FIELD OF DREAMS

Can we just go back for a minute? It’s easy to do during these difficult times. I want to transport you to a time when country stores were only a mile or two apart and seasoned burley farmers sat out on the front porch of Neas’ store in St. James, or they moseyed on down to Browning’s store on Cedar Creek. The main topics of discussion in 1919 amongst the wise sages of store benches were tobacco, the Nineteenth Amendment, cattle, World War One, Spanish Flu, horseshoes and baseball. Baseball brought everyone together during this time and took precedent when brought up in conversation. One name that came up frequently brought a smile to everyone’s face and a “yes sir he’s got it alright” when it came to the diamond. So, go get a fresh pack of sunflower seeds or peanuts and a bottle of pop because there is a runner on third with two outs and David Dale Alexander just stepped into the batter’s box.

Dale was born on April 26, 1903, to Don and Alice Alexander on a beautiful farm in Greene County that had been in the family since the seventeen-hundreds. Don taught his children hard work in the tobacco fields, and he also encouraged a love for the game of baseball- Don was an excellent catcher in the Appalachian League (Nowlin). Although Dale turned out to be a gifted baseball player, he was also a standout athlete in basketball and football where he lettered in both at Milligan College. In 1924, Dale Alexander stood at six feet and three inches tall and weighed in at 215 pounds of nothing but farm strength, muscle, and pure athleticism. His toughness and huge stature earned him the nickname “Moose,” and he would become the dread of pitchers across North America. Though it would be hard to tell it by looking at him because he had a very thin frame and exceptionally long arms, he could absolutely knock the cover off a baseball.

In that same year, Dale would play his first professional baseball game with the Appalachian League, then to South Atlantic League in Charlotte, he then went to Toronto to play in the International League. It was in Toronto where he was scouted by the Detroit Tigers in 1929. Alexander had made it to the majors, and he would leave no doubt that Greene County was in the house by leading all the other rookies that year by a wide margin- there was no title for Rookie of the Year in 1929, but if there was one he would have won it (Nowlin). He had 215 base hits, which led the league, and was ranked fifth with 25 homeruns, and 137 RBI’s- no one had achieved that feat since “Shoeless” Joe Jackson in 1911 nor would it be done again until Ted Williams in 1937.

In midseason of 1932, Detroit decided to trade Moose to the Boston Red Sox. Detroit, it seems to me, was trying to limit Dale, only giving him 23 games and was becoming extremely critical of his fielding performance on first base. I LOVE THIS PART OF THE STORY. When Moose was traded to the Red Sox, he found his zone. His work ethic and his practice of only going after a “good ball,” had him with a .367 batting average at the end of the 1932 season. This average won him the title “American League Batting Champion.” Also, his fielding performance at first base caught the attention of sports writers across the nation, including the Los Angeles Times that noted him as “one of the best in his line” (Nowlin). It is worth noting here that Alexander achieved his notoriety on the worst team in the American League, arguably the worst in the history of the Red Sox franchise with a winning percentage of .267.

Moose’s star was rising fast and he caught the attention of the Yankee’s franchise player Babe Ruth who was, in 1933, in his twentieth season and was still bombing the stiches with 33 dingers that year. The Babe is quoted saying “he sure bruises the ball” in the New York Times article (The Nimrod of the Nolichuckey). He hit the ball hard, really hard, and what’s very special about Alexander’s stroke is that he usually hit the ball in the opposite direction. He was right-handed and he was the panic button for any second, first basemen, or right fielder. The New York Times reporter in 1933 claimed “an infielder is in danger of having an arm or leg carried away when Dale rifles one in his direction.”

It was in the 1933 season on May 29, Memorial Day, that Mr. Alexander’s fortunes would turn for the worse. While sliding into home, he would gravely injure his leg. Upon his injury, the Red Sox trainer used a new form of treatment called diathermy- this involves sending high volts of electric currents into the treated area. Since the treatment was “new,” the trainer had little to no idea what he was doing and ended up giving Dale third degree burns on his leg. The injuries were so severe that they set up gangrene and Moose nearly lost his leg. Dale’s time in the major leagues had came to an end, but once again, he will overcome adversity.

