Fernweh, An Ache for Distant Places

 (Blog title credited to lyrics from a beloved former Knoxville band, Cristabel & the Jons)

SOUTH KNOXVILLE has always been a very strange place to me. It seems like the second I cross the Henley Street Bridge over Blount Avenue, everything turns to white noise.

Sometimes I feel a heaviness creep in when I am in the area, like a hot and sticky oppression. There is so much wasted potential, recalling all the places that have closed with nothing ever opening in their stead.

There are so many wonderful sites to see, but each one is so disconnected and distanced from one another.

Outside of Chapman Highway, the main drag, it is mostly residential. Large parts of South Knoxville are just acres of crumbling barns and shacks surrounded by piles of rusted cars and junk.

Long stretches of charred remains of burned down houses, ugly heaps of debris, and the shells of businesses that have long been closed and vandalized line the roads.

Shop windows are busted or kicked in, vulgar graffiti covers the exteriors, and signs of Mother Nature reclaiming the land are in full swing.

I think I know what my old friend was singing about in her song “South Knoxville Blues.”

Honestly it took a lot more work to put together something cohesive about South Knoxville than anywhere else I have written about, but friends persisted and kept sending me recommendations, and the more I drove around, the more interesting places I found afterall.

This blog is about South Knoxville from the Old Sevier District to Vestal, Island Home, Lake Forest, and the areas near Governor John Sevier Highway and leading to the Seymour community.

PARKS & NATURE
My favourite thing about South Knoxville has always been the abundance of parks, nature centers, hiking trails, and beautiful natural settings.

Some of the best parks in East Tennessee can be found just beyond the Gay Street and Henley Street bridges.

Ijams Nature Center and Charter Doyle Park are my favourites to return to over and over, but here is a list that includes a several more. 

IJAMS NATURE CENTER
Harry and Alice Ijams started developing Ijams Nature Center in 1910 as a protected space for birdwatchers, and hosted Girl Scouts camps for decades before turning it into a city park.

Over the years, Ijams has acquired two marble quarries, various wildlife areas, and merged with the Baker Creek Preserve and High Ground Park to form the Knoxville Urban Wilderness.

Ijams Nature Center has a welcome center, museum, gallery, classrooms, gardens, and an outdoor stage around the main entrance.

I always reach this side of Ijams by following the Will Skelton Greenway, and it some really awesome totems, carvings, and natural art.

Ijams has nearly 100 acres with miles of diverse trails for all levels, from small educational paths, long stretches through the woods, or my personal favourite, the river/boardwalk trail.

It is also home to the Navitat adventure center, voted top outdoor activity in Knoxville on TripAdvisor and the winner of many other awards.

I have been visiting this dreamy nature center for more than 25 years and still find new things to fawn over each time.

Meads Quarry is across the street from the main Ijams entrance. It has a few trail options and a seasonal concession stand by the old railroad tracks that border the parking lot.

Tharp Trace Trail is one of the more strenuous trails in my experience, but that could have something to do with me always having to lift up my elderly 52-pound dog and carry him over some of the trenches and rocky areas.

I have never been without him to know otherwise. Rest in peace, sweet pup.

Ijams Primal Playground is part of the Meads Quarry area. It was a really exciting idea when it first opened, but there has not been much development since.

Much of the minimalistic structures were broken, not yet assembled, or had dangerously sharp edges and jagged metal sticking out when we visited.

I get that it is supposed to be primal, primitive, and workouts involve using natural items, but I would love to see this concept filled out more.

Another feature of Ijams Nature Center is its bird sanctuary, a home to the East Tennessee Ornithological Society since its creation, and host to a variety of birding events.

URBAN WILDERNESS
As I mentioned, Ijams is the heart and center of the Knoxville Urban Wilderness, a thousand-acre recreational space with more than sixty miles of greenways and trails that lead past lakes, quarries, and historic sites.

Baker Creek Preserve is also included in the Urban Wilderness, known as a major destination for mountain biking enthusiasts.

