South Hamilton County Place Names

  • Thursday, January 12, 2017
  • Chuck Hamilton

These are the historic communities, those completely past and those still extant, of Hamilton County, Tennessee, south of the Tennessee River to the Georgia state line and west of Missionary Ridge to the Marion County line.  Everything here falls within the current boundaries of the City of Chattanooga, and is largely taken from my previous article “Chattanooga and Its Historic Suburbs” with some additions and corrections.  Also, it is now presented entirely in alphabetical order than than by “original city” and then suburbs.  In addition, I’ve also included the more prominent geological features and waterways.

Alton Park lies south of West 37th Street, east of Alton Park Boulevard, and north of West 47th Street, and is bordered on the west by Forest Hills Cemetery and Hawkins Ridge.  It began life as Oak Hills under the Belt Line and became Alton Park when Chattanooga Southern (Tennessee-Alabama-Georgia) Railway took over the rail yards and maintenance facilities along with the depot in 1895.  The post office of Alton Park operated 1895-1920.

Amnicola was the large farm of first the Crutchfields and later the Montagues along the Tennessee River, south of South Chickamauga Creek and west of the railroads.  The post office of Amnicola, which was actually in Boyce, operated 1879-1887, and the Western & Atlantic Railroad altered the name of its station to conform, but Cincinnati Southern Railway did not.

Arno (see Sherman Heights)

Atlanuwa is the Cherokee name for the cave in the cliff below Battery Place, now submerged beneath the Tennessee River since the closing of the gates on Nickajack Dam.  It is also the Cherokee name for the city.

Avondale originally lay between the railroad and Missionary Ridge, south of Crutchfield Street to Ruby Street, and later expanded all the way to Citico Avenue.

 Avondale was a subdivision immediately south of Sherman Heights and a station on Chattanooga Union Railway (Belt Line)  just north of Citico Avenue.  Because of the station, the definition of Avondale expanded to include it, eclipsing the adjacent Burgess.  It became part of East Chattanooga in 1905.  The post office of Avondale operated 1894-1905.

Battery Place lies along the street of the same name between the river and Riverfront Parkway, formerly the site of a Civil War battery.  It was, and still is, one of the more prestigious areas in which to live downtown.

Belvoir was the residential area around the large home of Col. W.R. Crabtree, which still stands, that became part of the larger community of Brainerd.

Beulah was a community beween St. Elmo and Mountain Junction, now absorbed into St. Elmo, along Beulah Avenue from West 51st Street south to West 54th Street.

The Big Nine was the stretch of East 9th Street (East MLK Boulevard), particularly between Houston and Magnolia Streets, that was the paramount cultural and commercial center of the Afro-American community in Chattanooga, especially during Jim Crow and segregation in the first half of the 1900s.  Amongst the barber shops, retail stores, and numerous clubs, its center-piece until 1985 was the Martin Hotel which once stood where the Bessie Smith Hall is now.

Billy Goat Hill lies at the end of North Chamberlain Avenue, which at one time was Sherman Boulevard, and north of Missionary Ridge.  It was occupied by Union troops under Sherman’s command during the Battle of Tunnel Hill, Tn., fought the same day as the Battle of Missionary Ridge.  Gun emplacements and rifle pits from the battle still exist.

Black Bottom once lay south of Workman Road (formerly Hamill Road, formerly West 47th Street), east of Wilson Street and west of Chattanooga Creek.  It got its name from the coal sludge dumped into Chattanooga Creek from the factories lining its path, particularly its upper reaches in Walker County, Georgia (those in Hamilton County did equal or greater damage, but that did not affect Black Bottom).  An effort was once made to restyle it “Harrisburg”, but it never caught on, and the area eventually became Piney Woods.

Blue Goose Hollow was north of where West 6th Street (West MLK Boulevard, earlier Mill Street) came over Cameron Hill.  It began as a company housing for workers at Roane Iron Works and is famous for being the birthplace of the Empress of the Blues, Bessie Smith.  Fulton St. is all that remains.  The upper management of Roane Iron lived until the Roane Iron Works shut down.

Bluff View was once the premier place for the wealthy to live in downtown Chattanooga.  Along the bluff overlooking the Tennessee River at the end of High Street, it survives as Hunter Art Museum, Houston Museum, and Mary Portero’s Bluff View Arts District, which preserves the great majority of the former homes.  The upper ends of Cherry, Walnut, Lookout, and High Streets and Georgia Avenue were also once affluent residential areas.

Boulevard Park was a suburb in its own right that lay west of Rossville Boulevard below East 40th Street opposite Cedar Hills, and has long been that suburb’s western half, even formerly hosting Cedar Hills School.

