Cumberland Jack: The dog that built Mount LeConte

Atop the Great Smoky Mountains' third-highest peak stands LeConte Lodge. Its origins lie with a young man from Knoxville named Paul Adams and his saddlebag-wearing German shepherd, Cumberland Jack, also known as Smoky Jack.

Drawing millions every year, the Great Smoky Mountains is the United States' most visited national park.

Its third-highest peak, Mount LeConte, is a big attraction among dedicated hikers with reservations at the famous LeConte Lodge booked out months in advance.

From 6,593 feet up in the mountains, it’s hard to imagine that a century ago Mount LeConte was also one of the park's only bastions of wilderness amid the march of the industry.

"There had been so much logging that had gone on in southern Appalachia, and LeConte was one of those areas that still looked relatively untouched," said Michael Aday, the librarian-archivist at the Great Smoky Mountains Collections Preservation Center.

In the early 1920s, the North Carolina-based Champion Fibre Company owned the mountain, but Colonel David Chapman with the Great Smoky Mountains Conservation Association saw an opportunity as the group advocated turning the logging-scarred Smokies into a national park.