2024 Saturday, July 27, Day trip to Granville, TN "Tennessee's Mayberry"

We began our journey in Pulaski, where we stopped at Walmart for a few items and Murphy to fill up with fuel. 

We continued on Hwy 64 to Fayetteville, took 50 through Lynchburg, Tullahoma, and took Hwy 55 to Manchester and McMinnville. 

Hwy 56 to Smithville to I-40 to Hwy 70 is a very curved road to 53 

We went home by way of I-40 to 840 to I-65 to Saturn Parkway to 412 to 31 South to US-43 South home.

Welcome to Granville, Tennessee 

Hubby and I rode to Granville, TN, a history town nestled on the Cumberland River. 

Tennessee Mayberry Town. We bought tickets at $7 each to visit the Museum of Granville. 

We first stopped at the Farm to Your Table Agriculture Museum. There, we saw farm equipment, milk trucks, tractors, a mural, and signs throughout the building telling the history of farming and Funeral Services in Granville. 

T.B. Sutton Store 

Next, we stopped at the Sutton General Store, a two-story building with fixtures from the early 20th century. 

They had ordered grilled hamburgers left over from the day before.

Whistle Stop Saloon

Next, we stopped at the Whistle Stop Saloon, where we learned this building and area was used as an office by Dr. Wm B. Holmes, John B. Ragland used it as a Saloon during the Steamboat days, and Davis Huff used the building as a General Store. CW and Martha Ramsey made it their home, and SW & Dorothy Powell placed a trailer on the property. Randall & Peggy Clemons purchased the property and constructed a building similar to the original building. 

We visited the three-part museum highlighting the Andy Griffith Show with the characters of Andy, Barney, Aunt Bee, Opie, Otis, Floyd, Gomer, Goober, and others. 

I love Lucy 

Andy getting his hair cut by Floyd. 

A part of that museum was dedicated to The I Love Lucy Show featuring Lucy, Desi Armaz, Ethe, and Fred Mertz with Little Ricky. 

A third section was dedicated to Whiskey Decanter, a collection donated by several people. 

The Barrett’s of Watertown collection of over 2,000 Jim Beam decanters.

I Love Lucy, Andy Griffith Show, and Jim Beam Whiskey Museums

Gussie and Joe Miller of Cookville donated 3,000 decanters, including The Elvis Presley collection depicting the “King.” 

We saw the Sutton Homestead, Granville Museum, the Daniel Barber Shop and Post Office, Clemons Car Museum, and Tennessee Quilt and Textile Museums along the way. 

Last, we visited the Historic Granville Pioneer Village, which was full of museums and crafts. 

Pioneer Village

Sutton Service Station, Quilt benches at Pruett Stages, and Webster’s barn that showcased farm equipment.

We learned the process they used to grind corn into cornmeal at Ellen Grist Mill. 

We saw a chicken house, an outhouse, and a smokehouse. 

We saw the Williamson Pioneer Cabin built in 1820. We walked through Pauline Carter Johnson Cottage Garden, and we saw growing in the garden: Tobacco, broom corn, and other vegetables. 

It was beautiful but got increasingly hot by the afternoon. We ran into rain on the way home. 

2023 Sep 22, James D. Vaughn, Old Jail Museums and David Crockett's Log Cabin Lawrenceburg, TN

 Today, we rode to Lawrenceburg.

Our granddaughter didn't have school today and wanted to go to a museum. 

Just this year she has gotten interested in museums so we are always looking for a new one to visit.

Today, we went to the James David Vaughn Museum located at the 

Visitor Center 31 Public Square Lawrenceburg, TN 38464. 

Opened Monday-Friday 9:30-11AM and 1-3PM  call to get an appointment (931)762-8991 

A Piano, Microphone and Worship and Service Hymns of James D. Vaughn 

Sheets of his music: Gospel Chime, Working on the Road, Hills of Tennessee, Jesus Forgives and Forgets, I Believe in the Lord, Jesus is All I Need, Talk it Over with Jesus, Love Lifted Me, My Loved One sare waiting on me, Heaven Must be my new home, and O what a blessing he is to me.

Vaughn School of Music 

David Crocket Log Cabin (Closed for Repairs)

Old Jail Museum Waterloo St Lawrenceburg, Tn 38464
Opened only 
Tuesday-Friday 10-2PM 
Please call (931-212-1944) 

Upstairs are the jail cells, the Sheriff's office, and the home. You can walk inside the cells that once housed prisoners, which Ave didn't like She would not go inside the prison cell blocks.