Boyce  was an organized town east of the Western & Atlantic Railroad and west of Taylor Street between Bachman and Sims Streets.  Its name derives from the eponymous station on the W&A later shared with the Cincinnati Southern Railway.  It was also a station on the Belt Line and on the Chattanooga Electric Railway and its successors.  Boyce became part of the greater town of East Chattanooga in 1905.  The post office of Boyce Junction operated briefly in 1879 before changing to Amnicola a month later, to Boyce six months later, back to Amnicola three weeks later for eight years, back to Boyce for a year-and-a-half, then finally to East Chattanooga until 1885, which lasted until 1905.

Bozentown lies north of Appling Street between Riverside Drive and Belmont Avenue to the section of Wood Avenue that intersects with Riverside Drive.  Its “main street” was and is Wood Avenue, where the First Baptist Church of Bozentown sat until recently (it now occupies the former Ridgedale Methodist, where my grandmother attended church).

Brabson Hill refers to both the actual hill from Market Street eastward to beyond Central Avenue and to the knob upon which the former Brabson House stands.  It was also the popular name for most of the old East Side west of the ETV&G to Georgia Avenue.  Much of it has fallen to expansion of Unum (Provident) and UTC.

Brown’s Ferry is the northern section of Lookout Valley, more or less everything north of Cummings Highway to the Tennessee River, named for the ferry.

Brown’s Valley is the name for the valley north of Lookout Creek not directly drained by that stream and so-named for John Brown of Landing, Tavern, and Ferry fame.  It is also the local name for the Lookout Valley community north of Tiftonia.

Brushy Knob was the name for the hill which is the core of the National Cemetery.

Burgess once the south of Ruby Street down to Wilson Street, between the railroads and Missionary Ridge or North Chamberlain Avenue.  The name came from the station on the East Tennessee, Virginia, & Georgia Railroad.  The area became part of East Chattanooga in 1905 and got swallowed up into Avondale and forgotten.

Bushtown was the first black-governed municipality in the State of Tennessee.  The suburb lies between the railroad and Orchard Knob Avenue from East 3rd Street to Citico Avenue.

Cameron Hill was a prestigious West Side neighborhood in its own right, with two houses along its crest and others on Cameron Drive.  A spacious Boynton Park once adorned its peak, only to become fill dirt for the freeway.  In its place, the Cameron Hill Apartments were constructed, now replaced by offices for Blue Cross/Blue Shield.  As a geographic feature, Cameron Hill is the entire hill west of the original city, including the spurs and knolls of Reservoir Hill, Terrace Hill, and College or Academy Hill.

Cash Canyon was the local name for the Tennessee River Gorge that begins just below Willams Island.  Also called the Suck and the Narrows from two of its river hazards.  It was also the informal name for the community along Cash Canyon Road north of its intersection with O’Grady Drive and River Canyon Trail that once hosted its own school, Riverside School, across the river from Signal Point.

Cedar Hills lies at the foot of Missionary Ridge south of East 40th Street and east of Rossville Boulevard, though it is now considered to take in the former Boulevard Park west of the boulevard (in fact, the former Cedar Hills School is there) as well as the former suburb of Rossville, Tennessee.  Also, its northern border was originally East 44th Street

Chattanooga was originally the name of a Cherokee town (Tsatanugi) at the mouth of Chattanooga Creek in the vicinity of St. Elmo.  The name was later adopted  by residents of the community of  Ross’ Landing at the foot of the bluff downtown.  In time, it became one of the major rail hubs in the South, serving as a terminal for at least six different long-haul railways.  The post office operated as Ross’ Landing 1837-1838, and since 1838 as Chattanooga.

Though it takes in the entire area covered in this article and a lot more, the original town was confined to the area between the river in the north, James Street (9th Street, now Martin Luther King Boulevard, between Chestnut and Market Streets) in the south, Georgia Avenue on the side of Brabson Hill in the east, and Pleasant Street on the side of Cameron Hill in the west.  Its main street has always been Market Street, its second street, now Broad, was at first named Mulberry Street then became Railroad Avenue in 1850.

In 1851, the town reincorporated as the City of Chattanooga, and annexed territory out to what are now Baldwin Street in the east and West 23rd Street (then Missionary Avenue) in the west; these were the city boundaries in the Civil War.  After the war in 1869, the city expanded to Central Avenue (then East End Avenue) in the east and West 28th Street (then Chattanooga Avenue) in the West.  Its next expansions came in the early 20th century, and at the end of the thrid quarter it grew exponentially.

Though Chattanooga has always had satellite communities since even before the Civil War, its real historic suburbs did not come into existence until its speedy and broad industrial expansion during its “Dynamo of Dixie” years in the latter 19th century.

Until the 1880s, the primary suburbs for Chattanooga were St. Elmo (originally named Kirklen) and Hill City on the north side of the river.  With the economic boom of 1887, numerous suburbs spread across the Chattanooga Valley beyond the city limits. 

