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The Valley River is a tributary of the Hiwassee River that begins as a pair of springs in the Snowbird Mountains of Cherokee County, North Carolina and descends 〔USGS Topographic Map; 7.5 minute series, Topton, North Carolina; 1976; USGS Topographic Map; 7.5 minute series, Andrews, North Carolina, 1990 and USGS Topographic Map; 7.5 minute series, Murphy, North Carolina, 1990〕 in elevation in approximately to enter the Hiwassee embayment at Murphy, North Carolina. The Valley River flows generally southwest, roughly paralleling US 19 between Topton, North Carolina, and Murphy, North Carolina having a total watershed of 120 m2 (11.15km2)〔Hiwassee River Basin Report http://h2o.enr.state.nc.us/basinwide/documents/Chapter2Subbasin02_001.pdf〕 ==Geology== The Valley River’s origin dates from the uplifting of the Appalachian chain during the Paleozoic Era, Devonian Period, in an event known as the Alleghenian orogeny. Earlier in the Paleozoic the area was the site of shallow seas which resulted in large limestone deposits. The Alleghenian orogeny caused both uplift and the metamorphism of rock at the highest pressure points within the various Appalachian mountain chains. The Snowbird and Unicoi Mountains which border the Valley River contain silver, gold, copper, limestone, sandstone, marble, brown iron ore in economically recoverable quantities.〔Asheville Historical Resources Commission: referenced to: (1883. Wilbur G. Zeigler and Ben Grosscup. ''In the Heart of the Alleghanies...'', pp. 208-9) http://www.heritagewnc.org/WNC_mines_minerals/default_mines_minerals.htm〕 The erosion of the mountains over a 480 million year period allowed the Valley River to carve a broad flat valley with rich fertile soil. Marble, North Carolina is the site of high-quality white, gray, pink and blue marble. It has been known since the removal of the Cherokee in 1838-1839 and has been quarried intermittently ever since. Near Rhodo, North Carolina is Silvermine Creek, said to be the location of a small silver deposit. Silvermine Creek is a tributary of the Valley River. Silvermine may derive its name from the following story: ''In the counties west of the Blue Ridge, there has been as yet no exploration to any depth beneath the surface of the ground, with perhaps the single exception of the old excavations in the county of Cherokee. According to the most commonly received Indian tradition, they were excavated more than a century ago, by a company of Spaniards from Florida. They are said to have worked there for two or three summers, to have obtained a white metal, and prospered greatly in their mining operations, until the Cherokees, finding that if it became generally known that there were valuable mines in their country, the cupidity of the white men would expel them from it, determined in solemn council to destroy the whole party, and that in obedience to that decree no one of the adventurous strangers was allowed to return to the country whence they came. Though this story accords very well with the Indian laws which condemned to death those who disclosed the existence of mines to white men, yet I do not regard it as entitled too much credit''.〔." (T.L. Clingman's letter to the Editor of The Highland Messenger, Asheville ()'s newspaper in 1849 Lanman, Charles. Letters from the Allegheny Mountains, p. 189.)〕 Talc has been mined in Cherokee County since at least the 1850s.〔History of Western North Carolina: Volume XXV: Mines & Mining; John Preston Arthur; 1914 ()〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Valley River」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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