Fwd: The View From Gallows Hill

[Janice Tocher]

Greetings Neighbors,

Please note this email from Knoxville History Project - especially the first paragraph about the release of the South Knoxville book - yay!!

They are looking for photographs of SK icons… "We still have some way to go with it, and may be depending on your help, especially in terms of striking photographs of South Knoxville icons, if you have any in your attic.”

ALSO, note their next Tuesday meeting @ Maple Hall will be talking about South Knoxville. This is sure to be an interesting discussion!

Cheers!

Janice

Phone: 865-661-1685

Begin forwarded message:

From: Knoxville History Project <nic...@knoxvillehistoryproject.ccsend.com>

Subject: The View From Gallows Hill

Date: January 7, 2026 at 9:51:32 AM EST

To: jto...@bellsouth.net

Reply-To: nicol...@knoxhistoryproject.org

January 7, 2026 Happy New Year, everybody. 2026 is going to be a big year for the Knoxville History Project, because we’re bound and determined to have our long-gestating Historic South Knoxville book out this year. We still have some way to go with it, and may be depending on your help, especially in terms of striking photographs of South Knoxville icons, if you have any in your attic. It’s also the nation’s 250th anniversary, and we’re already planning a big event to celebrate Knoxville’s role in October—look for more in months to come. And thanks to Robin Wilhoit and the team at WBIR for an apt reminder of the role former Knoxvillian Adolph Ochs played in the nation’s most traditional celebration of the New Year.  Watch Clip Here Maple Hall: South Knoxville Tuesday, January 13 at 6:00 p.m. at Maple Hall, 414 S. Gay Street  Next week, on Tuesday, Jan. 13, Knoxville’s 210th anniversary of elective municipal government (see below)—we’ll be talking again about South Knoxville. Or as wits of another era called it, “South America.” The subject of our biggest book project of 2026, we began groundwork on it years ago, and have already learned a lot about that huge, hilly, green, sometimes bewildering and often unruly region across the river, from industry to aviation to architecture to tourism to music, but there’s still a lot more to know before we can call it done. We’ll share a few highlights of what we’ve learned, and if you know something we don’t, we hope you’ll share that. We are particularly looking for information or stories about music venues and nightclubs, distinctive restaurants, and hotels and motels during the tourism era (1930 onwards) on Alcoa Highway and Chapman Highway. We would also like to know more about the Vestal Lumber Company in particular, marble quarries beyond the obvious ones like Mead’s, and airfields and airstrips, too. As always, we’re especially interested in finding distinctively South Knoxvillian photographs. We look forward to hearing your comments. Free program. Food and drinks available for purchase. The new McDonalds, shortly after it opened on Chapman Highway, in 1961. (Courtesy of Alan Webb.) Knoxville Walking Tours Join native East Tennessee historian, poet, and storyteller Laura Still with Knoxville Walking Tours for a tour of the city, as she brings to life the stories of pioneers, soldiers, outlaws, and others who walked these streets before us. Choose from Knoxville’s Early Years, the Gunslingers, the Civil War, Knoxville’s Musical History, and more. Find all the details for these tours and online booking on their website or call 865-309-4522.  A portion of tour proceeds from downtown-based tours benefits the Knoxville History Project.  Visit Knoxville Walking Tours Fortnightly Puzzler   What was 1936 Olympic speed-skating medalist Leo Freisinger doing in South Knoxville in June 1950? A - He was performing in an outdoor Holiday on Ice extravaganza.   B - He was on his way to see the national park, and stopped at Smoky Mountain Market to have a hot dog and sign autographs.   C - He was visiting his folks in Vestal, his childhood home.   D - His airplane made an emergency landing at Downtown Island Airport.  