Mousetail Landing State Park is a

state park State parks are parks or other protected areas managed at the sub-national level within those nations which use "state" as a political subdivision. State parks are typically established by a state to preserve a location on account of its natural ...

located on the eastern bank of 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 names, ...

Perry County, Tennessee Perry County is a county located in the U.S. state of Tennessee. As of the 2020 census, the population was 8,366, with an average population density of 18.6 persons per square mile (7.2 persons per square km) it is the least densely populate ...

near Linden. The park was established in 1979, making it one of the more recent additions to the Tennessee State Parks system. The name is thought to have been derived from an event during the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...

in which a tannery located at a river landing on the site of the present day state park caught fire. The tannery was infested with an unusually large number of mice which fled the burning

tannery Tanning may refer to: *Tanning (leather), treating animal skins to produce leather *Sun tanning, using the sun to darken pale skin **Indoor tanning, the use of artificial light in place of the sun **Sunless tanning, application of a stain or dye t ...

in the direction of the landing, giving the landing its present name. The park has of trails, 24 prepared campsites, a swimming beach, a boat landing, sports fields and courts, an archery range and an enclosed event pavilon. Also located within the park are several archeological ruins, including the original landing pier, a blacksmith shop, and Parrish Cemetery. Soils in the park have brown silt loam topsoil over brown or red silty clay loam to clay. Chert and gravel commonly occur. The bedrock is

limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms whe ...

with varying amounts of

chert Chert () is a hard, fine-grained sedimentary rock composed of microcrystalline or cryptocrystalline quartz, the mineral form of silicon dioxide (SiO2). Chert is characteristically of biological origin, but may also occur inorganically as a prec ...

and

phosphate In chemistry, a phosphate is an anion, salt, functional group or ester derived from a phosphoric acid. It most commonly means orthophosphate, a derivative of orthophosphoric acid . The phosphate or orthophosphate ion is derived from phospho ...

. Perry County tourism authorities claim that there are around 250,000 visitors to Mousetail Landing State Park per annum. In 2020, the park reported that campsites were full on most weekends. There were over 3,100 campsite rentals that year, up from 2,149 in 2019. The increase in visitors was probably due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

encouraging outdoor activity. The park reportedly generated $14.3 million in economic impact to Perry County in 2021.

References

External links

Mousetail Landing State Park
at Tennessee State Parks * State parks of Tennessee Protected areas of Perry County, Tennessee {{Tennessee-protected-area-stub