This birth and growth of these suburbs was supported by one of the country’s best streetcar systems, starting with in 1875 with horse-drawn cars, later adding steam-locomotive driven cars in 1885, and electric traction powered cars in 1889.  From 1889 through most of 1891, the city was serviced by all three.  The opening of the County (Walnut Street) Bridge paved the way for explosive growth north of the river, but those are covered elsewhere.

Chattanooga Creek rises from a large spring in Hidden Hollow at the eastern foot of Lookout Mountain in Walker County, Georgia.

Chattanooga Public Wharf once stood at the end of West Montgomery Avenue (West Main Street) on the Tennessee River.

Chattanooga National Cemetery is the nation’s first national military cemetery.  Occupying

Chattanooga Valley, specifically the Lower Chattanooga Valley, lies between Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge.

Churchville is Bushtown’s next door neighbor, and lies within Citico Avenue, East 3rd Street, Orchard Knob Avenue, North Kelly Street, and Dodson Avenue.  Like Bushtown, Churchville originated as a black-governed municipality in the late 19th century.  It was a stop on both the Belt Line and the Chattanooga Electric Railway and its successors.

Citico City  lies north of East 3rd Street, between the railroad and Central (East End) Avenue, and is now better known after the name of the adjacent public park, Lincoln Park.

Citico Creek rises from Indian Springs now beneath what used to be Parkwood Nursing Home in northern Glenwood.

Citico Junction was the name for the area west of the junction of the Western & Atlantic Railroad (W&A) and Cincinnati Southern (CS) Railway, which originally lay west across from the end of Wilson Street, with an ill-defined north limit.  The name derives from the Gardenhire farm called Citico which straddled the eponymous creek, itself named after the Cherokee village once there.

City Center (see Downtown)

Clifton Hills straddles Rossville Boulevard below East 28th Street down to East 32nd Street east of Rossville Boulevard and to East 33rd Street west of it.  It was begun in 1886 by John C. Roberts out of the Oakland plantation.

College Hill, also called Academy Hill, is actually a eastern spur south of Cameron Hill, as one can see from the large panoramic photo behind the desk of the library’s local history section.  As a neighborhood, it remains as the College Hill Courts, or Westside projects.  Despite the fact that the hill and surrounding flats were farther from the pollution of the factories to the immediate west, this was where the rank-and-file of the factories lived, with a longer commute.

Cowart Place is south of Main Street, across South Market Street from Fort Negley, extending south to the freeway.

Cross Roads, so named for being the intersection of the first two post roads in the later Chattanooga (intersection of St. Elmo Avenue and West 38th Street) opened in 1820, was an antebellum community adjacent to Kirklen that was later absorbed into it.  

Cummings Bottoms along Lookout Creek are the land upon which John Walter Cummings built a house in 1862 for wife Rebecca Fryar, and is now home to the Cummings Cove subdivision and golf course.

Cummings Gap runs through Raccoon Mountain connecting Lookout Valley with Kelly’s Ferry on the Tennessee River.

Curtain Pole was the community in the vicinity of the H.L. Judd factory, built about 1890.  Later, Sherman Hill Baptist Church formed the center of the community.  It lay off Amnicola Highway along the road of the same name.  Amnicola School operated here for several years.

Downtown officially has always been the same as the original town of Chattanooga as set out in 1839, minus four of the original streets west of Pine Street (Poplar, Cedar, Cypress, Pleasant) obliterated by the construction of the I-124 (now US 27) freeway.  The tourist industry now refers to it as City Center, though this term covers a larger area, which is also the case with many uses of the term “downtown”.  To some, this means everything between Missionary Ridge and Lookout Mountain, which is not exactly incorrect if imprecise.

Dutchtown once lay in the area of the Lerch Street and Glendon Place neighborhoods and was the residential area around the dairy of Jacob Kellerhalls that later became part of the greater community of Brainerd.  There was an attempt to rename it after the prestigious suburb of Memphis, which is why we have Germantown Road.  Despite the name, its inhabitants were German and Swiss.

East 8th Street runs from Palmetto Street to Central (formerly East End) Avenue, and was once part of McCallie Addition subdivision.  Until UTC expanded in the 21st century, the residential neighborhood extended west all the way to Douglas Street.

East Chattanooga proper is everything north of Citico Street between the railroads and Missionary Ridge.  Within this area lie the formerly separate communities of Boyce, Sherman Heights, Avondale, and Burgess, which merged under this name around 1905.  The name is also sometimes used, if imprecisely, for the entire area north of McCallie Avenue between the railroad tracks and Missionary Ridge.  The post office of Boyce changed its name to East Chattanooga in 1889, operating until 1905, and the Sherman Heights station on the Southern Railway (formerly East Tennessee, Virginia, & Georgia Railroad) changed its name to East Chattanooga in 1914.

The name East Chattanooga entered the local area’s nomenclature as the name of a land company’s extensive development of everything west of the railroad tracks south of South Chickamauga Creek to what is now Crutchfield Street, plus everything east of the tracks and north of Sims Street to Harrison Pike.  The plans included several large public parks and even incorporated Bozentown “as is”, with its identity and character intact.  The streets were graded in 1890, but the endeavor collapsed.