Check Your Answer!!!! Fortnightly Toasts Tuesday, Jan. 13, is the 210th anniversary of the first meeting of Knoxville City Council, then known as the Board of Aldermen, and therefore the anniversary of local elective government. By 1816, the city had already existed for 25 years, but because it was a territorial and state capital, when governors or legislatures made appointments to run the administrative center, Knoxville was slow to incorporate as a city with leadership elected by its own residents. Remarkably, of Knoxville’s original seven aldermen, three were Irish immigrants, one of them a Catholic. Dolly Parton. (Photo by Eva Rinaldi/Wikipedia.) As you’ve likely heard by now, Dolly Parton turns 80 on Jan. 19. The internationally idolized singer-songwriter was born and raised in the rural Pittman Center area of Sevier County, in the foothills of the Smokies, but from age 12 or so, she spent many hours in Knoxville, driven into town by her musician Uncle Bill Owens to perform on Cas Walker’s live radio shows, which around 1958 marked her broadcast debut. Despite the fact that judging by her autobiography, she may have performed on the Knoxville radio and TV studios hundreds of times as a teenager, and had a loyal live-audience following here, she got relatively little promotional fanfare or press attention until after she’d moved to Nashville in 1964. Her first publicly advertised show in Knoxville may have been when she performed with Johnny Cash, June Carter, the Statler Brothers and others at the Civic Coliseum in September 1966, when she was 20. We hope amid all the Dolly hubbub that this other show-biz diva isn’t forgotten: Jan. 20, which is a Tuesday, is the Centennial of the life of Patricia Neal, the most successful movie actress in Knoxville history. She was born 100 years ago in tiny and now nonexistent Packard, Ky., but moved to Knoxville as the preschool daughter of a middle-management coal executive. Here she spent most of her youth, and began her very successful career as an actress. As a child she practiced on the front-porch stage of the family home on East Knoxville’s Parkview Avenue, and under the tutelage of Emily Mahan, who ran a performing studio at 1832 West Cumberland, “Patsy Neal” was still an elementary-school kid when she was became a familiar face in public recitals. As a popular student at Knoxville High School, she began performing with the respected professional Barter Theater in Abingdon, Va. Her first big role was as Melanie in their production of a current Broadway drama Thunder Rock. After it's debut in Patricia Neal, circa 1952. (Wikipedia.) Abingdon in the summer of 1942, when Patsy was 16, Knoxville promoter Malcolm Miller was so impressed that he arranged for the show to make an unusual road appearance at Knoxville High School on Fifth Avenue on July 24, 1942. Some tickets were as cheap as 44 cents, with the option to bring canned food, a Barter tradition. She left Knoxville to attend Northwestern, and by 1946 she was on Broadway, earning a Tony award for her role in the Lillian Hellman play, Another Part of the Forest. She was soon in Hollywood, with roles opposite Ronald Reagan, John Garfield, and Gary Cooper, especially in a notable early movie, The Fountainhead. In years to come, she portrayed a wide range of roles from worried mothers to femmes fatale, winning an Oscar for Hud in 1963. She was for 30 years married to Welsh author Roald Dahl, with whom she had several children. After suffering crippling cerebral aneurisms at age 39, she recovered to return to the stage, and another Oscar nomination for The Subject was Roses. She spent most of her adult life away but helped establish the Patricia Neal Rehabilitation Center in Fort Sanders, and returned to visit friends in Knoxville, especially her lifelong mentor, Emily Mahan, so often that she was reserved a room at what’s now the Oliver Hotel.        Donate    Visit our Website Shop KHP Online!

Knoxville History Project | 123 S. Gay Street Suite C | Knoxville, TN 37902 US Unsubscribe | Update Profile | Constant Contact Data Notice

[sylviaw...@aol.com]

Whereis Maple Hall?

Sylvia

--
NOTE: unless otherwise indicated, opinions expressed on this SWNA Group discussion list are those of the individual sending the email - not the Board of Governors or any position taken by SWNA.
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "South Woodlawn Neighborhood Association" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to swna+uns...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/swna/796B6DA3-3150-447B-B9AE-DE1C0B5CB035%40bellsouth.net.

[Edward Acree]

On the east side of Gay street roughly between the Tennessee theater and Mast general

Sent from my Galaxy

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/swna/1050787753.4255265.1767813389581%40mail.yahoo.com.

[Janice Tocher]

Maple Hall, 414 S. Gay Street

Most convenient parking is State Street Garage - which is free after 6 pm

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/swna/1050787753.4255265.1767813389581%40mail.yahoo.com.