Wheat, Tennessee

Wheat was a farming community in Roane County, Tennessee. The area is now in the city of Oak Ridge.

The earliest settlers moved into the area in the late 1700s. However, it was not until 1846 that the area was established as the community of Bald Hill. The name was changed to Wheat in 1880, when a post office was opened and the community took the name of its first postmaster, Frank Wheat.

Early farming residents included John Henry and Elizabeth Inman Welcher. They owned Laurel Banks plantation on the Clinch River from the early 1800s until circa 1840. A Gallaher purchased the property in the 1840s, and it is now referred to as the Gallaher-Stone Plantation. The Wheat Community African Burial Ground (AEC #2) and Gallaher-Welcher Cemetery (AEC #1) still survive. At least some of those buried in the African Burial Ground are believed to have been part of the Gallaher-Stone Plantation; a monument to those held in slavery is on the cemetery grounds.

Wheat eventually included several churches, a seminary/college, several stores, a gas station and a masonic lodge. Poplar Creek Seminary, founded in 1886 by a Presbyterian minister, later became Roane College. In 1908, the college transferred ownership of the building to Wheat High School.

The community of Wheat was dissolved in 1942 when the United States Government purchased the land as part of the Manhattan Project. The residents were displaced as part of the Manhattan Project. Most of the site remains in federal government ownership, managed by the United States Department of Energy.

The George Jones Memorial Baptist Church is the only Wheat building still standing. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Crawford Presbyterian Church building was torn down for a highway construction project. The cemeteries of both churches are maintained and are still used for burials of former Wheat residents and family members. The Wheat community, including former residents and their families, holds a "homecoming" reunion at the George Jones Church every year on the first Sunday in October.

References

* Moneymaker, Dorathy S. "We'll Call It Wheat". Oak Ridge, Adroit Print Co., 1979.

ources

* [http://www.mensetmanus.net/wheat/history.shtml Excerpts From Oak Ridge National Laboratory: The First 50 Years]
* [http://smithdray.angeltowns.net/or/hm.htm#The%20Wheat Historical Markers of Oak Ridge]
* [https://iris.ornl.gov/R/?func=collections-result&collection_id=1098&pds_handle=GUEST Historical Wheat community photos] , ORNL Historical Photo Gallery