East End, a name which has largely disappeared from usage except maybe by longer term residents, was for a long time one of Chattanooga’s largest suburbs, home to a sizable working class population that worked in many of the surrounding factories. Currently it lies south of East 34th Street between Jerome Avenue, Workman (formerly Hamill) Road, and 4th Avenue, though many people refer to the area as part of East Lake.  East End was a station on the Belt Line, and also on Chattanooga Southern (Tennessee-Alabama-Georgia) Railway, and there was another station here called Radcliff or Radcliff Junction.  At one point there was an attempt to rename it South Lowell, but that never took.  The post office of East End operated 1888-1895.

East Lake lies along the foot of Missionary Ridge between East 28th and East 40th Streets and 4th Avenue, its central attraction being the beautiful East Lake Park, Chattanooga’s very first public park.  In addition to Grandview Station (see below), there was a separate East Lake Station on the Belt Line, and another on the Chattanooga Electric Railway.  The post office of East Lake operated 1893-1912.

East Lake Park was established by Charles E. James and donated to the city in 1896, becoming Chattanooga’s first public park.  From 1898 to 1915, the park also hosted Oxley Zoo.  It once included a spring house for drinking water, supplied by the same springs from which the lake was created.  Grandview Station on the Belt Line brought passengers directly to the park.

East St. Elmo (see South Alton Park)

East Side originally ran between East MLK Boulevard (formerly East 9th Street) and the river from Georgia Avenue to Baldwin Street, or, more practically at the time, to the old line of the East Tennessee, Virginia, & Georgia Railroad (ETV&G).  Later it extended with the city limits to East End/Central Avenue.  At one time the East Side included some of the most posh neighborhoods in the city, along with some of its worst slum areas.  Some of the East Side has been taken over by buildings and parking lots for Unum Provident, but most of the East Side that has disappeared has been swallowed up by the growing campus of the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga (UTC).  Much of this growth has been in the 21st century; for instance, when I was here at UTC in the early 1980s, East 5th Street School still operated.

Eden Park was one of the more prominent subdivisions in Highland Park suburb, from Willow Street to Lyerly Street, between Main Street and Anderson Avenue.

Endline was south of Mountain Junction, named for a station on the Chattanooga Southern Railway also called Dotys Station.  The post office of Endline operated 1897-1900.

Engel Stadium was built at Andrews Field and opened in 1930.  Andrews Field was built 1910-1911 to host the Lookouts baseball team transferred from Little Rock, Arkansas, after the 1910 season ended.  The stadium, named for local real estate developer and major baseball promoters Joe Engel, former pitcher with the major league Washington Senators.  The stadium was home to the Chattanooga Lookouts 1930-1961, 1963-1965, and 1976-1999, who moved to their new stadium on Kirkman Hill in 2000.  Andrew Field and Engel Stadium were also home to Negro League teams the Chattanooga White Sox (with which Satchel Paige got his professional start in 1926), the Chattanooga Choo-Choos (including a young Willie Mays), and the Chattanooga Black Lookouts.

Ferger Place was a very posh subdivision in Oak Grove suburb on Morningside and Eveningside Drives.  It remains quite attractive.

Forest Hills Cemetery north of Hawkins Ridge divides Alton Park from St. Elmo.  Unusual for the time it was established, as a whole it is racially integrated even if within whites and blacks are buried in different sections, though that doesn’t apply to modern burials.  It was established in 1874 as Oakwood Cemetery.

Fort Cheatham is at the foot of Missionary Ridge south of the freeway between East 28th Street and 4th Avenue.  Originally it was where Maj. Gen. John Breckenridge had is headquarters.  It is, ironically (given its namesake), one of Chattanooga’s oldest historically black suburbs.  It hosted stations for both the Belt Line and the Chattanooga Electric Railway.

Fort Negley, built around the site of the Civil War fort, stands east of Market Street to Rossville Avenue and Washington Street, between East Main and East 20th Streets.

Fort Wood originally occupied the area from the ETV&G to East End/Central Avenue between East 5th Streets and McCallie and Avenue, but it’s practical western boundary since the 1980s has been Palmetto Street.  It too was named for a Civil War fort.

Foust Place, south of the freeway between South Hickory Street and 4th Avenue and north of East 28th Street.  It began life as New England Park, so-named for a driving or racing track it contained, but came to be called by the name of the housing development that covered its entire territory.  It was actually a subdivision of the greater East End suburb.

Gamble Town was the section of St. Elmo at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries centered along Harris Street (now Florida Avenue) populated by Afro-Americans.

Glenwood lies north of McCallie Avenue next to Missionary Ridge, west to Derby Street and north to East 3rd Street, taking in Derby Circle, taking in the former communities of Indian Springs and Suburba.

