Trails Forever

In 2008, Friends of the Smokies received a challenge to match a $2.3 million grant from the Aslan Foundation of Knoxville, the legacy of an avid hiker and Friends of the Smokies founding board member, Lindsay Young. Now an $8 million endowment, Trails Forever funds a full-time trail crew to reconstruct and rehabilitate some of the park’s most impacted trails. The Aslan Foundation’s $2.3 million challenge grant was accomplished with the help of friends and family members of Tom Cronan and Margaret Stevenson and many others who gave with the vision of revitalizing trails like Alum Cave, Forney Ridge, and Rainbow Falls.