Life With Ferris: Chattanooga's Hidden Gem Is Rockmont Park

Rockmont Park may be a hidden gem in Chattanooga’s crown, but it’s no wonder it’s not on the radar screen for the city’s assets. For decades, it’s been covered in vines so thick massive boulders aren’t even visible, nor is the old home place that overlooked a lovely vista of the Tennessee River. Rockmont Park was built for the city’s first neighborhood, St. Elmo, and fell into disrepair over the years. 

Enter the Lookout Mountain Conservancy and Robyn Carlton. Throw in a team of super heroes from Howard High School, also known as Howard interns, and you’ve got yourself a lovely park. Or at least you’re well on the way.

“The interns cleared out the massive kudzu vines by hand,” Robyn said. As she spoke, the interns grinned proudly, rolling their eyes when Robyn said it was endlessly hot and the mosquitoes were relentless. The result of this hard work is a beautiful stand of grass looking the river, with the cityscape just beyond it. The plan is for Rockmont Park to be used as a venue for meetings, weddings or any sort of gatherings where a picturesque setting and fresh air is desired. 

This project has made an enormous dent in the landscape of the park, but work is only beginning. The plan is to develop the area into a 50-acre park, complete with a teaching garden, a bouldering park, a pollinator garden, a hostel and an amphitheatre for performing arts. All of this may sound like a pipe dream – how could it come to fruition with a very limited budget, a very young work force and a mountain of kudzu? If you wonder that, even for a second, you haven’t met Robyn. She’s a force to be reckoned with, despite her self-effacing, gentle persona. And her energy and creativity is endless. 

“No, I don’t really do anything,” she argues, gesturing at the interns standing near her. “This is all them. They tell us what they need and where they want to go.” She cites the vegetable garden as an example. The interns initially tended to eat packaged food for lunch, and Robyn, who considers these kids her family, goaded them to eat more vegetables. They challenged her to plant a vegetable garden so they could have access to fresh produce, and the garden was born. 

It’s not just any vegetable garden. Carved out of the hillside, it consists of raised beds in a fenced-in area, and yields a bonanza of cabbages, tomatoes, squash, okra, peppers and more. But that’s not the most impressive part of at the garden – that would be the condition of the site before the interns dug out dumpster after dumpster of chert, constructed 12 raised beds, dug post holes and filled them with concrete, and fenced in the large area. 

The interns shrug, biting back grins, and the truth is clear. They recollect a particular day of work, a day when the black storm clouds were rolling toward them. Minutes before they were pelted with rain, they ran. Not toward the cars, but toward the shovels. Since there was no danger of lightning, it was safe to work. And work they did! Exhausted and covered in a thick layer of mud, they all agree that day of working frantically in the rain was their finest hour. But no doubt there will be many more such hours from which to choose. There is the boulder park, and it is in use, as evident from the chalk marks on them. Each boulder has been named by the interns – including the Slide, which was named for the waterpark that used to sit on the site; the foundation of that slide is at the base of the rock. 

“We could have taken it out, but I wanted to leave it because it is a part of the history of this place,” intern Shay said. There are dozens more boulders on the grounds (some still unrecognizable as such by the overgrowth on them) that the interns plan to uncover. 

The interns aren’t the only volunteers. Rob Vannoy and Wade Anderson both lent their time, as well as that of their employees for the rockwork and building. These men demonstrated techniques one time, and the interns took it from there, securing stone steps on the path up the hill and sinking posts for the garden fence. Businesses also sponsor workdays for their employees, who are supervised by the interns. 

“We get a lot done on those days,” Shay said proudly. 

Indeed, through the LMC, a heck of a lot is getting done. 

Rockmont Park is up Old Wauhatchie Pike from Chattem.

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Ferris Robinson is the author of three children’s books, “The Queen Who Banished Bugs,” “The Queen Who Accidentally Banished Birds,” and “Call Me Arthropod” in her pollinator series. “Making Arrangements” is her first novel. “Dogs and Love - Stories of Fidelity” is a collection of true tales about man’s best friend. Her website is ferrisrobinson.com and you can download a free pollinator poster there. She is the editor of The Lookout Mountain Mirror and The Signal Mountain Mirror.