Loudon County is a

county A county is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposes Chambers Dictionary, L. Brookes (ed.), 2005, Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, Edinburgh in certain modern nations. The term is derived from the Old French ...

in the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...

Tennessee Tennessee ( , ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked state in the Southeastern region of the United States. Tennessee is the 36th-largest by area and the 15th-most populous of the 50 states. It is bordered by Kentucky to th ...

. It is located in the central part of East Tennessee. As of the 2020 census, the population was 54,886. Its

county seat A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or civil parish. The term is in use in Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, Taiwan, and the United States. The equivalent term shire town is used in the US st ...

is Loudon. Loudon County is included in the

Knoxville Knoxville is a city in and the county seat of Knox County in the U.S. state of Tennessee. As of the 2020 United States census, Knoxville's population was 190,740, making it the largest city in the East Tennessee Grand Division and the state' ...

, TN

Metropolitan Statistical Area In the United States, a metropolitan statistical area (MSA) is a geographical region with a relatively high population density at its core and close economic ties throughout the area. Such regions are neither legally Incorporated town, incorporate ...

History

Loudon County was formed on May 27, 1870, from portions of Roane, Monroe and Blount counties.Joe Spence,
Loudon County
" ''Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture''. Retrieved: 22 October 2013. Originally, it was named Christiana County, but a few days later the name was changed to Loudon in honor of nearby colonial-era Fort Loudoun. The fort was named for

John Campbell, 4th Earl of Loudoun General John Campbell, 4th Earl of Loudoun (5 May 1705 – 27 April 1782) was a Scottish nobleman and British army officer. Early career Born in Scotland two years before the creation of the Kingdom of Great Britain, in which his father Hug ...

and a commander of British forces during the

French and Indian Wars The French and Indian Wars were a series of conflicts that occurred in North America between 1688 and 1763, some of which indirectly were related to the European dynastic wars. The title ''French and Indian War'' in the singular is used in the U ...

. In August 1870, the county officers were chosen. On September 5, 1870, the county court was organized at the Baptist Church in Loudon. This church became the temporary quarters of the county court until the new building, built by J. W. Clark & Brothers, was finished in 1872. Bussell Island, at the mouth of the Little Tennessee River, was inhabited by Native Americans for several thousand years before the arrival of the region's first European settlers. The

Overhill Cherokee Overhill Cherokee was the term for the Cherokee people located in their historic settlements in what is now the U.S. state of Tennessee in the Southeastern United States, on the western side of the Appalachian Mountains. This name was used by 1 ...

village of

Mialoquo Mialoquo (also "Malaquo", "Big Island", or "Great Island") is a prehistoric and historic Native Americans in the United States, Native American site in Monroe County, Tennessee, in the southeastern United States. The site saw significant periods o ...

was located along the Little Tennessee near modern Tellico Village. Fort Loudoun was constructed by the British near modern Vonore in 1756, and was destroyed by the Cherokee four years later. Loudon County Creation

One of the earliest American settlements in what is now Loudon County was a river port and ferry known as Morganton, once located on the banks of the Little Tennessee River near modern Greenback. Morganton thrived during the early 19th century, but declined with the rise of the railroad in the latter half of the century. The town's remnants were inundated by Tellico Lake in the 1970s. Lenoir City is rooted in a plantation established by

William Ballard Lenoir William Ballard Lenoir (1775–1852; also given as 1781-1855) was known as a businessman and politician in what is now known as Lenoir City, Tennessee, where he moved in the early nineteenth century. He had served in the militia and reached the ran ...

in 1810, which by the 1850s included a railroad stop known as Lenoir Station. The Lenoir City Company, established by Knoxville financiers

Charles McClung McGhee Charles McClung McGhee (January 23, 1828 – May 5, 1907) was an American industrialist and financier, active primarily in Knoxville, Tennessee, in the latter half of the nineteenth century. As director of the East Tennessee, Virginia and Geor ...

and Edward J. Sanford, platted modern Lenoir City in the 1890s. The town of Loudon began as a ferry and later steamboat stop known as Blair's Ferry, established by James Blair and his brother-in-law, John Hudson Carmichael, in the 1810s. The town changed its name to "Loudon" during the early 1850s, when it expanded following the arrival of the railroad. The railroad bridge at Loudon was one of eight bridges targeted for destruction by Union guerillas as part of the East Tennessee bridge-burning conspiracy in November 1861, at the outset of the Civil War. The bridge was too well-guarded by Confederate sentries, however, and the guerillas abandoned the effort.

