Birth of the Tail of the Dragon

I have been driving the Tail of the Dragon since 1976. At first it was in the family car when we were finishing construction of my parent's vacation home near Robbinsville. There were limited building materials available locally in those days, so a couple of trips across US129 to Maryville for paint and paneling were necessary. I was the driver delegated to make the trips in the station wagon and loved the twists and turns with absolutely no traffic.

We made trips to the mountains at least once a year and sometimes two or three times. By 1983 the trips became even more frequent after I purchased the house and property adjoining my parent's vacation home. We of course would tour the mountain roads and by that time I was driving a 1976 Corvette, much more fun on that "damn crooked road to Tennessee" as locals called it. Little did I know that I would later name the road and some of the corners. I never dreamed it would become world famous.

After my divorce in 1980 and then an escape from a miserable eight year relationship, I met Nancy Marten in 1989. The next year I introduced Nancy to the "damn crooked road" on a trip from Kentucky back to West Palm Beach. We took a slight detour and hit the "crooked road" at midnight. It was foggy and would have scared a lot of people, but not Nancy. We took the T-tops off, cranked up the stereo and had a great spooky run. We were the only car on the highway and the Vette made it even better. Nancy was hooked.

In 1991 I retired from the West Palm Beach Florida Fire Department as a Battalion Chief after twenty-two years service. We moved to Robbinsville permanently. We still had the Corvette but were more interested in setting up our homestead than anything else. It was a unique change coming from the big city to our 20 acre little piece of heaven hidden in the backwoods.

Traffic was usually very light with an Average Daily Traffic (ADT) count of just 400 vehicles in those days. For several years we were countrified rarely going to the big city. We gardened, raised chickens, geese, and pigs. One thing we continued was our interest in computers and the Internet. In 1994 we actually constructed our first web site for new friends Robert and Karen Rankin who had just purchased the Snowbird Mountain Lodge. Looking back it was an amazing feat using Microsoft Publisher and dial-up connections.

Tail of the Dragon

To those coming from the North Carolina side, the Dragon begins at Fugitive Bridge with a view of the Cheoah Dam where Harrison Ford jumped in the movie The Fugitive. It ends 14 miles across the mountain at the Tabcat Creek Bridge in Tennessee. From Fugitive Dam US129 climbs through The Slide, a steep series of "S" curves where one would not want to meet one of the tractor-trailers that come this way at times. The road then levels and straightens until a series of curves approaching Deals Gap Motorcycle Resort and the Tail of the Dragon T-shirt Shack with its Big Metal Dragon. Next comes Deals Gap and the Tennessee State Line. For the next eleven miles, technically the Official Tail of the Dragon, most people just remember curve after curve after curve and surviving the run of their lives.

After riding many other twisties across the United States, we always come home to the Dragon and rate it the best of them all. We have ridden roads that have more hairpins, roads with more scenic beauty, and roads much more dangerous than the Dragon, but overall there is no comparison. The Dragon wins hands down.

In addition to the 1993 movie The Fugitive, three other movies have been filmed along this road. The first feature film made on US 129 was Thunder Road. This 1958 Robert Mitchum film about backwoods moonshining had scenes at the power line easement at about mile 4.5 on the Dragon map and you can see the old wooden "safety" posts on the corner. A few of the old posts still remain.

Part of the 1971 classic movie Two-Lane Blacktop was filmed on the Dragon. There are scenes of the state line sign, some of the curves, the old Esso Gas Station, Macs Motel and Café, Tapoco Dam and the original single lane bridge below the dam. These scenes are in the last ten minutes of the movie. This unique film featuring a 1955 Chevy and a 1970 GTO was filmed at various locations across the United States. There were three Chevies and two GTOs. A car carrier transported the cars to each shooting location. The movie is so bad it is good and has become a cult classic. It is the only movie James Taylor ever appeared in …. they discovered he couldn't act.

About 1999 I began to video the crossings and naming the various sections and curves. I had been using Adobe Illustrator at the West Palm Beach Fire Department for years to draw the city streets with hydrant locations. I started drawing the US 129 from Tapoco to Tabcat Bridge in Tennessee. We just called it the Dragon in those days. The curves and various points on the highway were named for topographical features, some historical references, and several were just made-up to denote the oddities of the roadway itself. A couple of places like Picnic Tables and The Wall had appeared on Doug Snavely's original map that Pete at Crossroads of Time had photocopied and sold for a dollar each. The map which featured an outline of the road as the back of a dragon only named three places.

By 2000 I had graduated to motorcycles. I have always loved the road, finding it a hoot in whatever we happened to be driving. One of the most exciting rides was in our Expedition over an icy roadway in 4-wheel drive. Another was arriving at the Dragon on our motorcycle in early April on a return trip from Atlanta with a light snow falling with temps in the low 30s.

The Tail of the Dragon gained popularity after our website TailoftheDragon.com went on-line in 2000. This site, run by Ron and Nancy Johnson of Robbinsville, offered T-shirts, souvenirs, photos, maps, and advice on how to survive at the Dragon. It was at this point that we secured a Federal Trademark to protect our products as does Harley Davidson and Disney.

