Wheat

Overview

The town that made way for Oak Ridge

Wheat was a farming community in Roane County, in what is now west Oak Ridge. Settlers came in the late 1700s. The place was called Bald Hill from 1846 until 1880, when a post office opened and took the name of its first postmaster, Frank Wheat. At its height it had several churches, stores, a gas station, a Masonic lodge and a school that began in 1886 as Poplar Creek Seminary, became Roane College, and from 1908 housed Wheat High School.

In 1942 the federal government bought the land for the Manhattan Project, the secret wartime program to build the first atomic bombs, and the families of Wheat had to leave. Their land became part of the Oak Ridge reservation, and most of it is still federal property managed by the Department of Energy. The K-25 plant went up to the west.

One building survived: the George Jones Memorial Baptist Church, a church of 1901 with a square bell tower. Wikipedia calls it the only structure left from Wheat. The Crawford Presbyterian church was torn down for a highway project, though its cemetery, like the Baptist one, is kept up and still used for burials. In 2013 Oak Ridge Today reported that former residents and their families held a homecoming at the George Jones church on the first Sunday in October, hosted by the Wheat Alumni Association. We found no newer report of it.

Timeline

From Bald Hill to Oak Ridge

1. Late 1700sThe first settlers arrive in the valley.
2. 1805Levi Henderson Wheat, born in Virginia, appears on a Roane County tax list. He buys 146 acres in 1814.
3. Early 1800sThe Welcker family runs the Laurel Banks plantation on the Clinch River until about 1840; records show they bought and sold enslaved people. George Hamilton Gallaher buys it in the 1840s.
4. 1846The community is established as Bald Hill.
5. 1854The Baptist congregation that becomes George Jones Memorial forms as Mount Zion Baptist Church.
6. 1880A post office opens and is named for its first postmaster, Frank Wheat. Bald Hill becomes Wheat.
7. 1886A Presbyterian minister founds Poplar Creek Seminary, which becomes Roane College.
8. 1901The congregation builds its brick church and renames it for George Jones, who gave most of the land.
9. 1908The college hands its building to Wheat High School.
10. 1942The federal government buys the land for the Manhattan Project. Wheat's families are moved out, late in the year by the Park Service's account.
11. Dec 13, 1948Ed Westcott photographs the church and cemetery for the government.
12. 1992The church is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
13. 2000Will Minter finds the Wheat Community African Burial Ground. Department of Energy staff and volunteers clean and mark it.
14. Jul 13, 2024Park rangers lead a free public walk through the townsite from the Wheat Greenway lot.

1938–1944

Wheat on camera

Wheat was photographed before and after the government took the land, so it is unusually well recorded for a vanished farm town. The Department of Energy's Oak Ridge photo archive has put many of the pictures online. They show a crossroads store in 1938, a farmer with his mule team, the school's basketball team in 1940 and the big two-story farmhouses of the valley, one of them photographed in 1944 by Ed Westcott. Westcott came back in December 1948 to photograph the church and its graves.

The photo dates on this page come from the archive's own captions. We left out files whose dates we couldn't square with what they show, including a market scene captioned 1939 whose clothing looks decades later.

What's left

A church, three burial grounds and a greenway

The church stands on the old Wheat Road, a gravel road off Blair Road, east of the former K-25 site and a short way north of the Oak Ridge Turnpike (SR 58), which it can be seen from. Wikipedia describes a brick, three-bay building with wood cladding and a metal roof, and a 1½-acre cemetery to the west. It was listed on the National Register in 1992.

The 2024 ranger walk covered about a mile and a half of gravel paths and trails, with stops at the church, the Roane College site and the Crawford Cumberland Presbyterian memorial. The Wheat Community African Burial Ground, found in 2000, has a monument to enslaved people on its grounds. The Gallaher-Welcker cemetery also survives.

The 1895 Loudon sheet in the historic maps below shows Wheat among Elverton, Ethel and Selkirk, with Poplar and Bear creeks and the Clinch River. The 1935 and 1941 Bethel Valley sheets mark Wheat, the George Jones Memorial church and a Cumberland church along the road. By 1953 the church and its cemetery stand with a pumping station to the southeast, and the 1968 sheet adds a valve station and SR 58. Today's topo has no Wheat label at all.

• George Jones Memorial Baptist Church (1901)
• Church cemetery (1½ acres)
• Crawford Cumberland Presbyterian memorial and cemetery
• Roane College site
• Wheat Community African Burial Ground
• Gallaher-Welcker cemetery

Historic maps

Wheat on USGS maps, 1895–1968

Crops from the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection, centered on the townsite. Each sheet shows what surveyors mapped that year; compare them with today's topo and aerial on this page.

