Why is the Cosby, Tennessee area so murdery, by murders?

The Cosby area is a hotspot in the modest sense: two murders, two episodes, two towns, 220th overall and third in Tennessee. Cosby itself sits in eastern Tennessee, pressed against the Smoky Mountains near the North Carolina border, with 742 people in 2024. The name has been in use since at least 1838 and nobody knows why. One theory credits an early trapper and distiller, another a doctor and Revolutionary War veteran. A town that cannot account for its name will not account for its murders.

The two cases fall a decade apart, with 18 miles between the towns. In July 1987 Pigeon Forge was a town of souvenir shops on the brink of the tourist boom, and two friends from neighbouring shops met most days on a covered porch. In July 1997 the story runs from twins who had disliked each other since school to a family campground outside Cosby, managed by a minister who preached at its small church. One victim each, so no single dreadful night carries this hotspot: its total is two ordinary summers, ten years apart, in a corner of the state where both towns live off the same mountains.