Known as the Smoky Mountain Railroad, this line offered passenger service between Knoxville and Sevierville until 1962. With the opening of Great Smoky Mountains National Park in 1934, tens of thousands of tourists began passing through Sevierville, which was situated about halfway between the park and Knoxville. U.S. 441, initially known as Smoky Mountain Highway, was completed to Sevierville in 1934 and later extended to North Carolina. Entertainer Dolly Parton was born in Sevierville in 1946. Her Parton ancestors had migrated to Greenbrier sometime around 1850 and later moved to Locust Ridge (near Pittman Center), where Parton was born, after the establishment of the national park. In more recent years, the town erected a statue of Parton on the lawn of the courthouse and named Dolly Parton Parkway after her. Much of Cormac McCarthy's 1973 novel "Child of God" takes place in Sevierville and the surrounding area. Sevierville is located at (35.878, -83.570). In the town's eastern section, the Little Pigeon River is formed by the confluence of its East Fork and Middle Fork, both of which flow down from their sources high in the Great Smoky Mountains. Five miles (8 km) downstream to the west, the Little Pigeon absorbs its West Fork before turning north and flowing for another five miles (8 km) to its mouth along the French Broad River. Sevierville is centered on the stretch of land between these two junctions of the East and Middle Fork and the West Fork, known traditionally as Forks-of-the-Pigeon or Forks-of-the-River. Situated in an area where the Foothills of the Great Smokies give way to the Tennessee Valley, Sevierville has long acted as a nexus between Knoxville to the north and the Appalachian towns in the mountains to the south. Great Smoky Mountains National Park is located approximately ten miles south of Sevierville. Due to its hilly terrain and the relatively poor roads of 19th-century Sevier County, a number of smaller communities developed independently along the outskirts of Sevierville. These include Harrisburg and Fair Garden to the east and Catlettsburg and Boyd's Creek to the north. In addition, the United States Postal Service associates the name "Sevierville" with ZIP codes for much of Sevier County, including the town of Pittman Center and other geographically extensive areas located outside Sevierville's city limits.