Dr. Walker, An English Chap

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Just a few miles from Levi Jackson Wilderness Road State Park, we saw a sign for Dr. Thomas Walker State Park. We were intrigued again and decided to make another stop.

Back in the early 2000s, our family traveled to one homeschool group after another to perform our “Walk Through Tennessee History in Story and Song” program. We always began with the traditional folk song “Cumberland Gap,” which starts with this verse:

First white man in Cumberland Gap
First white man in Cumberland Gap
First white man in Cumberland Gap
Was Dr. Walker, an English chap.

In the “story” part of our program, we told of Dr. Walker naming the Cumberland River and the Cumberland Gap after Great Britain’s Duke of Cumberland. Dr. Thomas Walker was a doctor, planter, merchant, leader in his church, and soldier. He was a relative of George Washington by marriage. He served as Thomas Jefferson’s guardian after the death of Jefferson’s father.

In 1750, three decades before Daniel Boone founded Boonesborough, Kentucky, Walker led an expedition through Cumberland Gap (called Cave Gap before Walker renamed it) into what are now Tennessee and Kentucky. His journal of the expedition tells of his discovering the Cumberland River. It also tells of the party building a cabin in Kentucky. That cabin was the first one built in Kentucky.

In the early 20th century, the Barbourville, Kentucky, American Legion post decided to honor Walker’s memory. The post and the Barbourville community donated twelve acres of land that included the traditional site of the Walker cabin. According to this sign, . . .

. . . George Owens erected this replica in 1922 to commemorate the 1750 Walker cabin.

The park also honored Dr. Walker with this sign on an old rock entrance . . .

. . . and with this new sign high on a pole above the miniature golf course.

Dr. Walker never lived in Kentucky. He returned to his mansion called Castle Hill and continued to be a leader in colonial Virginia. He served with young George Washington in the French and Indian War and was a supporter of the American Revolution.

As Ray and I traveled on, we passed through Cumberland Gap National Historical Park and remembered the visit we made there many years ago. Our children, my parents, and Ray’s father traveled with us. When we climbed the short hike to the Gap, Ray’s dad waited for us on a bench at the bottom. My family and my parents walked up the trail easily, while I (in my late 40s) huffed and puffed and stopped to rest. By the time I reached the top, I was so tired that I lay flat on the ground.

A few weeks later, our daughter’s Homeschool Dramatic Society performed one of their earliest plays. As folks milled around after the play, I again lay flat in exhaustion, this time on the stage. But this time was different. Our physician’s children were in the play and he noticed me lying on the stage. He asked me how I was feeling. “Well, Chet . . . “ I began and then I told him about my pre-menopausal symptoms.

“Come see me tomorrow,” he said. I complied. When the results of my blood work came back, my red blood cell count was so low that he ordered a wheelchair, and his staff wheeled me straightaway to the hospital next door for a one-night stay which included four pints of blood.

Of course, I was terrified at the thought of receiving blood. When I questioned our friend and doctor before I left his office, he said, “You are at risk of a heart attack or a stroke if you don’t.”

Our drive through the Cumberland Gap Park on Sunday reminded us of our deep gratitude for our friend’s attentive kindness and for our Father’s loving grace.

Do not fear, for I am with you;
Do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God.
I will strengthen you, surely I will help you,
Surely I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.
Isaiah 41:10

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