Lewis C. Buckner

Buckner was born into slavery at Strawberry Plains in neighboring Jefferson County, the son of a white father and an African American mother. He learned carpentry as an apprentice in Sevierville after the war, married Jane Bryant in 1875 and listed himself as a cabinetmaker by 1880. Over the next four decades he built whole houses and added ornate porches and staircases to plain farmhouses; at least fifteen survive. His carved pews and pulpit are inside New Salem Baptist Church, and he built his own house near Millican Grove in 1894.

What the plaque says

Lewis C. Buckner circa 1856-1924 Born a slave, Lewis C. Buckner worked as a carpenter, cabinetmaker, and house builder in Sevier County after the Civil War. The talented African-American craftsman hand-carved elaborate furniture, mantels, staircases, and the exterior trim and porches for many Victorian-era houses. This house, enlarged around 1890 for Riley H. Andes, was one of Buckner's most ornate.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Beck Cultural Exchange Center — 19 mi
  Knoxville's Black history museum and archive, opened in 1975 in the 1912 Dandridge Avenue house the community bought for $22,500.
• Blount Mansion — 20 mi
  The 1792 frame house of William Blount, governor of the Southwest Territory, Knoxville's only National Historic Landmark, where the people he enslaved are named.
• Newfound Gap — 21 mi
  The lowest drivable pass through the Smokies, at 5,046 feet on the Tennessee and North Carolina line, where Roosevelt dedicated the park in 1940 and Kuwohi's Cherokee name was restored in 2024.
• Cades Cove — 23 mi
  A Smokies valley ringed by mountains, once the Cherokee hunting ground of Tsiyahi and later a farming community of 685 people, kept by the park after its families were bought out.

More markers nearby

• Isaac Dockery — 1.2 mi
• The McMahan Indian Mound — 1.4 mi
• John Porter McCown — 1.7 mi
• New Salem Baptist Church — 2.0 mi