Glass Farm District (see Sherman Heights)

Gobbler’s Peak is a knoll just south of Bozentown.

Hawkins’ Ridge is the narrow hill dividing St. Elmo from Alton Park.

Hell’s Half Acre was one of the most interestingly-named areas of Chattanooga, and there were actually three so-called.  The “main” Hell’s Half Acre was in Orange Grove between East 16th Street and the railroad to the south, taking in Doris, Fillmore, Fagan, and Polk Streets within those bounds.  There was another Hell’s Half Acre next to Tannery Flats and yet one more Hell’s Half Acre near Moyses Street, which once ran near West 19th Street beyond Riverfront Parkway in South Chattanooga

Highland Park lies between McCallie and Holtzclaw Avenues and East Main and Willow Streets.  The elevated part of the suburb is the Civil War-era Indian Hill.  Highland Park Baptist still stands in its original location.  It hosted three stations on the Belt Line and others on the Chattanooga Electric Railway.  The post office of Highland Park operated 1894-1898 after being moved from Orchard Knob.

Hooterville lies south of the freeway to Chattanooga Creek.  That’s the name the locals and those who know them have given it.

Hustle (see Mountain Junction)

Indian Hill is the high ground upon which the core of Highland Park sits.

Indian Springs was what the northern portion of what later became Glenwood was before that suburb appeared on the map, so-called for the springs at the site of one of the two internment camps during the Cherokee Removal in Hamilton County.  Indian Springs was a stop on the Belt Line, at least in its early years.

Irish Hill once sat between Cherry, Lindsay, East 8th Street, and East MLK Boulevard (East 9th Street)  Many do not realize that the first railroads into Chattanooga (Western & Atlantic and East Tennessee & Georgia) were built by the same workforce that did so elsewhere in the country: immigrant Irish.  Most accounts tell that this population disappeared with the arrival of the Civil War.  However, that leaves unexplained how the Irish of Chattanooga contributed a an entire “regiment” to the Fenian Brotherhood’s Army of Irish Liberation for the invasion of Canada in 1867.  Sts. Peter and Paul Church is all that remains today of that community.

Jackson Park once surrounded the National Military Park, which was then limited to the hill known as Brushy Knob and not fenced.  The public park occupied the flatlands.

Jefferson Heights lies east of Fort Negley but straddles Main Street, with Madison Street as its east boundary and the railroad to the south.

King’s Bridge (see Old Boyce)

Lake Lookout is privately owned, south of Elder Mountain Road in Brown’s Valley.

Lenora Springs (see Lookout Mountain)

Lime Kiln Hollow is the ravine between Trueblood Hill and Billy Goat Hill.

Lincoln Park, opened in 1918 by Ed Herron, then Commissioner of Parks, once covered the entire area between East End (Central) Avenue and Wiehl Street.  It was the city’s and county’s first park for black residents under Jim Crow.  The park originally hosted a playground, a dance pavilion, a carousel, a ballfield, a miniature golf course, and refreshment stands.  A swimming pool was added in 1937.  The ballfield was home to  the Chattanooga Black Cats and hosted games of the Chattanooga Choo-Choos, Chattanooga Black Lookouts, and Chattanooga White Sox, all of which were teams of the nation’s Negro Leagues when the game was segregated along with much of the country.  Willie Mays, Satchel Paige, and Jackie Robinson all played here.  After desegregation in the 1960s, attendance and upkeep declined.  A much reduced park remains, owned since 1979 by Erlanger Hospital, which has recently cut off public access.

Little Egypt was a tenement neighborhood near East Lake, but the exact location is unknown.

Lookout Creek rises near Valleyhead, Alabama, flowing north opposite Wills Creek, which also rises near Valleyhead but flows south.

Lookout Mountain, Tennessee, was incorporated in 1891, the same year Crawfish Springs, Georgia, changed its name to Chickamauga in honor of the soon-to-be national military park.  It’s still independent.  The Cherokee name for the mountain is Atali-danda-ganu.  There were several stops on the Chattanooga and Lookout Mountain Railroad here.  The post office here  as Lenora Springs operated 1858-1866 and as Lookout Mountain since 1867.

Lookout Valley is the valley carved by Lookout Creek from Valleyhead, Alabama, north to the Tennessee River, between Lookout Mountain on the east and Sand Mountain on the west.  In Hamilton County, the name also refers to the community from the stateline to the Tennessee River.  The Cherokee town of Tuskegee was there before the Removal, and for a long time the area was called Wauhatchie.  It acquired the name Tiftonia from a late 19th century housing development.  However, to locals this name meant just the middle section straddling Cummings Highway; the northern section was Brown’s Ferry and the southern section near the railroad station was still Wauhatchie.  The community of Cash Canyon along the Tennessee River is included as well.  The post office of Lookout Valley operated 1834-1848.

