<the> Great Smoky Mountains National Park

[Silverobama]

This sentence was written by me but corrected by an AE speaker in 2012.

We went to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park to appreciate the charms of the landscape.

She did use the "the" here in the sentence before the name of the park but today a BE speaker told me that the bold "the" is not needed. Is this Americanism? I can't ask the AE speaker now because she passed away in 2016.

 

[emsr2d2]

It's not part of the official title of the park so is, correctly, not capitalised. The inclusion of an un-capitalised definite article is optional.

 

[SoothingDave]

It is typical to use a "the" with mountains. The Alleghenies. The Rockies. The Great Smoky Mountains.

 

[jutfrank]

I'm reluctant to say it's wrong without 'the' but I do think it almost is. It's customary to drop the definite article when writing names, but that doesn't mean you don't say it in speech.

You wouldn't say I went to Great Smoky Mountains, so what's the difference here?

 

[Skrej]

You wouldn't say I went to Great Smoky Mountains, so what's the difference here?

The difference seems to be the word "park". Drop 'park', and the article is required.

Looking at these combinations, it seems that 'mountains' requires the definite article, unless it's followed by 'park'. (Presumably some other noun might work, but I can't think of an example at the moment to test.)

Make 'mountains' singular, and no article is required either.

I went to Great Smoky Mountain National Park.
I went to the Great Smoky Mountain National Park.
I went to the Great Smoky Mountains.
I went to Great Smoky Mountains.
I went to Great Smoky Mountain. (singular, probably fictional)


I went to Rocky Mountain National Park.
I went to the Rocky Mountain National Park.
I went to the Rocky Mountains.
I went to Rocky Mountains.
I went to Rocky Mountain. (singular, fictional name)

I went to the Rockies.
I went to Rockies.

I went to Yellowstone.
I went to Yellowstone National Park.
I went to the Yellowstone National Park.
I went to the Yellowstone Mountains. (fictional name)
I went to Yellowstone Mountains. ( fictional name)
I went to Yellowstone Mountain. ( (singular, fictional name)

 

[jutfrank]

The difference seems to be the word "park". Drop 'park', and the article is required.

It seems to me the article determines Mountains, not Park, for which reason the 'National Park' part of the phrase has no bearing on whether an article is needed.

As Dave has said, names of mountain ranges use the. Single mountains don't.

Great Smoky Mountain (mountain)
the Great Smoky Mountains (range)