David Dale Alexander continued to thrive in baseball even after almost losing his leg. He stacked up titles and winning percentages in the minors over the next decade and went on to scout for Major League teams through the nineteen-seventies. He never complained about his injury, not once. He never blamed anyone or whined about it. You see, Dale’s dream wasn’t about him, it was about baseball. It was about the continuation of this pastime where young men bonded with each other on a level that few people understand. Where fathers bonded with their sons and taught them how baseball could teach them a lot about life. Dale’s dream and legacy was on the field, in the game, and that celebrated culmination when the crack of the bat sends everyone into action.

Greeneville, Tennessee was his home and that is where he rests today at Shiloh Presbyterian in Tusculum. Greeneville is also where his name resides on the press-box of a field, a field that is named in his honor. I have watched so many outstanding young men achieve greatness here and I have watched them overcome obstacles when the chips were down. Yes, if Dale Alexander were here with us today, I have no doubt he would be in the stands with us cheering on the Greene Devils as they play on their own field of dreams.

Sabr.org. 2020. Dale Alexander | Society For American Baseball Research. [online] Available at: <https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/5568e9fe> [Accessed 30 April 2020]. Bill Nowlin

Kieran, John “Nimrod of the Nolichucky” New York Times. 15 April 1933 pg.18

Learning from Losing

Strike up the Osbourne Brother’s hit “Rocky Top,” flip on the Friday night lights, strike up the bands, and listen for the chanting cheerleaders- IT’S FOOTBALL TIME IN TENNESSEE! Football season means so much to so many people, that there is a nostalgia that cloaks the true meaning of the game- it brings us together. It gives young men and women a stage to display their pride and talents, and it allows a select few to be Coaches. I capitalized the word “Coaches” to emphasize the important role they play in moulding youngs into Men. We can analyze how they make their players excel in the game and help them become better players through drills, watching tape, and working out, but good coaches know exactly what they are doing- they are teaching their players how to lose and how to die with pride.

Now hold on, give me a chance to explain. I also had a visceral reaction when I heard these exact words. I was shocked at what I was hearing, and it was issued by the booming voice of the legendary Fred Sorrells. Fred Sorrells coached and taught for 40 years (1959-1999), twenty-two of which were spent at Burley Stadium. It would be nearly impossible to calculate the amount of people he influenced and helped throughout his life, some of which, like me, he doesn’t really know. His stories live on for me through Coach Todd Newberry, who is a very dear friend of mine- we have taught and coached together for over a decade now, and I would be pressed to find a more loyal friend. Coach Sorrells was inducted into the TSSAA Hall of Fame in 2007 for his continued service to not just athletes, but also the coaches across our great state.

Back to the draw-dropping statement about losing and dying. I heard this speech from Coach Sorrells last year at the FCA golf tournament, and, like I said, I was confused at first. But the more I listened the more I understood how profound his words were becoming. You will want to take this in because it changed my whole paradigm on life, and I know that it has made me a better man.

“We have to teach our young men how to die.” This was followed with “lose” as well. He said “It’s easy to be a winner”- to stand in the spotlight and receive love and praise. It’s easy to be healthy, to be able to throw 300 pounds over your head as if it were nothing. He wasn’t talking about the process of becoming a winner or achieving goals- of course, those things take hard work. He was talking about the product (success) of those things. The product of success that never lasts very long. What happens when the product spoils? There is always another opponent, another axe to grind, another challenge, another wave on another wave- “And you will surely be swept away,” he said.

