Courtesy of Appalachian State University
Join App State’s Dr. Neva J. Specht for an in-depth look at this storied road spanning 469 miles. Through a bit of history and a few stories about how the parkway came to be, this talk focuses on the origins, the people who promoted the parkway as well as those who fought against it, and how the Moses and Bertha Cone estate became one of the most visited attractions along the Parkway.
The Blue Ridge Parkway connects the Shenandoah National Park in western Virginia to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, which straddles southwestern North Carolina and Tennessee. Along the way, the parkway varies in width from 200 to 1,000 feet wide. Often nicknamed the “skinny park” or the “elongated park,” the Blue Ridge Parkway has become the most visited site in the National Park Service averaging between 16-20 million visitors a year.
About the Speaker:
Dr. Neva J Specht Courtesy of Watauga Democrat
Specht serves as Senior Vice Provost of Academic Affairs at App State, and is the former Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and Professor of History at the university.
A native Iowan, she received her B.A. from Grinnell College and her M.A., Museum Studies Certification, and Ph.D. from the University of Delaware.
For six years, she served as the App State University Liaison to the Blue Ridge Parkway. During that time, she completed a Historic Furnishing Report for the Blowing Rock home of Moses and Bertha Cone for the National Park Service (NPS), directed two National Endowment for the Humanities Landmarks workshops on the Blue Ridge Parkway.
She also conducted a number of oral histories for the NPS including interviews with former CCC workers for King’s Mountain National Military Park.