Green

The above is here to be included in this page about the history of Tuxedo Hydro.

Built in 1916-1917 by the Blue Ridge Power Company, and making power by 1918, above is an early photo of the dam at Lake Summit. Blue Ridge Power was sold to the Broad River Electric Company in 1926, and then later sold to Duke Power, which became Duke Energy. In 2018, one hundred years since it first generated electricity, Tuxedo Hydro was sold to Arizona based Northbrook Energy, which bought five older Duke plants mostly in western North Carolina. This 2011 article in the Tryon Daily Bulletin goes over some of the history of hydroelectric power in the area.

See Kevin Colburn's May 2018 article on the American Whitewater site about the sale to Northbrook and related discussions about maintaining a similar release schedule for recreational interests. Agreements to maintain a similar program were completed thanks to the work of AW and the property owners along Lake Summit. The sale to Northbrook was also covered in the local popular press to varying degrees; see this story in the Hendersonville Lightning, for example.

Below is from a brief snippet of an article with a couple photographs in the January-June 1921 edition of Engineering World, detailing some of the information about the then recently built dam and Tuxedo hydro plant.

Interestingly, in George Ladshaw's original (and never completed) 1906 plans for four dams along the Upper Green and the Narrows, he claimed his four smaller dams would have generated 12,730 horsepower vs. the 8000 horsepower said to be generated by the one dam in the article above. Less power = more fun.

Thanks to Christopher Stovall for finding the Engineering World article and photos, a couple more of which can be found here.

A double whammy all across western North Carolina, as reflected above in a graph of the French Broad River during the high water May of 2018. Here is the USGS page for the French Broad.

Above is a photograph Woody Callaway took on Tuesday evening, May 29th, 2018. This is Hammer Factor at maybe the highest it has been seen, or at least the highest it has been photographed that I can find. What the actual level is in inches is anyone's guess.

Handy information when running the Green River Dries. The table above shows the level in feet over the top of dam at Lake Summit, and corresponding flow rates in cfs. Note that the flow increases exponentially as the water rises. The Lake Summit dam, which feeds Tuxedo Hydro via tubular methods, is about 300' long, and very approximately 210' of that is the portion the water flows over. A more generalized table of water over a dam and flow rates can be found here, but neither of these tables show what happens beyond one foot over the top.

Thanks to Tim Bell for providing this.

Above is an undated early photograph of The Notch, from the Historic Saluda Facebook page, and possibly taken by OB Garren in about 1900. It looks like Pencil Sharpener is a little different on the Flying Squirrel side? Maybe not. I put 5' for the level but have no clue as I didn't paddle that day.

Here's another one, dated 1906 and taken from this album, on a fine Summer day for a picnic:

Sweeping Historical Conjecture

This is likely just coincidental, but it was in June of 1906 that George Ladshaw was first hired to evaluate the hydro power potential of the Green River, and so he created a plan, blueprints, and a map to that end, which he then submitted on December 12th of that year. Those can be found on this page. Call it amusing guesswork and perhaps a reach too far, but what if this photograph above is of the Ladshaw family when George dragged them down there to look at his latest project?!?

Many thanks to Cindy Stephenson Tuttle, the chair of the Historic Saluda Committee, for her assistance with these photographs. Their Facebook page can be found here.

Stunning photo looking up the landslide that went for hundreds of feet starting near the top of the switchbacks heading down to Fishtop. For more on the 2018 Green River Flood, go here.

Great photo looking down the landslide that went for hundreds of feet starting near the top of the switchbacks heading down to Fishtop. For more on the 2018 Green River Flood, go here.

Great photo (including Bill Clipper) looking at the landslide that went for many many hundreds of feet starting near the top of the switchbacks and heading down to Fishtop. For more on the 2018 Green River Flood, go here.

Crom Carey's photo of Pencil Sharpener at a guesstimated 45', taken the day following the big rains on May 18th. More pics/info here.

Great pic from Rowan Stuart early Saturday morning May 19th following the four day rain-a-palooza in western North Carolina. The 45' level is a total guess here. For more information on the Green River Flood of 2108, go here.

The Green River Flood of 2018

Rainfall: 10.12' in 4 days, including and capped off by 5.87' in just 3 hours on May 18th, as measured near Pulliam Creek on Big Hungry Road.