I had so many questions:
When the time of your inevitable defeat arrives, whether that be a challenge or that life has decided to pull the rug out from underneath you, how will you react? Did you have that Coach that said, “Back on your feet, GET UP!” when you fell on your face? Did you have that Coach that pushed you far beyond what you thought you were capable of, so that when you lost you took pride in your loss because you knew that you put everything you had into it? You learned from your defeat. Where will your mind be when you reach the end of your road? Will you hang your head and limp off the field of life because you knew you didn’t prepare or put in your best effort?

As he was speaking to all the coaches, he made it abundantly clear that this was our mission. We needed to do an inventory of our own hearts and see what was at the center. He said in closing that “if you coaches have the desire in your heart to create young people that can face losing and death with pride because they have given everything they have to hold one another up in service, they gave their very best effort because you were their rock of support. They hold their heads high no matter what happens, well, my friends, you can put that in the win column.”

On the Corner of Main with the Irish

Across from the Catalyst Coffee Company stands a building that has been continuously occupied by businesses since its construction in the early 1800’s. It may be safe to say that this building is the oldest business building in town. The building is currently home to First Tennessee Bank. This building is so much more than the economic hub of our little town, it is the cornerstone of our mental and physical geography and it has so many stories to tell us about our heritage.

The building that we see now began as a store ran by Joseph Brown, an immigrant from the County Antrim in Northern Ireland (although when he migrated in 1800, it was still considered Ireland). Many Irish families found their way here following the lead of William Dickson (our first postmaster 1797- appointed by George Washington!), whose name still resides with the Dickson-Williams Mansion.

The terrible political and economic environment of Ireland during the 1790’s gave us many new residences, and we were blessed to have them. They are also the reason we have a thoroughfare named “Irish Street.” The building on the corner of Main and Depot remained a store until 1890 when a businessman by the name of W.H. O’Keefe (also the son of Irish immigrants) bought the store and turned it into the second branch of Greene County Bank. The original building (pictured here) was an architectural site to behold with steel beams and terra cotta awnings. The inside was adorned with mahogany countertops and black and white marble floors.

In 1966, the bank expanded and bought Stroud’s Barber Shop and remodeled the facades to the design you see today. It has gone from Greene County, to GreenBank, to Capital, and it is now First Tennessee Bank. History always amazes me when it comes full circle because on this very spot was where one of the “first” banks in Tennessee ever opened for business on the corner of Main with the Irish. 

Against All Odds

On August 8th, 1871, Sam Johnson would have been heard playing his fiddle where George Clem School is today. A happy spiritual would have flowed from his hands and his handmade violin. He was a master of the strings and quite the vocalist. “Go Down Moses,” perhaps, or maybe “Oh Freedom.” The seventeenth president of the United States was also in attendance at the celebration known as “Emancipation Day” in Tennessee. It wasn’t long before this event that Sam did not enjoy any of the rights promised in the Declaration of Independence or the United States Constitution. But on this day in 1871, he sat next to the former president, along with his friend George Clem, and they broke bread at the festival as equals.

Let’s go back another twenty years or so to 1843. Andrew Johnson was serving as a Tennessee State Senator when he engaged in the evil institution of human trafficking known as slavery by exchanging money for a human being- her name was Dolly, and life would never be the same for the Johnson Family, or Greeneville, again. Dolly had also asked Johnson to buy her half-brother Sam and had hoped to keep them from being separated. As Dolly and Sam lived at the Johnson House on Main Street, Sam managed the day to day affairs of the estate as Andrew was away and slowly but surely used his influence to gain status in the community. He was articulate, intelligent, talented, and few folks viewed him as an enslaved person, but enslaved he remained. He also understood that several others remained enslaved. He decided to use his influence to change this inequity, and he would do so with pinpoint accuracy and the will of God.