News Paper Article about Sheriff Greg O'Rear killed by a prisoner. 

Inside the cell with prisoners

The museum had artifacts about people, places, Military Uniforms, School Uniforms, cameras of every shape and size, famous people from Lawrence County, Old Apple Computers, bicycles, quilts, etc. You just have to come to see for yourself. 

Our historian could go on all day and never cover everything in this build. It is loaded with information about Lawrenceburg. Well worth a visit.

A.L. Cantrell Lawrence Co Confederate Veteran 
I lived to be 112 years old 
Bet he had some stories to tell!

People from Lawrenceburg went on to be famous or important in different fields.

Senior Texas Ranger Captain Bruce Casteel (also Texas Rangers Hall of Fame Waco, Texas) 

David Crockett 1786-1836 King of the Wild Frontier  

James David Vaughn 1864-1941Gospel Song Writer  

Silas Mercer Beasley 1834-1914 Early Settler 

Rollie D. Beckham (1879-1978)

Fred Dalton Thompson 1942-2015 Actor, politician, attorney, lobbyist, columnist, and radio personality

J.H. Stribling (1863-1951)Church leader, entrepreneur, financier 

2016 October 1, Saturday Banana Puddin' Festival, Car Show and Quilt Show Centerville, TN

I could not sleep and was up at 3AM watching TV and writing in my journal.
Ate a banana and two pieces of sausage for breakfast.
We were on the road by 7:30AM taking our time as we rode to Centerville.
The sun was just coming over the horizon and there was a cloud of mist that covered the ground.

We travel north on hwy 43 turning left on hwy 50 near Columbia.
Vendors were still sitting up at their booths when we arrived.
We walked around the square downtown, stopping and looking inside the old courthouse which housed several vendors.
Outside we stopped in front of the chicken wire MINI Pearl to take a couple of pictures.

Minnie Pearl 

We followed the signs to the open field where the Banana Pudding  Festival was being held.
Inside the gate, we were asked if we were first-timers and were given a banana sticker with first-timers written across the banana. There were several people placing pins on a large map to show where people were from.

Monkey Head

Smokey the Bear

Entering the Pudding Festival 

The woman said we have thousands of people from all over the world that come to our festival. We have a couple that come from Australia every year.

The Cook-off
The cook-off consisted of ten contests, we watched the first five.
Each contest made two of the same puddings, one for the judges to sample, along with samples passed out to the audience to judge.
The first pudding was to be auctioned off.

The first 5 contestants in the Cook-off

One of the contestant's Banana Puddin dishes

At 10AM we were at the Puddin' Path for 10 samples of different banana puddings.

The Puddin' Path Samples 

#1 Moon Pie Banana 

Baked by the Puddin'

Baked By: Bon Aqua United Methodist Church 

#2 The Chisel (Chocolate)

Baked by: Fairfield Church of Christ Youth

#3 White Chocolate & Caramel Banana Pudding

Baked by the Relay for Life: Friends of Hope Team

#4Bell’s Best Banana Pudding

Baked by: Shady Grove United Methodist Church 

 #5Pickadeli at the Hicadeli

Baked by Thomas Hickman Hospital

#6 Pudding & Pearls Banana Pudding

Baked by: Centerville Woman’s Club

7#Caramel Cheese Cake Banana Pudding

Baked by: East Hickman Baptist Youth

8#Party-lIne Banana Pudding

Baked by: Nunnelly United Methodist Church 

9#Classic Southern Banana Pudding

Baked by: Mt Zion AME Church 

#10Cinnamon Roll Banana Pudding

Baked by CrossRoads Cowboy Church

The puddings consist of bananas inside a variety of puddings, from various organizations.
Each organization had baked the pudding to raise money for their cause.
The Pudding path cost was $5 per person.
Once you tasted each pudding you could vote for your favorite with a donation.

We could not eat all the samples, some were very good, some not so good.
My favorite was the cheesecake banana pudding.

We stayed to listen to a couple songs sung and played by a group of three young people from the same family.

We strolled through the park, stopping to examine what each vendor had to offer.
We stopped at the car show and took several pictures.
We saw a replica of Mini Peal riding in a jeep.
From the car show, we walked a few blocks to The First Baptist Church on 123 Church Street to look at the Hickman County Quilt Guild.
The show featured, "Something old, Something new"!
Their mission is to promote an interest in the art of quilting.

