Chattanoogans and people everywhere continue to feel the sadness over the Texas Hill Country victims of the July 4 weekend flash flooding, including the 27 campers and staff perceived to have been lost at the Camp Mystic nondenominational Christian girls’ camp.
It brought back to my mind the story I had always heard of the drowning of some Boy Scouts camped by Whites Creek just off the current U.S. 27 between Spring City and Rockwood, Tn. Some historical accounts easily found online say eight Boy Scouts from Rockwood and a scoutmaster drowned in March 1929 during a Friday night camping trip to the area of a former Boy Scout camp site.
They were staying in a bungalow-style home along the creek when the flood waters began appearing. They had moved to an upper part of the home, but by morning a bridge had broken and waters began streaming into the area more strongly. Some were able to survive by clinging onto the tree limbs and rocks or finding safe places. The deceased scoutmaster, Jim Wright, who was said to be heroic, had been a University of Tennessee graduate.
In 1932, an obelisk memorial marker was dedicated at the site of the home just below the current highway bridge, and it still has a hauntingly somber look, particularly at night, when I periodically pass it and see it.
I looked up some information, and Camp Mystic was started in 1926 by Ed “Doc” Stewart, who was the son of a Methodist minister and had been the University of Texas football coach. A real Renaissance man, he had a medical degree, was an accomplished piano player and skilled orator, and also coached football at Nebraska, basketball at Purdue, and baseball at Clemson, among other schools. He was shot and killed accidentally in 1929 while deer hunting.
Some prominent girls have attended Camp Mystic, including generations of President Lyndon Johnson’s family. Former First Lady Laura Bush was also a counselor there.
The special camaraderie that camp has reminds me a little of Camp Nakanawa girls camp up near Crossville, Tn., and which dates to 1920. And there are countless other camps within an hour’s drive of Chattanooga that are popular and well loved.
There is something special about the childhood bonding and maturing that can come from a summer camp. I know I am better for having attended Baylor Camp as a day camper for six weeks or so over five or six summers when I was in elementary school, as well as for attending the UT All-Sports Camp in Knoxville the summers after sixth and seventh grades. At the latter, I got to stay in the old athletic dorm of Gibbs Hall and rub shoulders with several well-known UT athletes and coaches.
About the time I was at UT camp was when I had Rick Trimble as a PE teacher at Baylor in the seventh grade. After he unfortunately died in a plane crash in Dunlap on June 24 while taking an instructional flight with a passenger who was injured, I wrote about remembering when he taught physical education and did motorcycle jumps at Baylor games when I was in seventh grade.
I put in the story that I would have liked to have known more about his life after he left Baylor, and a small handful of people emailed to fill in the blanks. Although more than one person remembered that he as a still-maturing young teacher challenged a student in a running exercise at Baylor in a way that did not meet the approval of headmaster Herb Barks, he went on to enjoy an otherwise very successful and commendable life and career, people said. He also apparently had many friendships.
He and wife Lynda had started the Sonitrol security business here, one or two people recalled, and successfully ran it and treated their employees well before selling it for a likely profit. One person also said Mr. Trimble had gotten interested in flying while learning to ride a gyrocopter in the late 1970s.
He apparently rode motorcycles and flew airplanes regularly into his senior age, the writers remembered, and had placed high in motorcycle rallies and flying exhibitions. One person called him a very skilled pilot, while several remember that he also did those two activities for fun. He also held a rally motorcycle race by his home, one person said.
Others also remembered him as a rock climber and repeller in his younger years. As I alluded to in the story, a sense of adventure obviously ran in his blood. He was also a member of First Baptist Church of Dunlap.
Another man who recently died and I wish I had known was tailor and downtown clothing store proprietor John Yacoubian, who died at age 86. An Armenian native of Syria who came to Chattanooga and the United States from Beirut, Lebanon, in the late 1960s, he certainly found his place in America with his talents and apparently kind manner.
I don’t believe I often went in his store, but I wish I had now or at least had an opportunity to interview him. Someone passed along a story that mentions that the late noted former UT Vol football and basketball announcer John Ward bought many of his clothes from Mr. Yacoubian, even though he lived in Knoxville.
Literally hats off to Mr. Yacoubian for a life well lived.
Chattanoogan.com sports columnist Randy Smith, who was a popular local TV sports broadcaster and did UTC basketball games and was involved in UT broadcasts, wrote recently about some of these old sports announcers. That included Mr. Ward, whom I got to interview once on the phone about his memories of attending the old Knoxville High when I was helping the Knoxville News Sentinel. The conversation was friendly with Mr. Ward, and I got a typed letter from him afterward thanking me for the story.
Mr. Smith also mentioned that someone wrote to say he did not like the style of the late Georgia announcer Larry Munson because he was too much a homer.
As a Georgia alumnus who spent several agonizing nights in my Georgia dorm room as a student listening to Mr. Munson broadcast Georgia road games, I firmly believe that no group hung on to an announcer’s voice as the Dawg fans did with the emotional Larry Munson. He knew how to capture the spirit of a fan’s love for a team in a beautiful way.
But while trying to pull Georgia through to victory, he was always very respectful of the other team. I never heard him criticize or downgrade another team or make a petty comment criticizing the officiating. Nor did he talk with conceit about Georgia. In fact, he sometimes built the opposing squad up like a coach in a pre-game press conference.
Some people remember him saying that Georgia stomped Tennessee with a hobnail boot after the Bulldogs came back to score late for a victory over Tennessee in Knoxville in 2001 in a back-and-forth game. But I think that was just something that came out of his mouth in the excitement. As he said afterward, he did not mean to sound so brutal and did not realize exactly what a hobnail boot was.
I like a lot of announcers, sometimes just for the texture of their voice or their one-liners.
The talents of the world are enjoyable to savor, and a different kind of appreciated work in Chattanooga is that of the late noted architect Frank Lloyd Wright on the former mid-century home of the late Seamour and Gerte Shavin at 334 N. Crest Road on Missionary Ridge.
I noticed the nice story in the Times Free Press by Ellen Gerst recently talking about it. Although it is in a trust and is protected from demolition or significant alteration, the three children are currently trying to come to an agreement about ownership, the story said.
Let’s hope that can all be settled for relational, architectural and historical reasons. It is too much a treasure for Chattanooga as the only Frank Lloyd Wright home in Tennessee.
I first got to write a story on the home for the Chattanooga News-Free Press in 1987 after just calling Mrs. Gerte Shavin and going up there and talking with her and her husband. Most of the conversation was with Ms. Shavin, and she showed me around again a couple of other times, including during a tour for an architecture student and acquaintance and her mother.
I later also talked with her over the phone in her advancing years. She always seemed kind in her New York-born style in sharing the house with interested people like me.
As a sidenote, the best view of the home for a passenger from the street is not from North Crest Road, as it is barely visible. Instead, it is from the sloping back side from Crest Terrace Drive.
But it is still nice inside and out for many fans of his architecture, as were many of these people mentioned for those who cherish the great human spirit. And that includes the praised young camp girls just getting started with their lives.
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Jcshearer2@comcast.net