The town turned upside down

The ride from Falls Creek Falls State Park to Dayton Tennessee was only about an hour and a half, but it was at the same time beautiful and a bit hairy. We found you don’t need to be at 8,000 feet with Frog and Toad Connected to require extra attention while driving. 

Hairpin turns and steep grades with NO truck pulloffs took us out of one range of the Appalachian hills into the next. Gorgeous valleys and mysteriously dark hollows kept Mona saying, “I’ll watch the scenery. You watch the road.”  And that was a good plan. Signs for 15 mph on the corners were definitely taken seriously.

It is quite amazing to find a town, county, or nation, whose entire history, before and after a certain event, is completely and utterly eclipsed by that one event.  Hawaii may be surfing Eden and Heaven but the attack of the Japanese of ‘Dec 7, 1941, a day that will live in infamy…’ is what the last couple of generations of Americans think of when Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, is mentioned.

Such is the case with the pleasant little town of Dayton, Tennessee.  It has been before and after its notoriety a great place to bring up a family, and root for the High School, not the Philly, Eagles Football Team. But in July, 1925 the eyes and ears of much of the entire world were focused on the 1891 Rhea County Courthouse in the town square of this quaint village.  

The story of the Scopes Trial has been told by historians and journalists over and over so I won’t repeat it, except to say it’s a rip-roaring tale of American democracy, chicanery, and showmanship AND a story of truth being sought by the most honorable men of their age regarding issues that thunder at one another still: religion, and government; God as creator or creation as random accident.

The people we met downtown and in courthouse square, from the antique shop owner to the produce seller sitting on the tailgate of his pickup said it best, “Don’t miss the Monkey Museum. It’s still the best show in town.”

Well, there are no monkeys that we met in Dayton, but we did see the museum, and I’ve seen the movie, made from the pretty fanciful play about the trial called, “Inherit the Wind”. And Mona is going to read the book, now. And today we got to see where it all happened.

The courthouse and courtroom (there is only one for this very rural county) has been in continuous use since built in 1891, and it is almost completely unchanged since the 1925 trial. But that also means that while the basement museum and main floor and second floor halls are open to anyone, the courtroom is a workroom.  And so it was today, as on most weekdays.  But once again southern hospitality to we two Yankees was supreme.

We asked a sheriff’s deputy if we could see and photograph the courtroom and he checked with the bailiff who checked with the judge and we were asked if we’d like to wait outside while the fate of an accused  vehicle homicide felon was discussed around the tables William Jennings Bryan and Clarence Darrow argued religion over.

The wait was no more than a half hour and the judge came out in his robes and said he was glad to oblige ‘two visitors from the north’.  We were not permitted beyond the entrance as evidence was still arrayed over those tables I just mentioned.  But there it was, in all its 1925 

simplicity. 

The same wooden theatre chairs.  The same bench and rail.  Some new seats, a screen, and computers, but nothing else, right down to the metal ceiling tiles and tall arched wooden windows covered in dark fabric to keep out the hot sun.

See the rest of the pics on FACEBOOK, and read about this amazing American event, the like of which still occurs over and over in communities and courtrooms all over our country whenever religion and government are mixed.

We spent the night at Spivey Memorial UMC just outside Dayton. Thank you Pastor Bill! Bill and Noreeta, his lovely bride of 56 years are just too more of the many gracious UMC pastors and laypeople we've met on this journey.

 Bill has served Spivey for several years as it's part time licenced pastor, so we had much to talk about.

Bill was happy to receive our latest outcast; our toaster.  We got rid of the electric coffeemaker way back at Stratmoor UMC in Colorado Springs when I realized that I could easily make coffee without electricity and much cheaper with a Melitta filter system.  Now we make toast over a stove top toast holder, the same type your grandmother's mother probably used.  Easy, cheap, and for a dry-camper, the simplest way possible.

-Ken