When I'm enjoying the outdoors at Rock Mountain, I can't help but wonder about the people who were here before me. There is a big flat rock on Fire Tower Road where we like to picnic. It's a certainty that people have been enjoying meals on that rock for thousands of years. Those people walked the same trails and they waded in the same creeks as we do. Who were those people? Why did they leave this area? Who replaced them? Where did those people come from? Those are just a few of the questions that I have pondered during the half century since I first walked over Rock Mountain as a nine year old kid. Rock Mountain has been building a history spanning 10,000 years, but history books have barely mentioned it. I set aside the time to write this book when I realized that I watched so much of the tangible history of Rock Mountain disappear, and I didn't realize it until it was gone. Several years of prior research about the Native Americans who built their villages here and recently reading about the first settlers traveling down the Huntsville Road to Jonesboro convinced me that I had to spend more time writing that I had planned. I think that I've written a book that will be an entertaining read for those who want to know more about where they live, as well a book for those who love history.