Fontana Dam Kids - From local TV listing

There's much attention being paid to the different celebrations of World War II these days. So we jumped in, as well. Last week, we ventured to Oak Ridge for 'The Battle of Oak Ridge." (That's not the real name we just called it that.) It was a staged reenactment as part of the Secret City Festival, included therein were 150 soldiers, half tracks, jeeps, smoke bombs, and other activities. It was a huge event. It was a depiction of WW II fighting in France. It was a 'visual' story all right. More on it, later.
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This week's Heartland episode is of a different struggle. It is based on the celebration of the children of the builders of Fontana Dam. Often, particularly in wartime, huge sacrifices are feely made. Enormous hardships are endured. Tragedy and shock, emotional trauma, these are the products of people at war. America in World War II was no different.

Our story focuses on the children: the "Fontana Dam Kids." It's about the effects of war on the children. We're paying homage to the men and women whose life and work during such trying times cost them so much and in so many ways. But we're also looking at their children who also sacrificed substantially and whose story hasn't been shared quite as often.

Following the depression, many family's were fortunate to find work with TVA constructing the great dams: Norris, Watts Bar, Watauga, and others. Imagine what it must have been like to be the children of the workers who built the Fontana Dam. They were constantly on the move. Going where the work was -- job to job until they finally ended up in the middle of the rugged mountains of western North Carolina. It was a place where before they arrived 14 families scratched out a living in a small village known as Welch's Cove. It was quiet, isolated, pretty much like most mountain communities. And nearby there were four or five other little villages scattered around, half tucked away, too. Suddenly, this place was besieged by 5,000 people hell bent on 'getting a job done.' The job was the construction of the tallest dam in the Eastern United States. It was renamed after a waterfall nearby, and called Fontana. Also, this dam had to be built fast to provide electricity for Alcoa. In fact, it was finished in record time.

Doris Clayton, Dwight Morrow and Bob Dagley, and many others 'lived' -- experienced -- this story as children; sacrifices, hard ships, what we might regard today as 'impossible' tasks were to them routine. Bob Dagley said his family of 4 lived in a 24 foot trailer. His bed replaced the kitchen table each night. In the morning, he packed it away again. Dwight Morrow's grandfather worked the night shift. He didn't have his own bed. He slept in one of the 4 beds in the house while the others worked during the day.

It was a brave new world to these children, but since it was the only world they knew, it seemed 'normal.' This was their ABNORMAL world they grew up in from 1942 until the dam was completed in 1945. Then, as fast as it all started, they were gone. It was over. Most all of the children and families scattered back across the country to the 47 states from which they came.

It was as if it was all a dream. Then in 1986, a strange thing happened: a few of these 'Fontana Dam Kids' as they later began to call themselves, found each other. It was part luck part serendipity. But as fate would have it, while visiting Fontana Resort one day quite by chance, Doris ran into a few of her 'classmates' of 40-50 years ago! Those few classmates contacted others. They worked hard to contact still others and after an enormous effort many of these 'lost children of Fontana' reunited.

They exclaimed that it was as if 'missing years' were finally found. They explained that they never really shared their quite unique experiences of their formative years with anyone. And when they did, no one quite got it. How could they understand? It's like science fiction. Finally they reunited and their childhood experiences could be shared! Tales never told now could be. They said, it was like being an 'alien' and experiencing something that was so unique that few could ever relate to it. Except it was YOUR ENTIRE LIFE! Few had ever experienced the same thing. Or, ever would again.

When 'The Fontana Dam Kids' tell stories about finding 'ONE OF US' as they call it, they light up and almost squeal with excitement and joy

Reunions are now held annually and any Fontana Dam Kid can contact the others via Fontana Dam Resort. Or, contact us here at the Heartland Series and we'll get you hooked up with your old gang, the kids of Fontana Dam: the Fontana Dam Kids.