Abraham Lincoln was up for re-election in 1864. He needed a way to bring the southern states back and a strategy to keep the Union together. Luckily, for us Greenevillians, He had a cousin that lived in Greeneville that he frequently kept in touch with by the name of Mordecai Lincoln (he is buried in Harmony Graveyard behind Town Hall). Mordecai encouraged his cousin to always keep in mind his dear friend Andrew Johnson, who would be instrumental to Lincoln as the Military Governor of Tennessee during the Civil War. The appeal of a southerner as a running mate would surely lead him to victory and symbolize unification. Also, Lincoln didn’t have much competition in his opponent George McClellan who had suffered huge humiliation during the Civil War. The election of 1864 remains at number 8 in the top ten of lopsided presidential elections and Lincoln won 91% of the votes. This meant that the man that had Dolly and Sam enslaved just became the second most powerful man in the country and Sam would use this to his full advantage!

On April 14, 1865, Abraham Lincoln was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth at Ford’s theatre in Washington DC. Upon the death of Lincoln, Andrew Johnson became president. Now, the man Sam had influence with was the most powerful person in the country. Sam didn’t wait long to go into action and was appointed Commissioner of the Freedmens Bureau. Since the Civil War was over and slavery had been made illegal by the Thirteenth Amendment, Sam and George Clem set about finding ways to help the African American community. They both surveyed a piece of land owned by President Johnson and determined that it would be suitable place to build a school and church. Here are the exact words that Sam wrote to Johnson in a letter dated March 1867:

"I have been appointed one of the Commissioner of the Freedmens Bureau, to raise money with which to purchase a suitable Lot on which to build a School House for the education of the Coloured children of Greeneville - and my object in troubling you upon, the subject is to ascertain if there would be any chance for me to purchase an acre Lot off of one of your Tracts that lies out West of Town close to the Reble Graveyard. If you will let us have the Lot and will send me word as to the price of it I will send you the money, and would like for you to send me a deed to it. I am getting along as well as usual and have not changed any in Politics still being for you as much as ever. I would like to see you all very much."

This is what I love about this story. When Andrew Johnson received Sam’s letter, he had a deed made up immediately to donate the land for free. The “Tracts that lies out West of Town” is currently where George Clem School is located. Sam worked tirelessly to make sure that the children and community had a house of worship and AME (African Methodist Church) was constructed- and still stands! George Clem School started out as Greeneville Academy. It would not be called George Clem School until the nineteen-forties and named for George Clem’s grandson also named George Clem.

Now, can you imagine how George Clem the elder and Sam Johnson felt on August 8th, 1871, at the celebration for Emancipation and the opening of the AME church and school- when only a little over twenty years prior to this event, both men were enslaved? A celebration where they finally had a place in the sun and owned their land. They also understood that a new battle would begin as they entered this new realm of freedom with people that still hated them because of the color of their skin. But for now, during this celebration, these worries were set aside, and on that day, love truly triumphed over hate. Sam Johnson and George Clem risked it all against all odds and now it is up to us to keep their dreams alive.

Water Under the Bridge

The Little Chuckey Creek valley, located in the western part of our great county, may be the most beautiful part of the world you have yet to see. You will go through dramatic changes of scenery as you travel down the Warrensburg Road (Warrensburg was nearly the name of Greeneville had it not been for Robert Kerr and his generous donation of land where our town is currently located as the seat of government). As you begin this journey down the Warrensburg Road, it is sloping, curving, and back-dropped by picturesque mountains. When you reach the end of this beautiful road, the bottom falls out of the hills and you are presented with a very flat and vast Nolichucky River basin that looks like a scene you might catch way out west in the Great Plains.

One major attraction you will see along your journey down this route, is the Bible’s Covered Bridge. The original bridge was built in 1923 by A. A. McLean (a noted covered bridge builder in the Shenandoah Valley) on the property of E.A. Bible- a descendent of Christian Bible who was the first ancestor of mine to arrive in East Tennessee in 1783 from Pennsylvania. E.A. had been farming the fertile valley of Little Chuckey Creek and had to ford the stream to get access to the main road. He had the bridge built to endure the seasonal weather of East Tennessee and to preserve his wagons that had to make the fifteen-mile track to town.

