Walker Mill Hydroelectric Station, Sevierville Tennessee

Date added: October 20, 2023 Categories: Tennessee Power Plant Hydroelectric Power
Dam and Power House, looking east (1990)

The Walker Mill Hydroelectric Station is the kind of hydroelectric engineering project typical at the time of its construction on the smaller rivers of the State of Tennessee. Its design, while not unique among its class in the Volunteer State, displays the typical vertical emphasis of what can be called "early hydro-style." It, along with another now demolished site, provided the electric needs of the town of Sevierville until 1938 when the TVA acquired the station. It is capable of operation today when the water level is high enough.

The Walker Mill Hydroelectric Station represents a change in the business of trading, commerce, services, and commodities, and the gradual introduction of electricity into everyday human existence during the early twentieth century in Tennessee.

Initial interest in a hydroelectric facility was expressed in Sevierville in 1912. On October 28, 1914, the concrete dam was finished, and by November of that year the facility began generating electricity. Local competition flourished and soon there were two hydroelectric stations on the West Prong of Pigeon Forge River, one at the Newport Milling Company site, the other at the Walker Mill site. By 1938 the TVA had purchased both sites and by 1940 sold them back to the city of Sevierville which would buy its power from TVA and extend its own system to local rural areas. Only the Walker Mill site is extant and occasionally in operation when the river level is adequately high.

Site Description

The Walker Mill Hydroelectric Station is located in Sevier County (population 41,418) on the West Prong of the Little Pigeon River at mile 2.5, and just off U.S. Highway 441.

The dam is a concrete gravity structure approximately 227 feet long and eleven and five-tenths feet high. It features an uncontrolled spillway section 115 feet in length.

The steel-reinforced concrete powerhouse substructure and brick powerhouse measure forty feet by twenty feet and is located on the dam approximately fifty feet from the right abutment. One tapered concrete pillar extends from the river helping support the powerhouse's northwest corner. The intake is an opening in the powerhouse headwall which is controlled by two gates. The water conductor is a simple open flume.

Walker Mill Hydroelectric Station, Sevierville Tennessee Dam, looking south (1990)
Dam, looking south (1990)

Walker Mill Hydroelectric Station, Sevierville Tennessee Dam and Power House, looking east (1990)
Dam and Power House, looking east (1990)

Walker Mill Hydroelectric Station, Sevierville Tennessee Dam and Power House, looking southeast (1990)
Dam and Power House, looking southeast (1990)

Walker Mill Hydroelectric Station, Sevierville Tennessee Power House, looking north (1990)
Power House, looking north (1990)

Walker Mill Hydroelectric Station, Sevierville Tennessee Power House, south elevation (1990)
Power House, south elevation (1990)

Walker Mill Hydroelectric Station, Sevierville Tennessee Power House, east and north elevation (1990)
Power House, east and north elevation (1990)

Walker Mill Hydroelectric Station, Sevierville Tennessee Power House, north elevation (1990)
Power House, north elevation (1990)