Marr Aviation Field was opened by the Chattanooga City Chamber of Commerce in 1919, dedicated to local aviation pioneer Walter L. Marr, in the open area bound by the Nashville, Chattanooga, & St. Louis Railroad and Cincinnati Southern Railway to the west, Dodson Avenue to the east, Avondale to the south, and Anderson (now Crutchfield) Street to the north.  The airfield’s hanger and shops stood north of what would have been Anderson Street.  It ceased to operate in 1934.

Mindell Park was a fashionable, though less prestigious than Ferger Place, neighborhood of the suburb of Oak Grove.  It lay along Orchard Knob Avenue and Hawthorne Street.

Missionary Ridge is both the name of the ridge extending from East Chattanooga southwest into Walker County, Georgia, and a municipality.  The latter lies along the crest of the ridge of the same name and was incorporated in 1891, the same year as Lookout Mountain, Tennessee, and Chickamauga, Georgia.

Montague Park lies south of the Belt Line to East 23rd Street between Polk Street and the line of Gulf Street, which did indeed once extend that far.

Mountain Junction, also known as South St. Elmo and Lookout Junction, lies between Forest Hills and Lookout Mountain from West 47th Street to the stateline.  Its station was the junction of the Belt Line, Chattanooga Electric Railway, and the Chattanooga and Lookout Mountain Railroad.  The post office operated as Hustle in 1893, and as Mountain Junction 1893-1895.

New England Park (see Foust Place)

Oak Grove sits north of the freeway between Holtzclaw and Orchard Knob Avenues north to Main Street.  Among others, it contains the subdivisions of Ferger Place and Mindell Park.

Oak Hills (see Alton Park)

Oakland was the largest plantation in ante-bellum Hamilton County, this plantation was owned by Daniel F. Cocke, who built his home atop Clifton Hill, its crest circled by Clifton Terrace.  He sold it to Arthur Watkins, whose wife Anna was the daughter of George and Margaret McEwen Gillespie of the adjoining plantation across Chattanooga Creek.  Arthur died in 1886, and Anna continued to live there until moving in with her daughter Alice Shields.  By 1886, Oakland was owned by John C. Roberts, who subdivided it into the Clifton Hills suburb.

Old Boyce centered around the junction of Harrison Pike with the Western & Atlantic Railroad just west of the Chickamauga River before the Civil War.  It hosted a depot, a mill, stores, and rivaled nearby Chickamauga in size and prestige.  When Boyce Station was rebuilt after the war, it was nearly four-and-a-half miles down the line toward Chattanooga.  Later the Western & Atlantic Railroad built King’s Bridge Station near the same place, named for the bridge on the Harrison Pike replacing Sivley Ford.

Olympia Park (see Warner Park)

Onion Bottom lay between East 11th Street, Central Avenue, and the East End Yards.  If you doubt it is bottom land, wait for the next gullywasher.  In the early 20th century, it contained the city workhouse, a dump, a coal processing plant, and one of the largest and most notorious slums in the city, with a mixed population.

Orange Grove borders the Chattanooga National Cemetery on the south and sits north of the railroads tracks between Central and Holtzclaw Avenues.  Orange Grove School was originally here, which is how it got its name, begun in a no-longer used public grammar school. The Belt Line station for the National Cemetery was in its northeast corner.  It was annexed in 1913.

Orchard Knob is north of McCallie Avenue and south of East 3rd Street, between Holtzclaw Avenue and North Kelly Street.   It is the name for the hill which is part of the National Military Park, and for stations on the Belt Line and the Chattanooga Electric Railway.  It was annexed in 1922.  The post office of Orchard Knob operated 1888-1894 before moving to Highland Park.

Pan Gap passes from Brown’s Valley in the east to Cash Canyon and the Tennessee River in the west, getting its name for the river obstruction known as The Pan.

Park City, one of the smaller suburbs, is north of Doyle Street, along Cannon Avenue, all of it east of Rossville Boulevard.

Park Place originally lay from Magnolia Street to East End/Central Avenue between Flynn Street (originally St. Charles Street) and the railroads beyond East 13th Street.  It was a built for a mixed socioeconomic population, and the cheaper housing from the south side of East 11th Street to the tracks later deteriorated into slums.  Park Place was a station on the Belt Line (Chattanooga Union Railway and its successors).

Piney Woods (see Black Bottom)

Poeville (see South Alton Park)

Raccoon Mountain is the detached northern section of Sand Mountain that defines Brown’s Valley, the southern or left bank of the Tennessee River Gorge (Cash Canyon), separated from its larger neighbor to the south by Running Water Valley.

Radcliff (see East End)

Reservoir Hill is a spur of Cameron Hill that is almost a separate height.  During the Civil War, it hosted one of the Army of the Cumberland’s redoubts, and post-bellum the town’s first water reservoir, thus its name.  In the 20th century it was the home for the football field of Kirkman Technical High School (for which it is also known as Kirkman Hill), and in the 21st century for the stadium of the Chattanooga Lookouts.