Covered bridges, during the 20th century, became very decorative and ornate. The reason for covered bridges was to protect, preserve and prolong the life of the wooden trusses that supported the weight of the bridge. They are a wonder to behold and they always draw a crowd. Bible’s Covered Bridge is no exception, but I was very disappointed upon my last visit. The source of my disappointment comes from the amount of defacing and graffiti that was left behind by folks who felt the need to leave their mark on this piece of history. If you visit places like these, there is no need to spray paint or carve your name, leave it for other people to enjoy. I promise your mark will be left behind by the memories you will carry with you for the rest of your life.

The Kind Reaper

​Cyrus McCormick may have the most motivating and interesting story I have ever read. McCormick is credited with inventing the mechanical reaper- just like any invention, it was built on the backs of others who failed and completely gave up. After he successfully secured a US patent in 1834, he failed to sell a single unit until the year 1840 (he sold only one that entire year…) Here is what separates McCormick from the others who failed; he had a conviction in his heart to feed the hungry across the world using his reaper, which quadrupled harvest’s yields.

I have found that every time things happen that change the world, good or bad, there are always people that have a deep conviction in their hearts to achieve their goals. ​McCormick was nearly flat broke 15 years later in the 1850’s and was about to give up, until he met a lovely young lady named Nancy Fowler. Nancy, or “Nettie” as she was known, also had a conviction to help people achieve their dreams. She encouraged her husband, and with her support and love, Cyrus broke through and found great success in the mid 1850’s amassing a huge fortune. With their new found wealth, from the bottom to the top, what will they do with their abundance of income? They will give it all away. Amen.

​Upon Cyrus’ passing, Nettie took over the family fortune in 1884. She donated a sizable amount of money to a budding young college named Tusculum to expand the campus size. What you see in this picture is McCormick Hall, which was completely funded by the McCormick family. Tusculum College also has “Nettie Day” in her honor to celebrate the spirit of giving and volunteering not just for community but for all people. ​

After learning about the McCormick family I finally understood what we all (that’s all of us) should be doing. We should all be giving to each other. If you don’t have money, no worries I feel your pain, give up your time to help people. Never let an opportunity pass to help one another. Have an abundance mentality and give of yourself knowing that everyone on this planet is connected by one crucial thread- we are all children of the Creator. 

Mighty McDonald School

Before the invention of the automobile in the late 1800's, there were over 20 schools in Greene County. Each of these schools were ran and staffed by local people that lived within each community. Teachers received no pay and the school houses were built by community members. Many of these relics still stand in old pasture fields and some gauntly reach out to us as we go flying by on our highways. One school building that has stood since 1919 (the year women earned the right to vote in the US), is still going strong and leads us down Flea Ridge Road to McDonald School.

In October of 1919, McDonald School was established though it really had no name until December of that year when the school held its very first Christmas play. It was at this play that the school was formally named McDonald School and it first served as a two year high school. The school was named in honor of Mr. Earnest McDonald, a man of Irish decent, and had lead the "Cain" community to establish a school for higher education.

The land that the school was built on was donated by a Mr. Alex Ailshie, who is an ancestor to the current State Deputy Commissioner of Education for Tennessee , Dr. Lyle Ailshie. The two year high school quickly became a four year high school within five years, and was supplied with students from five "normal" schools. These areas have interesting names and I felt inclined to share them with you; they were: Lower Glades, Cain's, Murrays, Huan, and Scoot (my favorite).

It is interesting to note that the state of Tennessee did not collect taxes for education until a man from Greeneville became Governor of Tennessee in 1853, Andrew Johnson. Andrew Johnson doubled the amount of tax dollars spent on education because he was terrified of the number of illiterate people in our great state (he himself grew up not being able to read or write), which was close to forty percent. Wouldn’t you know it that within two years of tax funding and the building of tax funded schools, that the illiterate percent dropped to fifteen percent. McDonald School was and still is a leading public school in our area that is funded by the state, but more importantly it has the full support of all the wonderful people in Lowland.