The Carter Farm

The Columbia Pike began as a path created by bison and other animals traveling to the salt lick at present-day Nashville, then was used by Native Americans for hunting and travel. In the 19th century, these trails became the basis for white settlers’ road system, and this road bore different names in different places, including Gidden’s Road, Brown’s Trace, and Rodgers Ford Road. As communities expanded, smaller roads branched from it to form a broader transportation network. Chartered in 1831, the Franklin and Columbia Turnpike Company improved existing roads and built tollbooths to collect maintenance fares. Commonly called pikes, these turnpikes were the highways of their day, and though some were hard surfaced, many were battered by wartime traffic from soldiers, wagons, horses, cattle, and artillery. For more than 150 years, the Columbia Pike served as a major route to Nashville, the region’s commercial center, carrying farmers and their crops to market, and it was eventually extended south to the Gulf coast. On November 30, 1864, its direct route to Nashville brought two armies to Franklin, where Union Gen. John Schofield, moving his forces toward the safety of Nashville, planned to cross the nearby Harpeth River but found the bridges impassable and was forced to build defenses there against the pursuing Confederate army.

Franklin, Tennessee · United States