Mapping a Path to the Past

This system of American Indian trails is now the focus of The Trading Path Preservation Association, a nonprofit group with plans to map some of the area's lesser-known paths.

The effort is being led by Tom Magnuson, the association's president and founder. Magnuson, a Hillsborough resident, left a partnership in a software development firm in 1999 to follow his interest in the history of the Piedmont region and the Trading Path.

The Trading Path was a corridor of trails and river crossings linking the Chesapeake Bay region and Catawba, Cherokee and other American Indian towns in the Carolinas and Georgia.

Magnuson said the roads are critical tools in unraveling a mysterious 175-year period of anarchy in central North Carolina that began in the late 16th century.

Few records exist to document the years between 1585 and 1750, called the "contact era" because it marks the initial interaction between colonists and American Indians.

"It was a case of the red, white and black living together on the same land and, oftentimes, under the same roof," Magnuson said.

The trading paths served to join these cultures, and areas surrounding the paths were meccas of settlement for both American Indians and Europeans.

And growth along some trading paths continues in the present day.

In the precolonial era, the only sound along one main trading path was the occasional clap of the horses' hooves.

The path still exists today, 300 yards away from the constant hum of traffic on Interstate 85.

But Magnuson said he fears that the area's rapid growth might encroach on the historic relics that might lie nearby. "The urban sprawl in the Piedmont is moving at such a rapid clip that we are losing archeology that we don't even know is there," Magnuson said.

He said the Preservation Association, with the help of supporters and advisors, will promote preservation of lost trading path communities through heritage tourism, which will benefit rural communities. "Our advisory board has almost every luminary in the country on it," Magnuson said.

Steve Davis Jr., an archeological expert on the association's advisory board and a staff member at UNC's archeology research laboratories, said he hopes the association will locate trading paths, increase their protective status and raise awareness about them.

"These roads are an important part of studying the past and a reminder of how different the landscape was," Davis said.

On Feb. 2, the association will hold elections for its first board of directors -- a step aimed at increasing the association's effectiveness.

"In March, the board will take over the fund-raising and executive functions," Magnuson said.

Magnuson is also developing a proposal for the Hillsborough town manager requesting permission for Orange High School students to help him develop a nearby trail.

Then the association will continue to resolve the mystery of the "contact era," which has its roots embedded deep within the circuitry of the trading paths.

And Magnuson said one main question still remains unanswered.

"Who was here and what were they doing?"

The City Editor can be reached

at citydesk@unc.edu.