City Vows Lincoln Park To Be Preserved Despite Major Road, Sewer Projects

  • Tuesday, April 25, 2017

City officials vowed on Tuesday that Lincoln Park will be preserved despite a major road extension and sewer relocation planned nearby.

Maura Sullivan, the city's chief operating officer, said the Trust for Public Land will hold public meetings geared around ideas for refurbishing the African-American park that once featured ball fields, a swimming pool and other attractions.

She said environmental studies in the vicinity of Lincoln Park, which is next to Erlanger Hospital off East Third Street, should be concluded within days or weeks.

Meanwhile, the city is about to embark on relocating a major sewer that is under Erlanger and that dates to 1907.

Justin Holland, public works administrator, said the sewer serves "a huge area" of about 500 acres.

He said there is an opportunity to replace the old brick sewer with a separated system that will take about 350 million gallons of stormwater out of the Moccasin Bend Sewage Treatment Plant annually. He said that equates to about 10 days of operations at the plant.

Mr. Holland said the sewer work is separate from a plan to extend Central Avenue so that it connects with Amnicola Highway, but he said work could be coordinated to gain savings and efficiencies on the two projects.

He said the stormwater will be diverted into nearby Citico Creek.

Mr. Holland said the sewer, despite its age, shows no sign of failing. But he said "brick and mortar does fail as we found out at Market Street and Aquarium Way (Cheeburger Cheeburger building that partially collapsed).

He said the sewer is along Blackford Street and is now "under Erlanger Hospital."

The City Council is being asked to approve a contract with Ragan Smith Associates for $375,000 to draw up plans for the new separated stormwater and sewer lines.

Mr. Holland said work may start as early as this fall.

Bill Payne, city engineer, said there would be an initial phase built near where some apartments are rising off Amnicola Highway, then the full project would be completed later.

Councilman Anthony Byrd asked about the effect on Lincoln Park, saying residents there "are very concern" about development threats to the park.

He said, "The citizens are in an uproar and they say they are not being heard."

Councilman Russell Gilbert also spoke in behalf of saving Lincoln Park. He said, "So many people growing up we couldn't go nowhere but Lincoln Park." 

Meanwhile, a citizen group led by Tom kunesh and Eric Atkins held a press conference on the Lincoln Park topic on Tuesday.

They cited the Native American history of the location near the old town of Citico as well as the park's rich history.

The group said:

Historical Significance and Preservation of the Citico-Lincoln Park Site

1. Whereas, Native Americans were the first inhabitants of the Chattanooga area and were the first to create communities on the Tennessee River, to name the local creeks and land features, like Cvtonuga, and for over a millennia were the primary inhabitants of the many lands and waters of this region; and

2. Whereas, several indigenous tribes, such as the Yuchi, Muscogee, Shawnee and Cherokee have had an important and lasting impact on the history and legacy of the Chattanooga region, such that the Tennessee Commission on Indian Affairs passed a resolution in 2006 that identified and recognized these and other historical tribes of Tennessee, like the Koasati, Tuskegee, Natchez, Chickasaw and Choctaw; and

3. Whereas, the legacy of the Chattanooga region’s indigenous tribes began during the Paleo-Indian Period (12,000 B.C.E,.- 8000 B.C.E.),and includes the Mississippian Mound Builders — ancestors of the modern Yuchi, Muscogee (Creek), Chickasaw, Choctaw, who built Citico Town and its sacred temple mound; the famous Cherokee leader, Dragging Canoe, who relocated the Resisting Cherokee to this region in 1776 following his dissent from the Treaty of Sycamore Shoals and armed resistance from his base on Chickamauga Creek; one of this area’s most famed diplomats and Principal Cherokee Chief, John Ross, whose persistent advocacy for the rights of Indigenous Tribes led to the first U.S. Supreme Court decision in favor of a Native Nation (Worcester v. Georgia 1832), but whose trading post site served as the base of the City of Chattanooga after the Removal of all Native Americans from Tennessee in 1838; and