Above is a photo of a very high water Groove Tube taken by Crom Carey on Saturday morning following the exceptional rains on Friday night, May 18th. This led to serious flooding in Polk and surrounding counties of western North Carolina. A ball-parked guess for the river level by those on site is around 45'. Tuxedo was releasing 200% and the lake was at 101' or close to it. How high the Green got overnight is unknown. In comparison, while the high water year of 2013 was astounding in its duration/intensity, it did not blow-up like this in a single event. Scroll down for more photos of the Green, and some landslide pics from the Switchbacks.

A Very Rare Event

For perspective, one inch of rain in one hour's time is very heavy rain, but not uncommon and happens more than once per year. To maintain one inch per hour for three hours is much more rare, and happens on average once every ten years. The pace of two inches of rain per hour is a frog strangler, and to keep it up for one full hour happens by probability once every five years. Maintaining that two inches per hour pace for three hours straight is what created the epic rinse-down which the rivers, creeks, roads, culverts, and homes, couldn't handle, and is so rare as to likely happen only once every two hundred years, if not longer. Including Friday night's massive rain, we received 10.12' of rain as a four-day total, an amount that should happen just once every one hundred years. So in review: we got hit with a two hundred year level mega dump embedded at the end of a one hundred year deluge. And that's why the shit hit the fan. To poke around at the data for this, go to this NOAA Precipitation Frequency Estimates page, and use 'precip depth' in the top left. It takes a bit to get a handle on it, and is a great resource (thanks Starr Metcalf for finding it). Push other buttons, see colored lines and graphs and things.

Rivers and creeks all across the area were well outside their banks, mobile homes were moved, roads, culverts and driveways washed out, landslides occurred on the switchbacks down to Fishtop, Interstate 26 was closed for a spell, and untold numbers of trees were down. Trails and footbridges on the Gamelands were wiped out entirely in places, and Saturday's Green River Games had to be canceled. People living in Green River Cove took a major beating, with considerable property damage, including to our friends at the Wilderness Cove Campground. One woman in Polk County was killed when part of her house collapsed on her due to a mudslide.

This graph below of the French Broad River at Asheville is reflective of what other rivers and creeks experienced to varying degrees.

Pencil Sharpener:

The Notch:

Hammer Factor (Rowan Stuart pic):

Three great Switchback Landslide pics from Bill Clipper:

Photo of The Notch from Crom Carey the day after some super intense high water and flooding. More information here.

Of the now couple-few maps floating about of the Green River Gamelands trails, I think this is currently the best one. Pretty sure it's from Mountain True, but I added in the orange drop-down off Pulliam Creek Trail to get to the river. That's the steep section.

Matt Ray (1998-2018) styles into the Notch in the Spring of 2018, not long before his tragic death on May 5th at Go Left.

You can read Wade Harrison's accident report here.

If further accident reports are written, I will link to them here in hopes of them being a learning experience or at the least a cautionary tale. There are a few other minor accounts on the Facebook. People feel pretty gutted about this all around, whether they knew Matt or not. Heavy hearts at the Green right now.

I will say that similar to the two other recent paddling deaths in WNC, Matt most decidedly had the skills to be where he was on the river, and surely he fought like hell, just as those on location gave it all they had during a most awful ordeal. There's no consolation from that. None. Just questions that may have no answers.. :(

(Currently I don't seem able to edit the date/place/level on this page, will add/adjust soon)

Getting ready to go down the drops below Gorilla, the Green Scream Machine and Nieces Pieces. The photo was taken by Halley Burleson and Appalachain Exposures.

This is sheet two of the two sheet Ladshaw and Ladshaw blueprints, courtesy Speculations Lands Collection, Special Collections, Ramsey Library, UNCA

This is sheet one of the two sheet Ladshaw and Ladshaw blueprints, courtesy Speculations Lands Collection, Special Collections, Ramsey Library, UNCA

Dwight Braaping the Monkey

Another good trail map of the Green River Gamelands.

From Brad Kee and friends, here's a trail map of the Green River Gamelands.

Dwight Braaping to Rodeo through Hammer Factor

A lot of boat

Dwight Remixing it up with the left line

Scouting the Gorilla

Dropping through the final slot at Go Left

Below the Gorilla

Final Drop at Zwick's Backender

Making the Right choice to Go the Left way

Over the log and through the Boulders to the Mother Green's house I go

Going Left

Thanks to help the of David Weisgerber from the Polk County GIS office, here's a pic showing exactly where the boundary is

between Henderson County and Polk County -- about 15' downstream of the exit slot of Go Left and Die. You can see how

the log at the entrance to Go Left is just out of parallel with the county line. No idea on the date of the photo. On the Google Earth, the line crosses the log exactly.

