Old Chattanooga-made ash clean-out door found in Florida
I have recently seen examples of events that seem similar to past events.
That is, despite the early moves by President Donald Trump’s administration that seem somewhat unprecedented in American history, although one perhaps can compare them in a different kind of way to the early Franklin Roosevelt administration.
The tragic Washington, D.C., mid-air collision between a smaller American Airlines-affiliated jet and an Army Black Hawk helicopter brought back two other sad historical memories for America regarding plane crashes. One was the Jan. 13, 1982, plane crash by an Air Florida plane after takeoff from what is now Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. It was an incident recalled in a recent Opinion piece by longtime Chattanoogan Garnet Chapin, who was on site while working for the National Park Service.
That 1982 crash, in which the plane hit a bridge before plummeting into the Potomac River, unfortunately involved a former Chattanoogan as a deceased victim – Chalmers McIlwaine Jr., 41, the son of longtime McCallie School teacher and administrator Chalmers McIlwaine Sr.
I remember talking with the elder Mr. McIlwaine some about the history of the Baylor-McCallie football rivalry before knowing about his son’s tragic death just a few years earlier.
A small number of people were heroically saved then, and the upbeat communicator Ronald Reagan gave a touching reference to the event and heroism in the State of the Union address after that. It was the first time a president recognized someone in the gallery for achievement, a move that has become common since for presidents during their annual address.
Despite the sadness of that event, a lot of other people were happy in 1982 because at that time snow also fell during the day in Chattanooga, causing school to be out for several days, although parents did have a little trouble getting home from work in the middle of the day.
The other skating memory brought back was one involving some top U.S. figure skaters, who died on Feb. 15, 1961, following a plane crash in Brussels, Belgium, when a 707 jet was trying to land amid trouble. And the Wednesday night crash in Washington, D.C., also involved some blossoming U.S. skaters and former champion Russian skaters.
Historical sources say the once-proud American skating team needed several years to recover before getting back to the top after that 1961 tragedy. Although Scott Allen won a bronze medal in the 1964 Winter Olympics, it was said to be in 1968, when Peggy Fleming inspirationally skated her way to gold, that America skating sensed that it had fully recovered from the 1961 crash.
It is certainly sad to hear about the blossoming young American skaters and all who perished in the latest air tragedy.
If you think Chattanooga has no connection to Olympic figure skating, it does have an entertainment-related one. Sonja Henie of Norway -- who won Olympic gold medals in women’s singles skating in 1928, 1932 and 1936 – starred in the 1941 movie, “Sun Valley Serenade.” And do you know what song was featured and became well-known after that? That’s right, “Chattanooga Choo Choo” by the Glenn Miller Orchestra
As an aside, I realized from living in Knoxville for a few years that it has a deeper connection to ice skating and hockey than Chattanooga does and has had a minor league hockey team off and on since about the early 1960s.
Other examples of history repeating itself in some ways are the current debate about how many federal workers to have and the bill passed in a special session by the Tennessee General Assembly allowing students to get tuition vouchers to attend public schools.
With the federal workers, I thought back to when former automobile executive Marvin Runyon was named by President Ronald Reagan as chairman of the Tennessee Valley Authority in 1988. Although it was not initially known what he would do, he decided to cut the workforce amid debt issues and the varying TVA services that he deemed non-essential to the operation of the utility.
Supporters of him say it helped the utility survive, but others say it did have quite a human toll in that 7,000 employees were let go in one day, and many lives were negatively affected financially and emotionally by the sudden firing. As a result, he developed the nickname “Carvin Marvin.”
Regarding the school voucher bill that was approved, I realize schools seem to have a complex issue in trying to educate all students. Some parents might want their children to get a better educational opportunity at a private school, while some might like the possibility to go to a Christian or religious school and get additional moral instruction.
I have been fascinated at how many Christian schools there are now compared to maybe the 1970s when I was in high school, even though Catholic schools have been around since the 1800s locally. And who can forget the strict dress codes of Tennessee Temple from a half century ago as well. But the number of other schools has proliferated, and many might say it has shaped Chattanooga culturally, too, from the old days when the vast majority went to public schools, although church attendance was once higher.
I went to the private and independent Baylor School and the only issues we had were an occasional student not applying himself or getting kicked out for some usually small infraction of the school’s or even society’s code of conduct.