Geography

According to the

U.S. Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau (USCB), officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the U.S. Federal Statistical System, responsible for producing data about the American people and economy. The Census Bureau is part of the ...

, the county has a total area of , of which is land and (7.3%) is water. The

Little Tennessee River The Little Tennessee River is a tributary of the Tennessee River that flows through the Blue Ridge Mountains from Georgia, into North Carolina, and then into Tennessee, in the southeastern United States. It drains portions of three national ...

joins the

Tennessee River The Tennessee River is the largest tributary of the Ohio River. It is approximately long and is located in the southeastern United States in the Tennessee Valley. The river was once popularly known as the Cherokee River, among other name ...

at Lenoir City. The lower part of the Little Tennessee River is part of Tellico Lake, created by

Tellico Dam Tellico Dam is a dam built by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) in Loudon County, Tennessee, on the Little Tennessee River as part of the Tellico Project. Planning for a dam structure on the Little Tennessee was reported as early as 1936 but ...

near the mouth of the river.

Fort Loudoun Dam Fort Loudoun Dam is a hydroelectric dam on the Tennessee River in Loudon County, Tennessee, in the southeastern United States. The dam is operated by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), which built the dam in the early 1940s as part of a unif ...

spans the Tennessee River just upstream from its confluence with the Little Tennessee, creating Fort Loudoun Lake. The section of the river downstream from Fort Loudoun Dam is part of

Watts Bar Lake Watts Bar Lake is a reservoir on the Tennessee River created by Watts Bar Dam as part of the Tennessee Valley Authority system. Geography Located in the U.S. state of Tennessee about midway between the cities of Chattanooga and Knoxville, the l ...

Adjacent counties

* Knox County (northeast) * Blount County (east) *

Monroe County Monroe County may refer to seventeen counties in the United States, all named for James Monroe: * Monroe County, Alabama *Monroe County, Arkansas * Monroe County, Florida * Monroe County, Georgia *Monroe County, Illinois *Monroe County, Indian ...

(south) *

McMinn County McMinn County is a county in the U.S. state of Tennessee. It is located in East Tennessee. As of the 2020 census, the population was 53,794. The county has a total area of . Most of the county is within the Ridge and Valley province of the Ap ...

(southwest) * Roane County (northwest)

State protected areas

*Tellico Lake Wildlife Management Area (part)

Demographics

2020 census

As of the

2020 United States census The United States census of 2020 was the twenty-fourth decennial United States census. Census Day, the reference day used for the census, was April 1, 2020. Other than a pilot study during the 2000 census, this was the first U.S. census to of ...

, there were 54,886 people, 20,669 households, and 14,615 families residing in the county.

2010 census

As of the census of 2010, there were 48,556 people, 19,826 households, and 14,483 families living in the county. The population density was 212.03 persons per square mile. The housing unit density was 86.58 units per square mile. The

racial makeup A race is a categorization of humans based on shared physical or social qualities into groups generally viewed as distinct within a given society. The term came into common usage during the 1500s, when it was used to refer to groups of variou ...

of the county was 95.35%

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no hue). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully reflect and scatter all the visible wavelengths of light. White o ...

, 1.11%

African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...

, 0.28% Native American, 0.59%

Asian Asian may refer to: * Items from or related to the continent of Asia: ** Asian people, people in or descending from Asia ** Asian culture, the culture of the people from Asia ** Asian cuisine, food based on the style of food of the people from Asi ...