Something Old, something new 

Two of the sweet ladies that we met at the Quilt show

My quilt pick!

We rode to Grinders Switch Grinder's Switch
Grinders Switch was the fictional hometown of the comic character Minnie Pearl, created and portrayed at the Grand Ole Opry by comedian Sarah Ophelia Colley Cannon, who grew up in the nearby Colleyville neighborhood of Centerville.

Watertower at Grinders Switch 

Grinders Switch 1940

Minnie Pearl said, People always ask me, "Where is Grinder's Switch?"

As I grow older, the place is no longer a little, abandoned landing switch on a railroad in Hickman County. Grinder's Switch is a state of mind -- a place where there is no illness, no war, no unhappiness, no political unrest, and no tears. It's a place where there's only happiness --where all you worry about is what you are going to wear to the church social, and if your feller is going to kiss you in the moonlight on the way home. 

I wish all of you a Grinder's Switch

On our way home we stopped at Ponderosa in Lawrence to eat an early dinner and late lunch.
We both ordered a steak and salad.

We still had a couple of hours to visit the Oktoberfest in St Florine.
The tractor was loaded with passengers as we approached.
We loaded into the wagon and rode around the festival.

Riding in the Wagon 

Oktoberfest

The Senior Center building was full of history about the German families that had settled in St Florine.
We walked inside but I stopped at the first display and began talking to one of the family members that lived in the area.
By the time I stopped talking the festival was about over.

Maybe I can return tomorrow

🎄🎄🎄🎄2009 December 6, Saturday, Belle Mont Mansion Tuscumbia and Walking tour of Mooresville, AL

Two of my grandchildren and I rode to the Belle Mont Mansion in Tuscumbia for the Plantation Christmas Event. 

This event offers entertainment and raises funds for further renovations of the mansion, which it desperately needs. 

It is a Jeffersonian style plantation home built in 1828 for Doctor Mitchell and sold to the prominent Winston family of Tuscumbia. 

The family abandoned it and soon fell into deteriorate. In 1983 the house and 33 acres was donated to the Alabama Historical Commission.

I parked my car along the wheat fields, along with several other cars.

There were a bus shuttling people to the mansion but my grandchildren and I walked along the gravel road to the mansion.

As we started up the gravel road, we saw the historic marker that read

Belle Mont Marker

Belle Mont Marker

Built between 1828 and 1832, Belle Mont is a foremost example of Jeffersonian Palladian Architecture in the Deep South and one of Alabama's first great plantation houses. 

It was build for Dr. Alexander W. Mitchell, a native of Virginia, and a graduate of the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, and one of the first large scale~ planters and slaveholders in this area. 

In 1833 this 1,680~ acre plantation was sold by Mitchell to another Virginian Native, Isaac Winston. Winston, also a prominent planter and strong supporter of the Confederacy, was the uncle of Alabama's first native-born Governor, John Anthony Winston. Belle Monte remained in the hands of Winston heirs until 1941. 

In 1983, the house and 33 surrounding acres were donated to the Alabama Historical Commission.

Belle Monte Mansion Christmas 2009

On the front door of the mansion was a green wreath with gold balls and a red ribbon. The white hand railing was covered in greenery, with red bows and orange-red and green balls. There was greenery above the door and on the front porch on the second floor.

Inside the Mansion there were green vines winding along the staircase leading to the second floor. There were vines, green plants and red apples over the fireplace and on other pieces of furniture.

There were women dressed in beautiful white and red ball gowns, and men were dressed in black suits.

In the dining area were a long table, a silver bowl full of greenery, a silver teapot full of hot cider, and a silver bowl full of punch. There were several silver trays of finger food. 

Women dressed in Red and White Christmas Ball Gowns 

We drank a cup of punch and helped ourselves to the finger food. 

On the walls were hung paintings of family members that had once gracefully walked in the rooms of this mansion, and a painting of the mansion was sitting on an easel.

 Finger foods

Belle Monte 

There was a curator in every room-filling our heads with the history of the plantation.

The book, Lady of the Lake by Scott was laid on a bedside table in one of the bedrooms. 

Gathered in the family room were men dressed in suits and women dressed in holiday ball gowns of red, and white. There were a couple of women playing Christmas tunes on flutes.

We walked upstairs where there was a display case showing the construction, layout of the mansion in its grander years.