Nearly 100 percent of the students were respectful to teachers and coaches, so it was quite an experience for me later trying to teach public high school for three years while in my 40s. I realized I did not have the personality of a military sergeant to get all the students to behave but later found college adjunct teaching a much better fit for me. Some teachers, on the other hand, have been effective public-school educators while possessing all kinds of personalities, and they are some of America’s heroes in my opinion.
And despite my struggles in getting as many high school students to learn as I wanted, with a youngster occasionally simply wanting to lay his or her head down on a desk and sleep during class, I am still a strong supporter of public schools. I am still a believer that if America falls or rises, it does so through the public schools.
The schools I taught at -- Bradley Central and Karns in Knoxville – had many great students and teachers along with a few youngsters who did not quite meet the various standards.
And I realized that a public school offers the enriching experience of being around all kinds of people and helps us realize we are all in the same boat in more ways than we think. Of course, public schools in Hamilton County vary in multiple ways among makeup, income level, etc.
Among the other pieces of history repeating themselves, I occasionally receive an email from someone about a story I had written 10 years earlier, and the writer is wondering about something related to it. For example, I used to occasionally get emails from out-of-town people wondering how they could get a tour of the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed home on Missionary Ridge.
In this case I was forwarded an email from someone who may have initially written fellow Chattanoogan.com contributor Harmon Jolley about an ash cleanout door. Harmon had visited the West Tennessee Delta Heritage Center in Brownsville, Tn., in 2012 and saw an old pea huller made by the Chattanooga Implement and Manufacturing Co. and became curious about the company’s history. As a result, he wrote a story linked below and included about Ed Sholar in the late 1800s founding the company.
Kim Reimer of Tallahassee, Fl., had seen Mr. Jolley’s article while looking for information online about the company, and he forwarded a picture of his ash cleanout door to Chattanoogan.com. He explained that when he was working on a new apartment complex in the mid-1980s and found an old barbecue pit that had been outside an older house, he found the item that had the name of the company on the ash cleanout door.
He later had it put in a chimney in his home, but the residence unfortunately was damaged by fire. However, he was able to salvage the metal piece again and put it in the chimney of his current home, while replacing the pins on the hinges.
“The door serves me well now,” he said of this item made in Chattanooga and with its own unique history.
A 1938 city directory from the Chattanooga Public Library said Chattanooga Implement and Manufacturing Co. was headed by Robert J. Maclellan, apparently from the Provident Life and Accident Insurance Co., and was overseen by several other support executives. The ad said the firm specialized in complete fireplace fixtures as well as such agricultural tools as hay presses, pea hullers, peanut pickers, disc plows, and stalk cutters.
The business was located at First Street and North Orchard Knob Avenue in East Chattanooga, although First there has apparently been given another name. There are a Sholar Avenue and Sholar Court in that part of Chattanooga, so it is not known if they were named for the company founder.
While that ash cleanout door opened a lot of history literally and figuratively, some new history was made recently in wrestling when Baylor beat rival McCallie, 30-29, on Jan. 24. As has been documented in the media, they did it with the help of a girl wrestler, Ryleigh Sturgill, who agreed to wrestle at 113 pounds after a need was pinpointed at that weight class for Baylor.
Although she lost, 11-8, to eighth grader Levi Scott, keeping him from a little disappointment or kidding, the fact that she did not lose by a major decision or pin in the match late in the competition gave Baylor the win. Of course, with Baylor and McCallie being close the last couple of years and each school sometimes missing wrestlers in matches for health or other reasons, who knows what the rest of the season holds.
But it was a great new moment in women’s sports history in Chattanooga and inspired me to even want to listen to the old Helen Reddy hit, “I Am Woman.”
I had the opportunity to interview Ryleigh and her brother, Hunter, last year for a story also linked below after they both won state championships in the girls’ and boys’ divisions, respectively. I found her very polite and friendly.
She would find her place in any of the various types of schools in the news amid voucher talks. And with the air tragedy and politically related squabbles of recent days in Washington, D.C., her accomplishment was welcome and inspiring news, too.
* * *
To see Harmon Jolley’s detailed story about the Chattanooga Implement and Manufacturing Co., read here.
https://www.chattanoogan.com/2012/8/23/232774/Chattanooga-Implement-Company-Product.aspx
* * *
To see the 2024 story on wrestler Ryleigh Sturgill and her brother, Hunter, read here.
https://www.chattanoogan.com/2024/3/11/484152/Sturgills-Become-Baylors-First.aspx
* * *
Jcshearer2@comcast.net