Wolf River is a alluvial
stream in
western Tennessee and northern
Mississippi, whose
confluence with the
Mississippi River was the site of various
Chickasaw,
French,
Spanish and American communities and forts that eventually became
Memphis, Tennessee. The Wolf River is estimated to be about 12,000 years old, formed by glacier runoff carving the region's soft
alluvial soil. It is one of many rivers in West Tennessee and Mississippi that prompted the Chickasaw to call the region "the land that leaks." About 400 AD, a massive seismic event in the Ellendale Fault (part of the
New Madrid Fault system) raised a low ridge across present-day east Memphis, diverting
Nonconnah Creek away from the Wolf, causing it to flow directly into the Mississippi River several miles south of the Wolf's mouth. The lowermost section of the Nonconnah that continued to flow into the Wolf eventually became known as Cypress Creek. The
Mississippian culture thrived in this area until about the 16th century, as evidenced by
mound sites and accounts by
Hernando de Soto. Shortly afterwards, the
Chickasaw nation settled northern
Mississippi, western
Tennessee, and eastern
Arkansas. In 1682, French explorer
Robert Cavelier de La Salle claimed the region near the mouth of the Wolf River. The French alternately called the river Rivière de Mayot (or Margot), Blackbird River, and Rivière du Loup. The original Loup was rumored to be a
Mahican Indian guide who disappeared along the river while guiding the French. The Mahicans were also known as
Les Loups or "The Wolves." According to one account, both the English and Chickasaw afterwards called the river "Loup" in their respective languages: "Wolf" and "Nashoba." During a multi-river voyage from
Chicago, Illinois, to
Biloxi, Mississippi,
Jesuit priest
Jacques Gravier made the following journal entry for 26 October 1700, after reaching the mouth of the Wolf: We passed the Riviere a Mayot [Wolf] on the south, from the name of a savage of the
Mahican nation who was of
Mr. de la Salle's party. This river does not seem to be very large, but is said to be a good hunting ground, and that the
Chickacha come to its mouth,
from which they are only three days‚ journey, cutting south inland. Concerned about American activities in their territory along the east bank of the Mississippi River, the
Spanish colonial government erected
Fort San Fernando de las Barrancas in 1795 near the Chickasaw Bluffs at the mouth of the Wolf River. The fort was dismantled in 1797 in accordance with
Pinckney's Treaty. Spanish documents referred to the river as Las Casas. , chief engineer of
French Louisiana. The French had named the Wolf
"Riviere a Margot" Monorail bridges. In the early 19th century, the Wolf River was declared navigable, from Memphis to
La Grange, by the
Tennessee General Assembly, which appropriated funds to remove obstructions for keel boat travel. In 1888, Memphis stopped using the Wolf River as its principal source of
drinking water, switching to
artesian wells, which are still used and which are replenished by the Wolf's watershed. Because of its foul odor, the Wolf was dammed in 1960 near its mouth and diverted into the Mississippi north of
Mud Island. The section of the Wolf downstream of this channel diversion became a slackwater harbor of the Mississippi known today as Wolf River Harbor, which separates Mud Island (actually a peninsula) from the Memphis "mainland." Completion of channelization of the Wolf from the Mississippi upstream to Gray's Creek, east of
Germantown, Tennessee, resulted in a lowered riverbed and diminished wetland habitat. In 1970, surface drainage, sewage, and industrial pollution caused a group of scientists and environmentalists to pronounce the river "dead" around Memphis. In 1977 Mary Winslow Chapman published
I Remember Raleigh, which included vivid descriptions of a pre-channelized Wolf River. In 1985, the
Wolf River Conservancy was founded by an alliance of conservation-minded real estate executives and local environmental advocates, united in opposition to plans for additional channel dredging. In 1995 the "Ghost River" section of the Wolf was saved from timber auction by a coordinated effort of the
Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency, the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation, local conservation activists Lucius Burch and W.S. "Babe" Howard, and the Wolf River Conservancy. The Ghost River section is located at: . In 1997 the river was designated an
American Heritage River by presidential proclamation under a special
United States Environmental Protection Agency program. In that same year musician
Jeff Buckley accidentally drowned in the Wolf River while swimming in Memphis. In 2005 the Wolf River Restoration Project was commenced by the
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Memphis Office to stop rapid erosion known as
"headcutting" at
Collierville, Tennessee. In 2007 the "Middle Wolf" Campaign attempted
sprawl-proofing of the western Fayette County section. Completion of the Collierville-Arlington Parkway segment of
Tenn-385 and
I-269 outer loop expressway, including two (and potentially five) interchanges poised to become major drivers of suburban growth into forested sections of the Wolf River's floodplain and the surface-exposed sections of the Memphis Sands
aquifer. ==Identified public benefits==