The History of Jellico

Jellico is located in Campbell County, Tennessee, United States, on the state border with Kentucky, 58 miles by road north of Knoxville Tennessee. The population was 2,355 at the time of the 2010 census.

The city of Jellico was initially founded in 1878 as "Smithburg" but later in 1883 its name was changed to "Jellico" to capitalize on the growing popularity of Jellico coal. The city was incorporated on March 7, 1883. Throughout the 1890s and early 1900s, Jellico was one of the most productive coal fields in Kentucky and Tennessee.

Jellico was built on a foundation of God, friends and family. Residents of Jellico have always held strong to their faith in Christianity as apparent by the many historic churches throughout the community which still thrive today. Since 1922, Jellico has been the home of the denominational headquarters for the Church of God Mountain Assembly, a holiness Pentecostal Christian denomination.

Jellico was the childhood home of Grace Moore, soprano star of opera, musical theatre. She was nicknamed the "Tennessee Nightingale." Her films helped to popularize opera by bringing it to a larger audience. She was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in One Night of Love.

Moore was born Mary Willie Grace Moore, the daughter of Tessa Jane and Richard Lawson Moore. She was born in the community of Slabtown (now considered part of Del Rio) in Cocke County, Tennessee.

By the time she was two years old, her family had relocated to Knoxville, a move Moore later described as traumatic, as she found urban life distasteful at the time. After several years in Knoxville, the family again relocated to Jellico, Tennessee, where Moore spent her adolescence.

After high school in Jellico, she studied briefly at Ward-Belmont College in Nashville before moving to Washington, D.C. and New York City to continue her musical training and begin her career. Her first paying job as a singer was at the Black Cat Cafe in Greenwich Village

In 1947, Moore died in a plane crash at the age of 48. She published an autobiography in 1944 titled You're Only Human Once. In 1953, a film about her life was released titled So This Is Love starring Kathryn Grayson.

Jellico was also home to Homer Rodeheaver, evangelist, music director, music publisher, composer of gospel songs, and pioneer in the recording of sacred music.

He published several songbooks, often buying and re-copyrighting old material, including ‘The Old Rugged Cross’ and ‘(He Walks With Me) In The Garden’, which he had recorded in 1916, the first of several recordings he made of this C. Austin Miles song. (In the 60s, the song was recorded by Elvis Presley.)

In 1906, a railroad car packed with dynamite exploded in Jellico, killing nine and destroying part of the town. Many of the buildings located downtown date back to this time and are still standing as a reminder of this tragedy.

On July 6, 1944 (3 miles east of Jellico) a troop train carrying new recruits on the Louisville and Nashville Railroad derailed, causing the locomotive and 4 leading cars to fall 50 feet into Clear Fork River; 35 people were killed and 100 more injured.

The Louisville & Nashville Railroad train had picked up speed through the mountains but wasn't running as smoothly as it had in flatter country. The men, sleeping or preparing for bed, knew the train was behind schedule. But they still thought it was going too fast. That's when they heard the crack.

And seconds later, the train was ripped in half. The engine, tender and four cars plunged 50 feet below. Twelve died instantly.

It is reported that 1,006 fresh recruits were on the train headed to "points South" the destination was classified because of the war.

The recruits, having finished basic training, were on their way to their first assignment to an Army unit at Fort Benning in Georgia. The train stopped in Corbin, Ky. before starting through the mountains at Jellico, near the Kentucky-Tennessee border.

The Jenkins Hotel fire is still named one of the most tragic events to ever happen in Jellico. Although the death toll was only 7.

In 1971, Indian Mountain State Park was created at the site of a reclaimed strip mine in Jellico. In 1999, much of North and South Main Street was placed on the National Register of Historic Places as the Jellico Commercial Historic District.

The historic Jellico Post Office was built in 1915. The first floor was a post office and the second floor was devoted to the activities of the U.S. Bureau of Mines and a local mine rescue organization serving the coal mining region around Jellico.

Mine rescue stations were outfitted with equipment needed to respond to underground mining accidents and served as sites for conducting training of local mining personnel. The basement was once a fully functional bomb shelter.

The old post office building is haunted by several spirits. Disembodied footsteps and loud voices are heard when no one is around. Mail is thrown around the post office, and objects go missing, only to turn up in different places to where they were left. The apparition of a tall dark man has been seen on several occasions in the post office building. People have also claimed to have seen a white apparition walking the stairwell at night. Some employees refuse to be there after dark.

"You will be hard pressed to find a more beautiful place filled with so much history than Jellico Tennessee"