, 0.10%

Pacific Islander Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the Pacific Islands. As an ethnic/racial term, it is used to describe the original peoples—inhabitants and diasporas—of any of the three major subregions of O ...

, and 1.08% from

two or more races 2 (two) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 1 and preceding 3. It is the smallest and only even prime number. Because it forms the basis of a duality, it has religious and spiritual significance in many cultur ...

. 6.99% were

Hispanic or Latino ''Hispanic'' and '' Latino'' are ethnonyms used to refer collectively to the inhabitants of the United States who are of Spanish or Latin American ancestry (). While the terms are sometimes used interchangeably, for example, by the United States ...

of any race. Of the 19,826 households, 23.52% had children under the age of 18 living in them, 60.10% were married couples, 4.13% had a male householder with no wife present, 8.82% had a female householder with no husband present, and 16.95% were non-families. 23.21% were one person and 11.17% were one person aged 65 or older. The average household size was 2.42 and the average family size was 2.82. The age distribution was 20.32% under the age of 18, 58.19% ages 18 to 64, and 21.49% age 65 and older. The median age was 46.0 years. 50.93% of the population were females and 49.07% were males. The

median household income The median income is the income amount that divides a population into two equal groups, half having an income above that amount, and half having an income below that amount. It may differ from the mean (or average) income. Both of these are ways of ...

in the county was $49,343, and the median family income was $59,044. Males had a median income of $44,110, versus $29,441 for females. The per capita income for the county was $27,046. About 9.2% of families and 13.8% of the population were below the

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for t ...

, including 23.8% of those under the age of 18 and 6.8% of those age 65 and over.

2000 census

At the 2000 census there were 39,086 people, 15,944 households, and 11,798 families living in the county. The population density was 171 people per square mile (66/km²). There were 17,277 housing units at an average density of 76 per square mile (29/km²). The

of the county was 95.90% White, 1.14% Black or African American, 0.32% Native American, 0.21% Asian, 0.02% Pacific Islander, 1.43% from other races, and 0.98% from two or more races. 2.29% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race. Of the 15,944 households 28.40% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 61.70% were married couples living together, 8.90% had a female householder with no husband present, and 26.00% were non-families. 22.80% of households were one person and 10.10% were one person aged 65 or older. The average household size was 2.42 and the average family size was 2.82. The age distribution was 21.90% under the age of 18, 6.70% from 18 to 24, 27.50% from 25 to 44, 27.70% from 45 to 64, and 16.20% 65 or older. The median age was 41 years. For every 100 females, there were 95.10 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 92.10 males. The median household income was $40,401 and the median family income was $46,517. Males had a median income of $33,567 versus $23,164 for females. The per capita income for the county was $21,061. About 6.90% of families and 10.00% of the population were below the

, including 12.80% of those under age 18 and 9.00% of those age 65 or over.

Education

The public schools in all areas of the county except Lenoir City are operated by Loudon County Schools.

Loudon County Schools

* Loudon High School * Greenback School (K-12) * Fort Loudoun Middle School * North Middle School * Eaton Elementary School * Highland Park Elementary School * Loudon Elementary School * Philadelphia Elementary School * Steekee Elementary School *Loudon County Technology Center

Lenoir City Schools

* Lenoir City High School * Lenoir City Intermediate/Middle School * Lenoir City Elementary School

Communities

Cities

* Greenback * Lenoir City * Loudon *

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

Towns

* Farragut (partial)

Census-designated place

* Rarity Bay (partly in Monroe Co.) * Tellico Village

Unincorporated communities

* Dixie Lee Junction * Unitia

Politics

References

External links

Official site
*
Loudon County, TNGenWeb
- free genealogy resources for the county {{Coord, 35.73, -84.31, display=title, type:adm2nd_region:US-TN_source:UScensus1990 1870 establishments in Tennessee Populated places established in 1870 Knoxville metropolitan area Counties of Appalachia Second Amendment sanctuaries in Tennessee East Tennessee