Ridgedale lies adjacent to the Ridge between the freeway and McCallie Avenue, west to Willow Street.  Its former Methodist Church which my grandmother attended is now First Baptist of Bozentown.  Ridgedale Baptist is now on Hickory Valley Road.  Ridgedale hosted stations on the Belt Line and the Chattanooga Electric Railway.  The post office of Ridgedale operated 1887-1903.

Riverside (see Cash Canyon)

Riverside Park was a post-World War II development between Riverside Drive on the east and a side-track of the Belt Line on the west south of Latta Street.

Ross’ Landing (see Chattanooga)

Rosstown once lay north of McCallie Avenue between Derby and Kelly Streets up to East 3rd Street.  At one time it was populous and prosperous enough to sponsor a baseball team in the city’s local Negro League.  Parkridge Hospital now occupies a good deal of the former suburb, much of it standing on the grounds of the former Frawley Stadium of Central High School, and only two small of its original blocks remain.

Rossville (Tennessee) was a subdivision within the greater East End suburb, bordering the eponymous town in Georgia south of the stateline.  In the early 20th century, there was a Rossville School under Hamilton County in the vicinity.  Its approximate boundaries north of the state line were Rossville Avenue (Boulevard), 14th Avenue, and East 48th Street.

The post office of Rossville in the Cherokee Nation moved Joseph Coody’s on the Federal Road (probably the old Daniel Ross place where Calvin Donelson School now stands) in what is now Hamilton County in 1827, and in 1834 to Brainerd Mission.

Rustville was south of Chattanooga Creek and west of Alton Park Boulevard above West 37th Street; the planned development originally included the area now known as Hooterville.

St. Elmo lies between Hawkins’ Ridge and Lookout Mountain north of West 47th Street.  The oldest suburb of Chattanooga, it began life as Kirklen before the Civil War and was renamed because of a novel based there.  It had stations for several street and long-haul railways.  The post office operated as Kirklen 1882-1888, and as St. Elmo 1888-1898.

Scruggstown was the residential area for Afro-Americans that sprang up after the War along the south side of East 9th Street that lasted well into the 20th century.

Shallowford Gap is the low place on Missionary Ridge through which Shallowford and Brid’s Mill Roads pass.  One of the engagements in the days after the Battle of the Chickamauga (Battle of Mud Flats) was fought here.

Sherman Heights was a prestigious suburb of the late 1880s that sprang up north of Crutchfield Street and east of Dodson Avenue, extending up onto the foot of Missionary Ridge to the east.  It was more or less the same area as the currently-designated Glass Farm District.  The suburb’s Glass Street was Chattanooga’s first paved street.  Its long-haul railway station was named Glass Station before the war, Tunnel afterwards, Arno briefly, then Sherman Heights, before adopting the name East Chattanooga in 1914.  It merged into East Chattanooga after 1905.  Its post office operated as Mission Ridge 1884-1888, then as Sherman Heights 1888-1905.

Sherwood Forest lies along both sides of Wood Avenue and Riverside Drive from Wilder Street to Wisdom Street.

South Alton Park, also known as East St. Elmo and Poeville, lies in the vicinity of the crossing of Tennessee Avenue, West 55th Street, and Lee Avenue at the south end of Hawkins Ridge.  There was for a stop here on the Belt Line named Thurman’s Station that also served Chattanooga Southern Railway.  It was annexed in 1930.  The post office of Poeville operated in the vicinity 1883-1891.

South Chattanooga is not simply a geographic designation, it was a land company that developed the area for residential housing.  Everything south of the East End Yards to West 23rd Street (or the freeway since its construction) and west of Market Street to Central (East End) Avenue is South Chattanooga.  This includes the neighborhoods of Cowart Place, Fort Negley, Jefferson Heights, and Hooterville.  Less precisely, the designation South Chattanooga is also used for all the area south of downtown, especially that part west of Chattanooga Creek.

South St. Elmo (see Mountain Junction)

Stanleyville was a historically black community north of Cleveland Avenue and south of Citico Avenue between what are now North Kelly Street and Arlington Avenue that eventually got swallowed up by Churchville.  Stanleyville was the stop on the Belt Line under Chattanooga Union Railway.

Stillhouse Hollow was the gulch between Reservoir Hill and Cameron Hill proper, filled by dirt from the top of the latter to support I-124, which is now US 27.

Suburba was the southern portion of what later became Glenwood, so-called after the station on the Mission Ridge Incline Railway and later Chattanooga Electric Railway.  The post office of Suburba operated 1885-1901.

Summertown was the name of the community atop the northern tip of Lookout Mountain until it incorporated in 1891.

Tadetown was the residential area for Afro-Americans that sprang up after the Civil War along the north side of East 9th Street which lasted until well into the 20th century.