Taking this off the web to put it onto this page:

Ladshaw Day

Frankenstine race line

Robbie Gilson stomping down a line off Gorilla. Photo by Mitch Bearden.

Mike Patterson here running The Notch at maybe 10-ish inches with ice around the edges on a gorgeous January day. Robbie Gilson photo.

Glorious and beautiful icicles abound on the Green when the conditions are right. See this ________,,,,and these _________ (to be added)

The Origins of Ladshaw Day:

Hydroelectric power supplies a modest 6-8% of electric demand in the U.S. today, but following the installation of the nation's first hydroelectric plant in Wisconsin in 1882 there was a headlong public and private rush to develop the technology. By 1907 the level had reached 15% of electricity produced and by 1920 the number had grown to a startling 25%. Hydroelectric power was occasionally called 'white coal', even --- and was seen as a boon to the rural southeast in particular. Dams were being built everywhere around here at a rapid clip. It's in this context and time period that the wonderful Green River was nearly taken away from us back in 1906.

Above is a tiny piece of one of the two large scale blueprints produced by George Ladshaw and his brother on December 12th, 1906. The creek in the bottom right of the blueprint is the micro-sized Johnson Branch, which joins the Green River immediately below the first drop below Frankenstein. Upstream to the left is one of the FOUR dams proposed by the Ladshaw brothers. Each of the four dams were to have accompanying penstock piping (the 'trunk line') going downstream to individual power houses, with roads, power-lines, and other infrastructure. Two dams were recommended for the Upper Green and two for the Narrows, as described in the three page Ladshaw proposal. The dam shown on the blueprint fragment above is about halfway between the Big Hungry confluence and Bride, and their curvature is off a bit too when one views the full print.

The Upper Green and the Narrows as we know them today would have ceased to exist had the Ladshaw brothers' plan been enacted. Somehow we wound up with just the one dam that we have, creating Lake Summit and piping down to Tuxedo Hydro, built in 1918. Although they were hired to make the engineering study and proposal (and were paid $4200 for it), no amount of searching or contacting historical societies has turned up any reasons or information about why the Ladshaw plan was not accepted, and I have all but given up that part of my quest.

Regardless, it adds up to December 12th being Ladshaw Day. A day to raise our glasses to this mythical George Ladshaw and celebrate our dumb luck which became fine fortune --- because it is only but for an unknown whim by the powers-that-be over 100 years ago that we have our precious Green River to frolic upon today. Without the Green surely thousands of lives would be altogether different now, a few wonderful local businesses wouldn't be here or would be in different form. Some love affairs and relationships might never have started, some might never have ended, and three people who died on the Green would be alive yet today. None of us would have the countless hours of zen experience under a full moon or late afternoon light with our fine companions as lifetime memories to cherish -- memories occasionally intermingled with simple embarrassment or sheer terror. There would be no Green Race, no Fishtop at noon, no icicles in the cold eddies of winter. Man's mysterious failure to 'advance' gifted to all of us a world class gem of a place, and one that's worth celebrating.

Arguably, mid-December is a tricky time to have another holiday. It's just a month-plus after the Green Race, hot on the heels of Thanksgiving, and tucked in there as people are putting up Festivus poles, having the Airing of Grievances, saying Happy Hanukkah, and whatever else one does during Saturnalia and Christmas proper. Nonetheless, whether spending the day by themselves, huddled in small groups for fellowship, or at elaborate and costumed dance parties, Green boaters the world over make time each December 12th to hold up their pints and speak aloud: 'To Ladshaw!!'.

State of North Carolina Recognition

The North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources

has recognized the importance of Ladshaw Day and

selected December 12th, 2014 to mark the occasion with

the publication on their 'This Day in North Carolina

History' web page of this article.

Ladshaw and his dams were featured in a Blue Ridge

Outdoors article by Charli Kerns in October of 2016.

More Green River maps and stuff are found here: Page of Maps. Go to the American Whitewater Green Narrows page for additional information about the Green.

Reproduction of the blueprint above was done with the kindness, permission, and help of Helen Wykle, staff librarian in Special Collections at UNCA's Ramsey Library in Asheville. When I looked at all the Ladshaw materials in 2009, Helen scanned some small sections for me so I could have a few digital images -- although we weren't able to capture a good impression of the whole operation in any way. Looking at the two large blueprints laid out on a table is most impressive, and I highly recommend it. The map numbers you want are 143 and 156 from this page if you go.

Outlined in green above are most of the 14,000 acres or so making up the state owned Green River

Gamelands. Image courtesy of Rick Lockamy.

