The tunnels on the Parkway (there are 26 of them) were carved out of the Blue Ridge mountains. Most of the work was done by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s. Building these tunnels was a costly and hazardous venture. But it had to be done if the road was going to run along the ridge of these famous mountains. I confess that these tunnels are one of my favorite parts of the parkway. They were excavated in the pre-war period using compressed air drills and dynamite. For the most part they were dug out by hand. Little machinery was used with the intention of creating manual labor in depressed economic times.

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