After our business began to take off Nancy retired from the school system. Her superintendent boss couldn't believe she was leaving her well paying job to sell T-shirts, but he just didn't understand how much work went into our now flourishing business.

In 2000 we had a couple of motorcycle groups stay in our TreeTops Vacation Rental. We went up the hill and checked-out their motorcycles and gear. Several members of this group are still our friends in 2018. The group from Texas, California, Tennessee and Ontario had met on the Internet and still come to the TreeTops the first week of every May.

The other group is known as C.O.R.E. or the Central Ohio Riding Enthusiasts. Their make-up has changed over the years, but members of the group still come every year. One of the originals was Mark Brauning from Columbus.

Finally one day in May of 2000 I mentioned that we should consider getting a motorcycle. Nancy headed for the computer and ten minutes later called me to see the motorcycle I was going to buy. It was a 1998 Honda Shadow Spirit 1100. All bikes looked alike to me and I would have no idea if it was a good one or not. After calling the seller in Alabama I called my friend Carl who had taunted us for years about getting a cycle and told him we were going to make a trip to finally get me a motorcycle.

A couple of days later we were standing in an Alabama driveway looking at a yellow machine that I had no idea how to operate. I was 53 and had never ridden one of these things. Carl got on it and fired up the engine. It sounded okay so I paid the man and loaded it on the trailer. Back at home we rolled it into the garage and Carl gave me a couple of instructions showing me the throttle, shift lever and brakes. I was a nervous wreck just thinking about taking this out on the road.

For the next two weeks I would venture into the garage several times a day and just stare at the alien machine for ten or fifteen minutes at a time. Finally one morning Nancy had gone out running and I built-up enough courage to take the cruiser out for the first time.

The first hundred yards on our driveway was a real challenge as it was loose gravel with a switchback and climb. Then another 300 yards of gravel out to the pavement. I don't know how, but I made it to the asphalt. On the highway I managed to get to the highest point of the Cherohala at over 5400 feet before turning around and making it back home feeling something like a Wright brother on his first flight. The run was only 20 miles, but I had survived.

The next day I went to take my written test without studying and failed it. Taking a pamphlet home to study I did pass it the next day and got my learner's permit and it was off to that "damn twisty road into Tennessee". Within a week I was dragging pegs and throwing sparks.

We had a group of sport bikers at one of our rental houses a few weeks after my first ride and they asked me to guide them to the Dragon. Off we went on the Joyce Kilmer back road. At the Dragon I pulled over and told them to go ahead. They insisted that I lead them on their first run. Taking off I kept looking in the rearview and had to keep slowing to keep from losing them. At the Overlook they couldn't believe how fast I was going through the curves on the big cruiser. Hell, I was taking it easy!

Nancy rode two-up a few times before announcing that she wanted her own bike. Carl and I found a Honda Shadow 750 and bought it for her. We putted around for a few weeks before she had enough of the underpowered mini-cruiser. She picked-up a SV 650 Suzuki sport bike.

It was about this time in the summer of 2000 that we went looking for biker gear and T-shirts. We stopped at the Crossroads of Time which was in the process of changing hands from the crusty old Pete to new owners looking to cash in on the motorcycle crowd. Nancy rejected the cheap T-shirts they were selling as insulting and poor quality. One actually said "I'm Dragon Trash". No way she would ever wear anything like that.

We attended the Honda Hoot in Asheville with Carl and Polly hoping to find some decent Dragon stuff. We were amazed that there was nothing available. We toured the inside of a Fun Mover RV thinking we could never afford anything like that.

Returning home Nancy mentioned that we should make our own T-shirts to sell. I had drawn maps using a computer program for years at the fire department and had actually drawn one of the Dragon. Nancy said we could use that on the back of a shirt. She was soon on the Internet looking for an artist to design us a dragon.

She found some great dragons on a site by artist Massimiliano "Max" Bertuzzi. We exchanged emails and he agreed to create a special dragon for us. We described the details; a dragon with wings raised to resemble a "gap" in the mountains with a road edged with spikes down its back and tail. The dragon would be "blowing fire" on its tail to signify a dangerous roadway.

Max quoted us a $100 fee for the project which we thought was quite reasonable. I was surprised when he gave us his address in Italy. The Internet had played a big part in our first commercial project.

After a few sketches and corrections we had our first dragon. We felt it was an excellent representation of what the road was all about.

My map took several weeks to create. I drove the entire 11 miles a number of times filming and marking the various mile markers. Back at home I assembled a number of references to come-up with the various names that would appear on parts of the map. My main source was the USGS topography map. The map was finally drawn with several dozen curves and straights named. We were ready for T-shirts. As of 2011 Max was still drawing dragons and had our Tail of the Dragon on his site, MaxBert.com. By 2013 the site had changed.

We formed our Tail of the Dragon, LLC and purchased TailoftheDragon.com and US129.com in September 1999. With the new designs and a couple of photos of the Dragon we started our website in early 2000.

There is much more coming. The fun is just beginning.........