We finished our tour and walked outside to get a better view of the three chimneys, the two tear, six, white column front porch. The house was built out of red brick, with six windows on the west side, four windows on the front with two front doors. The backside of the house had a root cellar, with the large landing of stairs leading to the ground. It had a large back porch with two of the bedrooms having doors leading outside.

I guess this was to get easy access to the outhouse.

Belle Monte Mansion Back porch 

Entrance to the Dining Room @ Belle Monte Mansion

Brick Church in Mooresville

Refreshments at Brick church Mooresville

Post Office in Mooresville

Historic homes in Mooresville

My grandkids and I rode to Mooresville to take the Christmas Walking tour. 

We toured the Post Office, the Stagecoach Inn, the Tavern, and the Brick Church. 

We walked up and down the streets of the small community enjoying the Christmas decorations. 

The Brick Church was open for the tour so we stepped inside where we enjoyed a cup of hot cider and a woman playing the piano.
The Post Office was opened for the tour and the employees showed how the post office worked and the post office is still used by the community.
The old tavern was opened with a fire burning in the fireplace, there was greenery on the mantel and a small library of books in the back room.

Stage Coach Stop 

The tour ended at 5:00PM by that time it was cold and dark outside.
The grandkids and I loaded into my car and I drove us home. 

I had spent a wonderful day with two of my grandchildren. We learned some local history about the Belle Mont Mansion and the historic town of Mooresville. I took lots of pictures and I hope the grandkids remember the time we spent on both tours.

We saw several historic markers telling the history of Mooresville. 

Mooresville Incorporated in 1818

Post office contains original call boxes 

Old tavern, 1817 used as a stagecoach stop

Red Brick Methodist church 1817

U. S. Gen. James A Garfield was stationed here 1862

White frame church is more than a century old 

Andrew Johnson was apprenticed tailor here

Neoclassic architecture

1971 by Alabama Society Daughters of the American Revolution 

Mooresville, Alabama Incorporated November 16, 1818

Mooresville Post Office, c.1840, is the oldest operational post office in the state of Alabama. It has served the community form the same building since its construction of sawmill lumber in 1840. The mailboxes and office furnishings are even older, having been transferred from the original post office in the Stagecoach Tavern. The mailboxes are numbered 1-48, and some families have had the same box numbers for several generations. The building is owned and maintained by the Town of Mooresville.

Mooresville Stagecoach Inn and Tavern

The Stagecoach Inn and Tavern were built c.1820 and served as the post office before the current post office was constructed around 1840. An Act of Congress on March 13, 1818, authorized mail delivery to and from neighboring Huntsville and necessitated the establishment of a post office in Mooresville. A road was built between the two towns, and horse and rider carried mail. The Stagecoach Inn and Tavern were listed on Tanner's Post Map of 1825 with supper priced at "2 bits." The original post office was located on the right side of the building and mail may have been deposited and received through the small window. This window is also believed to have been used for the after-hours sale of liquor. The first floor was used as a common room with an outside stairway leading to two sleeping rooms on the second floor. The Stagecoach Tavern is currently used as a museum and the official town hall.

Mooresville Brick Church

Completed by 1839 this Greek Revival Structure was probably under construction for several years. On November 18, 1838, Alabama's 2nd Governor, Thomas Bibb and his wife Pamela deeded this property to William K. Adams, Monroe F. Moses and James Allison trustees of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. This denomination retained the title but over the years permitted the Baptist and Methodist to meet here.

Outstanding religious leaders who preached here were Cumberland Presbyterians "Father" Robert Donnell, the early leader and Constantine Blackmon Sanders, the "X+Y=Z Preacher" as well as Methodist Clare Purcell later Bishop of North Ala., West Fla. and Central Conferences.

National Register of Historic Places Mooresville Historic District 4/13/72

The Cumberland Presbyterian Church

This faith was organized in Dickson County, Tenn., Feb. 4, 1810, as an outgrowth of the Great Religious Revival of 1800. Its founders were ministers of the Presbyterian Church who rejected the doctrine of election and reprobation. They formulated and published a “Brief Statement” setting forth the points wherein Cumberland Presbyterians dissented from the Westminster Confession of Faith.

Robert Donnell, one of the founding fathers of the church, was preaching in this area as early as 1810. About 1834 he moved from Tenn. to Mooresville and was largely responsible for the early growth of the faith locally.

Mary Ann Walton, a local benefactor, died in 1899 willing much of her estate in trust to the Presbytery. Her will was contested and upheld three times by the Alabama Supreme Court in Woodroof vs. Hundley.