Super shot of Go Left and Die from the paddler's perspective.

Level about 10-ish inches maybe.

'Orange Juice Squeezer' was what John Kennedy called the rapid around the time of the Green's

first full descent in 1988. More lore and early nomenclature from the period can be found in Tom Visnius'

(thankfully preserved) notes from 1991.

Here's a fine rendering of the Green River Gorge courtesy of Rick Lockamy. The bottom of the picture is half a mile upstream of Fishtop, and looking up points you towards the northwest (or maybe west-northwest, even). Pulliam Creek comes in from the right towards the bottom 1/3 of the frame, and Interstate 26 can be seen as a light grey ribbon in the upper left.

The 'straightaway' you see in the heart of the gorge makes up close to the steepest half mile on the run, is home to the majority of the named rapids, and is where more-or-less the entirety of the Green Race is held each November. Well, truth be told the race starts just around the corner a bit at the top of the straightaway.

Want more? Page of Maps

The late Spring and Summer of 2013 showed a staggering amount of rain dropped consistently over a 5 month period in western North Carolina. At some point in July the rainfall totals put the Asheville gauges 27' above normal for the year. The graph above is courtesy of Kelly Ivors and the staff at the Mountain Horticultural Crops Research and Extension Center, and shows that the Mills River area received well over twice the average annual rainfall .

In terms of the Green River, the Tuxedo hyrdro plant released water at 200% continuously once for 17 days straight ---- during the Summer. And even so there was water coming over the dam frequently for days on end. This is unheard of. From April through August the river levels were all over the map, but the baseline 'Summer Hundred' became 13' instead of most years when it's 7'. It got to be where even the mid-teens in inches were joked about as being 'boney' due to the extended days of 20+' levels. There were multiple days with well over 30 inches of flow that were paddled by the intrepid, and one occasion ( May 5th-6th) 50++ inches was estimated but not paddled nor verified. Anecdotal comments of near-empty parking lots on Summer weekends were not uncommon, as the high water kept mere mortals off the river. The Green's levels were even high enough, consistently enough over a long period of time, that Green Key sales actually took a dive during these months and special appeals had to be made to get the numbers right.

Obviously, creeks and rivers all across WNC charged at high levels on-and-off for most of the year, much to the delight of area paddlers. And although impressive, this graph below from the USGS of the French Broad River for 2013 needs an 'average by month' line through it or something for context. Common levels are more like 1000-2000cfs.

Matt Risch on-line and making the race line boof at Frankenstein. Although this picture makes the rapid look much longer than it is, it's a nice perspective from some folks up in Maine who made a journey south. Jeremy Cass the photographer, and it came outta this bloggie here. The level on the stick gauge was 8.5'.

The slot one enters for the race line is the narrow one center-right in the pic. The 'trad line' begins a bit out-of-frame to the right and enters the program just beyond the slot.

The next 'slot' to the left in the photo above gets used by paddlers who are off-line, or rarely at high water intentionally. That program generally leads to running the bottom drop on the left of the triangle rock, which can work out fine but has piton and pin potential that is real. Run that side fairly close to the rock with a tad of right angle, I believe, to make up for one's error.

Shane Benedict's fine photo (altered and over-cooked a bit) from river right above the launch pad of Gorilla, taken on race day 2013. Level 9' or so.

Amy Little's photo of Geoff Kohl running Reverse Seven Foot, Fall of 2013, at about 8'. The top hole of Zwick's is in the foreground.

Powerslide at 19' in the middle of August during the 2013 epic never-ending high water bonanza.

Tyler Boeing in the right place here at the right time.

Cliff Dean crushes the boof in the center-right of Nutcracker at 19'.......just more

middle-of-Summer high water goodness.

Please note that it's possible through navigational error to foul-up the entrance to this boof,

and wind up a bit left in some unpleasant sieve action that you won't be happy with.

Following this Nutdropper, people have been portaging Groove Tube and Sunshine on the

right with an easy exit to shore --- immediately above the now defunct California Line (as described here).

The late Mike Huggins styling it.

John Grace rips through Frankenstein in one of the first commercially available versions of the Liquid Logic Stinger, May 2013.

Shane is finishing the rapid in the green boat (also a Stinger) ---- and is much closer than he appears.

The Stinger, in very limited production at the time, won the 2010, 2011, and 2012 Green Races. Starting in the Summer of

2013 Liquid Logic began making them commercially with a production mold slightly different than the prototypes.

Level here is about 11' on the stick.