During 1830, Edmund Jennings, a Kentucky hunter, was among the first to find his way into the valley that is now known as Red Boiling Springs. Jennings, upon returning to his home, told his friends and neighbors about the beautiful new area he had discovered.

As the story goes, Kirby, who had suffered from eye infections for years, was hewing logs for the new home he was building, when the pain in his eyes became so intense he quit working and went to the nearby spring to wash his eyes. By the next morning, the misery and suffering from his eye infection had improved tremendously, so he continued washing his eyes daily with the spring water. Within a short time, his eye infection, which had plagued him, disappeared.

Talk of Kirby's miraculous healing spread. Soon travelers seeking cures for every disease came. When they returned to their homes, the visitors brought back new stories of their own personal healings. As the lure of the healing waters spread swiftly throughout the world, more and more families began coming to the area, at first seeking the healing waters, and then moving to the town that sprang up around the "healing waters."

Over the next few decades, thousands of people would pour into the small town of just over 500 to partake of the waters during "the season". Nine large hotels and a number of boarding houses were built to accommodate the visitors. The mineral springs’ era was at its peak from 1860 to 1930.

Today, Red Boiling Springs is a city of just over 1,000 people nestled in a beautiful valley in Macon County, Tennessee. Three of the original hotels are still accommodating guests and the water still flows.

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