"On our journey up the Natchez Trace Parkway from Natchez to Nashville we are well up into Tennessee, and today we cross the TENNESSEE VALLEY DIVIDE. We have been riding along the highest elevation on the entire Natchez Trace, which is right at 1000 feet above sea level. The Tennessee Valley Divide is a watershed, part of a ridge that divides central Tennessee. Streams and creeks south of here flow into the Duck River and the Tennessee River, but to the north water flows down to the Cumberland River. It's on the banks of the Cumberland that the City of Nashville was built.

"Early travelers on foot and horseback would have been more conscious of these changes in elevation than we are today riding on a paved road, in motorized and climate controlled vehicles, and they would have noticed the directions that the streams flowed. The reason this watershed was important to travelers was because when Tennessee became a state in 1796, this ridge marked the boundary between the United States and the Chickasaw Indian Nation. This watershed marked the edge of the frontier.

"It was in 1805 that the Chickasaw began to surrender land south of the divide.

"Join us next time when we will take a look at some of the early history of Nashville, Tennessee. For Natchez Trace a road through the wilderness, I'm Frank Thomas."

For more about Natchez Trace: A Road Through the Wilderness, visit eddieandfrank.com