlook across the highway where they were moved to.
1936. After a fire caused by burning trash too close to a building, most of the downtown business section had to be rebuilt. High winds and a lack of fire-fighting equipment kept the fire from being brought under control and 5 businesses, a church, a hotel, the bank, and a lodge hall were destroyed. The damage was estimated at between $30,000-50,000 (a little over $1 million in 2023 dollars).But the town of Golden Pond thrived before and after that event. It wasn't until TVA created LBL that the small town of Golden Pond was all but erased from the landscape. If you're careful some bits remain and you can find them. A well here, foundation stones there, a cemetery or two... And the people continued on and return often in homecomings and just daily visits to their ancestral lands.