4. Whereas, Citico Town (ca. 900 C.E.) became an extensive agricultural area, extending for at least a mile radius in all directions, a crossroads and an integral link along the ‘Great Indian Path’, the foot highway that was traveled by indigenous persons and settlers, whose network of roads and pathways, along with the Cisca-St Augustine road which includes Nickajack Lake and the Unicoi Turnpike, and the Natchez Trace Parkway, served as precursors to the modern day American Interstate Highway system; and

5. Whereas, beginning in 1540 Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto, and later, Tristan de Luna (1560) and Juan Pardo (1567), began to engage the chiefdoms of the East Tennessee area, including Citico Town. The travels of James Needham and Gabriel Arthur were also significant explorations in the 1670's, as well as that of James Adair in the early 1730's; and



6. Whereas, part of the initial concentration of the Cherokee ‘Removal’ at Camp Cherokee began at the Citico-Lincoln Park site, and in 2009 the 111th United States Congress, through Senate Joint Resolution 14, officially acknowledged the “long history of official depredations and ill-conceived policies by the Federal Government regarding Indian tribes, and offer[ed] an apology to all Native Peoples on behalf of the United States”; and

7. Whereas, the Citico-Lincoln Park area served as an advanced fortified position and later a recreational area for Army troops during the American Civil War; and the systematic desecration of the sacred temple mound at Citico began during the Civil War when it was dug into and used to store ammunition; its ultimate destruction began in 1914 as it was considered “in the way” for the construction of the Dixie (Amnicola) Highway; and while many of the sacred items and valuable artifacts of this area were removed and now stored within the historical collections of the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington DC, most have been lost to Native American communities; and

8. Whereas, several research studies have been conducted on Citico Town and mound, including M.C. Read (Smithsonian Institution Report 1867); C.B. Moore (1914); James W. Hatch (“The Citico Site (40HA65): A Synthesis" (Tennessee Anthropologist 1976); Lynne Sullivan, “Reconfiguring the Chickamauga Basin”, Frank H. McClung Museum, University of Tennessee, Knoxville 2011; Nicholas Honerkamp (“What Ever Happened to the Citico Mound?”, Chattanooga Times Free Press 2015), University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. These earlier 20th century studies failed to include the input and inclusion of Native Americans communities; and

9. Whereas, after 500 years of Mississippian occupation, the systematic destruction of the Citico Mound eliminated the last surviving Native American structural remnant in downtown Chattanooga; and

10. Whereas, in 1887, the lands of Citico town and mound on the south side of the creek were developed by the local modern African American community as ‘Citico City’, “the first negro city on American soil”; and

11. Whereas, the development of Citico City culminated with the opening of Lincoln Park in 1917, Chattanooga’s first and only public park for African-Americans during segregation; among Lincoln Park’s many attractions were the Lincoln Center, lighting for night activities, a ferris-wheel, merry-go-round and other rides, a concession stand, tennis court, mini zoo, picnic area, and by 1938, an Olympic-sized swimming pool, built by the WPA, an auditorium for arts, dancing, drama, clubs, skating, badminton, and movies; adult programs in the evening - clubs, basketball, dancing, with daily preschool classes and school age activities; and

12. Whereas, Negro League Baseball became a pivotal aspect of the history of the Lincoln Park area with the formation of the Negro Southern League in 1920, and by the Chattanooga Black Lookouts serving as an inaugural member of that League. Teams from across the Negro League played on Andrews and the baseball fields of the Lincoln Park area; and

13. Whereas, the Black Lookouts, reconstituted as the Chattanooga White Sox in 1926, counted pitcher Leroy ‘Satchel’ Paige, “one of the all-time great baseball players of American history”, among the team’s players; and, after a short hiatus, the Negro Leagues returned to Chattanooga in the 1940s, and one of the more notable players from the Chattanooga Choo-Choo’s roster was a sixteen-year-old center-fielder named Willie Mays; and

14. Whereas, in 1947, local tennis star Wylma McGhee Reid played matches at Lincoln Park’s clay courts and became Chattanooga’s first national champion tennis player; and

