Logan Turnpike

Established in 1821, the 7.5-mile Logan Turnpike toll road ran through Tesnatee Gap and connected Cleveland, Georgia, to Blairsville, Georgia, becoming a vital trade route for residents of the North Georgia mountains, where the lack of roads and other transportation routes had made trade difficult. For a small fee, it gave remote mountain settlements passage through the mountains by horse-drawn wagons to surrounding towns, allowing previously isolated communities to trade produce, livestock, and forest products such as ginseng and chestnuts for store-bought items such as coffee, sugar, and shoes. So steep and rugged that wagons often had to drag fair-sized trees behind them to keep from running over the horses, Logan's Turnpike remained well used into the 1920s until it was abandoned after a paved road across Neel's Gap to the south was completed for easier automobile access.

Georgia · United States