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       In the northwestern part of Tennessee, near the Kentucky boarder is an eighteen-thousand-acre body of water named Reelfoot Lake. The lake is 20 miles long, seven miles wide and sits only three and a half miles from the Mississippi River.
       Reelfoot Lake is located 100 miles from Memphis, 50 miles from Humboldt, 20 miles from the Kentucky State Line and 48 miles from New Madrid, Missouri.  The 48 miles to New Madrid are via the Dorena-Hickman Ferry, which travels the Mississippi River between Dorena, Missouri and Hickman, Kentucky.
       Reelfoot Lake was formed by an earthquake, which occurred sometime in February 1812. Between mid-December 1811 and mid-March 1812 a series of catastrophic earthquakes shook West Tennessee and the rest of the Central Mississippi Valley. Judging from reports and eyewitness accounts, the quakes would have measured among the highest ever recorded on the modern Richter scale. Some reports said that the quakes were strong enough to awaken sleepers in Washington, D.C., and allegedly some tremors were felt twelve hundred miles away in Quebec City, Canada. The first of these historic quakes occurred in the St. Francis River area of northeast Arkansas; the second struck five weeks later and several miles to the northeast. Two weeks after that the third and strongest of the three quakes hit the area, with its epicenter still further north, at the little river port town of New Madrid, Missouri. The last of these three quakes is estimated to be the strongest ever recorded on the North American continent.  
       Geologists associate this early quake activity with the New Madrid or Central United States seismic zone. This ill-defined series of deeply buried faults runs roughly parallel to the Mississippi River Valley. The zone extends from Cairo, Illinois, south through Missouri to Marked Tree, Arkansas. A side branch also extends into the Reelfoot Lake region of northwest Tennessee.
        Since the affected region was a sparsely settled frontier, few written accounts exist of the early quakes. According to a few personal diary entries and scanty eyewitness accounts quoted in local newspapers, the endless days and nights of earth tremors and thousands of aftershocks must have been dreadful to experience. Few settlers had ever experienced a quake.
      The quakes caused much destruction along the Mississippi River as far south as present-day Memphis and as far up the Ohio River as Indiana. During the strongest of the quakes, great cracks and fissures opened and spewed out sand and water. Gaping crevices formed, some twelve feet wide and deep and more than twenty feet in length. Low waterfalls developed at points along the Mississippi in the vicinity of New Madrid. They were short-lived, however, in the soft sediments of the river valley. Shifting currents and changing flows along the Mississippi, Ohio, Arkansas, and other rivers created and destroyed islands, sandbars, and other familiar features. The quakes caused waves to rush over riverbanks. Return currents washed countless limbs and even whole trees into the main channels. Massive logjams formed, making navigation even more perilous.
       Many boats capsized, and cargoes and crews were never seen again. Seasoned riverboat pilots had to deal with whole new rivers. Cracks and fissures, downed trees, and other obstacles made roads and trails impassable. Massive landslides occurred along the Mississippi and Ohio River bluffs from Memphis to Indiana. Some ground areas rose or fell as much as twenty feet relative to the surrounding landscape. An eighteen- to twenty-acre area near Piney River in Tennessee sank so low that the tops of the trees were at the same level as the surrounding ground. Whole forests sank below their original level, filled with water to form swamps and shallow lakes. The eighteen-thousand-acre Reelfoot Lake was either formed or enlarged during the 1811-12 earthquake. In other areas, lakes and swamps rose to higher elevations. Soon their waters drained away or evaporated. In time they evolved into prairies and upland forests. Much of this land now supports Tennessee cotton and soybeans.
       As devastating as these early quakes were, destruction in human terms was light. Population was sparse, and Indians, traders, and settlers were quite self-sufficient, capable, and resilient. Due to a lack of census records and other reliable counts, the exact number of people who perished, as a result of the quakes will never be known.

     Legend says that at the beginning of the 19th century, a tribe of the Chickasaw was ruled by a mighty Chief. His heart was heavy, for his son had been born with a deformed foot. As the boy grew and developed normally, his walk was different from all the other Indians. He walked and ran with a rolling, so his people called him Kalopin, meaning Reelfoot.
       When the old chief died, Reelfoot became Chief. He, too, was sad and lonely, for none of the Indian maidens had stirred in him thoughts of love. His father had often told him of the mighty tribes dwelling to the south, and of the wondrous beauty of their maidens. So, restless in spirit, when the robins arrived from the north, he wandered south in search of a princess.
        After many days of travel, he reached the land of the great Choctaw Chief, Copiah. Reelfoot then beheld his dream princess, more beautiful than he had ever dared imagine, sitting close by the side of the Chief, her father. After they had eaten and smoked the peace pipe, Reelfoot asked for the old chief’s daughter in marriage. Old Copiah was filled with wrath because he did not wish his daughter to marry a deformed chief and told Reelfoot that his daughter could only be given in wedlock to a Choctaw chieftain.
       The old chief called on the Great Spirit who spoke to Reelfoot and said that an Indian must not steal his wife from any neighboring tribe, for such was tribal law. If he disobeyed and carried off the princess he, the Great Spirit, would cause the earth to rock and the waters to swallow up his village and bury his people in a watery grave. Reelfoot was frightened at this threat of dire punishment and sorrowfully returned home.
      By the end of the next summer, he decided to ignore the wrath of the Great Spirit and to steal the forbidden maiden. He stole the maiden, Laughing Eyes, and returned home to the great rejoicing of his people. Laughing Eyes was greatly frightened for she had heard what the Great Spirit had said to Reelfoot and begged that he send her back to her father. Reelfoot was so much in love that he was willing to defy everything.
      In the midst of the celebration and the marriage rites, the earth began to roll in rhythm with kettledrums and tom-toms. The Indians tried to flee to the hills, but the rocking earth made them reel and stagger. Chief Reelfoot and his bride reeled also and the Great Spirit stomped his foot in anger. The Father of Waters heard the stomp, and, backing on his course, rushed over Reelfoot’s country.
      Where the Great Spirit stomped the earth the Mississippi formed a beautiful lake, at the bottom of which lay Chief Reelfoot, his bride, and his people. Such is the Indian legend of Reelfoot Lake.