15. Whereas, Lincoln Park was the residential and recreational focal point of Chattanooga’s African American community from 1887 through 1960, and declined with the implementation of the desegregation social movement, culminating in the City transfer of the Park property to Erlanger Hospital in 1979, while the Lincoln Park neighborhood remained; and

16. Whereas, the City of Chattanooga applied to the National Park System to become a federally-recognized Historic-Preservationist ‘Certified Local Government’ in 1989, and has actively and successfully promoted the preservation of several European-American neighborhoods, including Fort Wood, Battery Place, Ferger Place and St Elmo, with “Historic Neighborhood” status, while failing to designate and preserve the Lincoln Park neighborhood and Citico site, or any other African American or Native American area in or adjacent to downtown as ‘historically significant’; and

17. Whereas, African Americans have resided in Chattanooga for over 180 years — survived slavery on Beck’s Farm in ‘North Chattanooga’, created Hill City after the Civil War, survived lynchings in downtown and on Walnut Street bridge, lived in the structural rejects of Chattanooga’s upper class on Cameron Hill before it was chopped off, and then moved into Public Housing Projects, like Poss, McCallie and Harriet Tubman Homes, which have since been closed and torn down, and yet there is no African American structural history or neighborhood that bears witness to their local habitation like there exists for European Americans; and

18. Whereas, in the summer of 2013, the Lincoln Park Neighborhood Association and coalition members began an Annual Reunion in order to rekindle public interest, awareness and support for the Lincoln Park site; and

19. Whereas, from May to July 2016, the Bessie Smith Cultural Center hosted Negro League Baseball exhibits, educational workshops and panel discussions which focused heavily on the influence of Negro League baseball in Chattanooga; and

20. Whereas, these contributions and continued active influences include important aspects of Native American, African-American, and Civil War history, and that the combined Citico-Lincoln Park site is one of the most historically relevant and culturally significant sites in the greater Chattanooga region; 

21. Therefore be it resolved, that we proudly recognize, honor and cherish the history, heritage and active influence that the Native American Citico and African-American gutLincoln Park sites contribute to the United States, to Tennessee, and to Chattanooga; and

22. Further, we call on the City of Chattanooga to comply with the federal requirements of being a Historic-Preservationist ‘Certified Local Government’, and to install a City of Chattanooga Historic Preservation Officer who will recognize, protect, preserve and promote the Citico-Lincoln Park site, and to devise and implement an Historic District preservation plan for the area; and

23. Further, before we the City of Chattanooga ever allow this Native American founding site of Chattanooga, now in private ownership, be finally and forever destroyed by private development, we call for the most in-depth study of the area – a Phase 3 archaeological study, by Native American Indian archaeologists, to provide the most up-to-date, and potentially, the last, historical analysis and interpretation, anthropological assessment and preservation of Citico town and mound site; and

24. Further, we call on the City of Chattanooga to honor Mayor Berke’s 2013 promise to preserve Lincoln Park, by providing Erlanger/Chattanooga Hospital Authority with surplus public property in a different favorable location, as it has previously desired, and deeding all extant, historical, and feasibly severable lands and property formerly encompassed by the Lincoln Park fairgrounds, including the former pool site, parking lots, ball fields and tennis court, to the new Ubuntu Century Institute land trust of Chattanooga for the preservation of local African American land; and

25. Further, we call for the intact preservation of the primary Citico Town site as a burial ground and public historical park, and for the reconstruction of Citico Temple Mound, as the First Site of Cvtonuga (as written in the native Muskogee language of this area) and as a commitment by Chattanooga to atone for and honor its Native American history and existing related Native American tribes by reconstructing the monument (anastylosis) that it destroyed in 1915; and

26. Further, we call for a Citico-Lincoln Park Interpretive Center to be developed that will work for the protection, preservation and promotion of this site, public education and outreach, and seek partnerships with appropriate agencies that includes the Smithsonian Institute, Tennessee Historical Commission, UTK McClung Museum, and the Negro League Museum; and

27. Finally, we resolve that this honored and sacred place shall remain intact and be rebuilt, and that it shall remain a symbol of human ingenuity, achievement, and reconciliation, both for ourselves and for future generations to come.



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