Tannery Flats was a collection of tenements that was originally company housing for the workers of the Chattanooga Tannery, which once stood along the river west of Cameron Hill.  It lay south of where West 6th Street (now West MLK Boulevard) came over the hill.  Of its four or five small blocks, only Ash Street remains.   During the heyday of Roane Iron, this was where the middle management lived.

Terrace Hill was the southern end of Cameron Hill, next in status to Cameron Hill proper as a neighborhood, with slightly less prestigious homes on East Terrace and West Terrace.

Tiftonia is the middle section of of the greater Lookout Valley community.  John Tift, who named it for himself, built what he intended to be a town on several hundred acres of what had been the Parker Farm.  It mostly lies south of Kelly’s Ferry Road and west of Wauhatchie Pike, though it spreads a little north of the first.

Trueblood Hill is the northernmost hill of Missionary Ridge, called Tunnel Hill in the military records of both armies during the Civil War.

Tunnel (see Sherman Heights)

University of Chattanooga began life as Chattanooga University in 1886, then served as a campus of Athens-based Grant Memorial University in 1889, before uniting with Normal University to become University of Chattanooga in 1907.  It originally occupied only the block bound by McCallie Avenue and Douglas, Oak, and Baldwin Streets.  Even that it shared first Central Junior High School (not the same as the later school), then the First District Public School, then the second Chattanooga Public Library (now UTC’s Fletcher Hall).  It acquired the block between Douglas and Baldwin to Vine Street at an early date, most of which was later taken up by Chamberlain Field (football).  Today it takes up nearly two-thirds of the entire East Side.  Formerly all-whie, UC integrated by merging with Chattanooga City College in 1969 to become University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, and has expanded to include half of the entire East Side.

Warner Park began life as Olympia Park in 1894, provide a racetrack and viewing stands for horse and horse-and-cart races.  The city bought the park in 1912 and renamed it Warner Park after Commissioner Joseph Warner.  It grew to 48 acres which included a swimming pool, amusement park, bowling alley, and horse riding.  From 1916 until the 1950’s, its half-mile racetrack hosted automobile races.  Within Central Avenue, East 3rd Street, Holtzclaw Avenue, and McCallie Avenue, the park currently hosts six ballfields, a swimming pool, a fitness center, a recycling center, picnic areas, and the Chattanooga Zoo, founded as Warner Zoo in 1937.

Wauhatchie is the southern section of Lookout Valley, deriving its name from the railroad station Wauhatchie Junction of the Nashville & Chattanooga (also Memphis & Charleston) Railroad with Wills Valley Railroad.  The name, however, has been used from a wide area, including all of the modern community of Lookout Valley, as well as northern Dade County, Georgia, where a  post office of Wauhatchie, Georgia, operated 1840-1856.  The post office of Wauhatchie, Tennessee, operated 1866-1918.

West Side included Cameron Hill and the area beyond and the residential area between West MLK Boulevard (once West 9th Street) and West Main Street (once Montgomery Avenue), from the river in the west to the Union Yards in the east.  Nearly all the West Side fell to the freeway and to the Golden Gateway “urban renewal”.  All that remained were two small streets of row houses, but these too fell to the bulldozers when Findley Stadium was built.  Originally, West 9th Street passed between Cameron Hill on the north and Terrace Hill on the south, and the one which crossed it where West MLK Boulevard now does was West 6th Street.

During the post-bellum Second Industrial Revolution, the entire West Side was owned by the Roane Iron Company, then by the Chattanooga Land, Coal, Iron, and Railway Company.  The Roane Iron Works served as the centerpiece and main source of jobs in the manufacturing district west of Cameron Hill.  When the iron works closed due to being unable to compete with modernized techniques adopted by northern factories, the works shut down, and so did much of the West Side.  From being a mostly working class district, it became a center of poverty.

White City sits west of Jerome Avenue, south of East 32nd Street, and includes everything to Chattanooga Creek.

Whiteside Flats was a sub-section of Brabson Hill neighborhood comprised of cheaper rental housing near UC.

Chuck Hamilton

<natty4bumpo@gmail.com>

Memories
Battlefields Saved Through The Civil War Sites Preservation Fund Grants
  • 2/27/2024

The Tennessee Wars Commission, the Tennessee Historical Commission division responsible for preserving the state’s significant military history, has announced the Civil War Sites Preservation ... more

"Nadine Turchin: A Woman’s Story From Chickamauga" Program Is March 9
  • 2/23/2024

Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park will provide a 45-minute ranger-led presentation on Saturday, March 9 at 2 p.m., discussing Nadine Lvova Turchin, the wife of US Brigadier General ... more

A Chattanooga Little Known Black History Story
A Chattanooga Little Known Black History Story
  • 2/19/2024

Diane Leslie Mason quit her corporate job at Xerox in 1974 and opened a small daycare in the basement of her parents' home (Kandy Kastle Daycare). She was motivated by a documentary she ... more