18951:125,00019351:24,00019411:24,00019531:24,00019681:24,000

Map & directions

Getting there

Oak Ridge is the closest city, about a quarter of an hour away along the Oak Ridge Turnpike. From Knoxville the route runs west on I-40 and north on White Wing Road (TN 95). Both routes end just off Blair Road (SR 327), about 0.3 mile north of the Turnpike, at the mapped point for Wheat. The 2024 ranger walk met at the Wheat Greenway gravel lot on Blair Road, 0.25 mile north of the Turnpike. The National Park Service says the church is reached on foot from that lot, along the Wheat Greenway.

Base map: USGS The National Map (public domain). Routes: OSRM on © OpenStreetMap contributors data (ODbL), computed October 2026. Times assume dry roads.

Photos

Wheat in photos

The George Jones Memorial Baptist Church, built in 1901, August 2008The church and cemetery, December 13, 1948A farmhouse in the Wheat community, 1944Charlie McKinney with his mule team, 1938McKinney Cross-roads Store, June 25, 1938The Wheat School women's basketball team, 1940An I-house in Wheat, about 1940

Visitor reports

Been to Wheat?

Been there lately? Tell the next visitor what you found: whether you could get in, the state of the road and what's still standing. Photos are welcome. We read every report before it appears here.

Thanks. Your report reached us, and we'll read it before it goes on the page.

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Nearby

Other sites near Wheat

Straight-line distance from the townsite to other mapped sites in our Tennessee index.

• Fork Mountain13.4 mi N · Anderson
• Montgomery18.2 mi NW · Morgan
• Rugby34.5 mi NW · Morgan
• Calderwood37.2 mi SE · Monroe
• Tellico Plains39.6 mi S · Monroe
• Tremont45.2 mi SE · Blount
• Elkmont48.3 mi SE · Sevier
• Olympus63.4 mi NW · Pickett

Sources

Sources and credits

1. ghosttowns.com, "Wheat": fact sheet fields (climate, best time, remains).
2. Wikipedia, "Wheat, Tennessee", retrieved October 2026: the early settlers, Levi Henderson Wheat, the plantations and burial grounds, Bald Hill, the post office and name, the churches, school and college, the 1942 purchase, Department of Energy ownership, what remains, the homecoming (cited to 2004), and coordinates.
3. Wikipedia, "George Jones Memorial Baptist Church", retrieved October 2026: the 1854 congregation, the 1901 building and name, its location and description, the cemetery, the 1992 listing, the old Wheat Road and its use.
4. Oak Ridge Today, "Manhattan Project Park: Walk through Wheat", July 4, 2024: the July 13, 2024 ranger walk, its stops, the parking lot, the route and the late-1942 displacement.
5. National Park Service, "Oak Ridge Wayside: The Community Known as Wheat", Manhattan Project National Historical Park, last updated December 12, 2024, read October 22, 2026: the wayside in front of the church, on the Wheat Greenway, reached from a gravel lot off Blair Road; homecomings on the first Sunday of October.
6. Oak Ridge Today, "ORHPA meeting offers rare look inside historic church in west Oak Ridge", September 2, 2013: the church's location off Blair Road and the first-Sunday-in-October homecoming.
7. Photos: Wikimedia Commons, credited below each one; 1938–1948 dates are from the Department of Energy archive captions on each file page. Elevation: USGS 3D Elevation Program point query. Routes: OSRM on OpenStreetMap data, October 2026. Not field-checked.

Photo and map credits

• The George Jones Memorial Baptist Church, built in 1901, August 2008: Brian Stansberry, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 3.0
• The church and cemetery, December 13, 1948: doe-oakridge, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
• A farmhouse in the Wheat community, 1944: doe-oakridge, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
• Charlie McKinney with his mule team, 1938: doe-oakridge, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
• McKinney Cross-roads Store, June 25, 1938: doe-oakridge, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
• The Wheat School women's basketball team, 1940: doe-oakridge, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
• An I-house in Wheat, about 1940: Atomic Energy Commission – Oak Ridge Operations, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
• Area base map, topo and aerial imagery: USGS The National Map (public domain).
• Historic maps: USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection (public domain): Loudon 1895, 1:125,000; Bethel Valley 1935, 1:24,000; Bethel Valley 1941, 1:24,000; Bethel Valley 1953, 1:24,000; Bethel Valley 1968, 1:24,000.