Red Clay State Historic Park

Red Clay State Historic Park
Eternal Flame of the Cherokee Nation
Type	Tennessee State Park
Location	Bradley County, Tennessee, United States
Area	263 acres (1.06 km2)
Established	1979
Red Clay Council Ground
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
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Nearest city	Cleveland, Tennessee
Area	150 acres (61 ha)
Website	Red Clay Historic State Park
NRHP reference No.	72001229[1]
Added to NRHP	September 14, 1972
Open	Year round

Red Clay State Historic Park is a state park located in southern Bradley County, Tennessee, United States. The park preserves the Red Clay Council Grounds, which were the site of the last capital of the Cherokee Nation in the eastern United States from 1832 to 1838 before the enforcement of the Indian Removal Act of 1830.^[2] This act resulted in a forced migration of most of the Cherokee people to present-day Oklahoma known as the Cherokee removal. At the council grounds, the Cherokee made multiple unsuccessful pleas to the U.S. government to be allowed to remain in their ancestral homeland. The site is considered sacred to the Cherokees, and includes the Blue Hole Spring, a large hydrological spring. It is also listed as an interpretive center along the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail.

After the Cherokee removal, the site became private land, and was primarily used for agriculture. In the later part of the 20th century, a group of local historians undertook an effort to preserve and protect the site and turn it into a state park. The site was named to the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) in 1972, and Red Clay State Park opened to the public in 1979. It encompasses 263 acres (1.06 km²) of land immediately north of the Tennessee–Georgia state line, and consists of a museum, replicas of Cherokee structures that once stood on the site, and three hiking trails, along with other amenities.