Its Bike Park has five different multi-use trails, three designated downhill mountain bike trails, and a space for new bikers and varying skill levels to pick up new tricks. The Devil’s Racetrack is listed as the only double-black diamond downhill bike trail in the region, and is recommended for expert riders only.

It can get really crowded out there sometimes, especially if they are having a mountain biking festival like AMBC or some other event.

People start parking in the median of the highway on either side of the exit you take to get there in situations like these, so plan ahead.

The 35-mile Urban Wilderness South Loop Trail and greenway system have several trailheads to hop on. Just choose from 2915 Island Home Avenue, 3518 Island Home Pike, 1302 Margaret Road, 3140 McClure Lane, and 5907 Burnett Creek Road.

Crafty Bastard Brewery, Alliance Brewing, and Bear Paw Bikes are three nearby businesses that are known for being favourite hang out spots for bikers, hikers, and other visitors to the Urban Wilderness.

HIGH GROUND PARK
This Civil War-themed park was created around actual ruins of the Union Fort Higley, complete with canons and rocking chairs at the top.

Plaques along the way tell about the Battle of Armstrong’s Hill and other wars that took place there and nearby, and you will be rewarded for you efforts with a scenic view of downtown Knoxville.

FORT DICKERSON PARK
Fort Dickerson is not considered part of the Urban Wilderness, but it is another Civil War park just minutes from Ijams and High Ground Park.

It is most famous for its quarry where locals like to swim and relax on floats, but the whole park is full of interesting history.

You can read my separate blog about Fort Dickerson here.

MARIE MEYERS PARK & THE WILLIAM HASTIE NATURAL AREA
These are two more components of the Knoxville Urban Wilderness, but I must admit I have not explored them myself.

The entrances to Marie Meyers appear to be for bikes and pedestrians only, and I do not know where to park my car on this narrow, winding road with no lane shoulders or really anything but private properties surrounding them.

I have recruited some pals to show me around both places soon, so check back later.

What I do know is that the historic William Hastie House sits on the corner of Woodlawn Pike and E. Moody Avenue. It once belonged to Hastie, America’s first Black/African-American federal judge.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed Hastie in 1937. Hastie later served as governor of the Virgin Islands, making him the first Black/African-American governor in the US. The house is a residential private property.

CHARTER DOYLE PARK
Moving on to a few places outside the Urban Wilderness complex, the Charter Doyle Park is one of my favourite and most frequently visited parks around Knoxville.

I used to take my dog all the time when he was still kickin’ because he loved the fenced PetSafe play parks so much.

I have rarely seen more than three other humans there at any given time, and it is always impeccably clean.

The greenway around the park is a paved 0.4-mile loop that goes past the dog parks, open greenspace, the playground, and tennis courts.

You can veer off down a gravel path to stroll through the woods and past a gated historic family burial plot.

The woods trail is officially listed as a 0.1-mile trail that connects back to the greenway, but there is plenty of space to wander off trail before you reach the adjacent subdivision.

IC KING PARK
IC King Park is a 230-acre park that has around eight miles of trails within.

There are two entrances, the second being the more recently constructed entrance to the two-acre dog park.

I have seen a lot of people in kayaks and on paddle boards here, as the access point into the water is very shallow and easy.

The water here leads into the Tennessee River so you could travel a great deal of space and distance from this starting point.

FORKS OF THE RIVER
This lovely spot is a nature preserve and wildlife management area. It is most famous for its Sunflower Fields, where locals and tourists alike flock to take photos each new season. I definitely have been there myself a few times. 

HISTORIC SITES
South Knoxville is FLUSH with historic sites. Many are related to the Civil War and other famous battles, but some have more international ties.

CANDORO MARBLE BUILDING is known for hosting local music and art events, especially during festivals like Vestival each year.

The old marble plant is located on Candora Avenue, the feminine version of the Candoro name. Many people, including myself, only know about this newly constructed building pictured below.

I recently learned that if you continue down Candora Avenue there is a site called Loghaven and a cabin that was built in the 1930s by a woman named Martha Thompson.

Back then, her home site was the center of what was essentially a commune for eccentrics, musicians, artists, and other creatives including the founders of Esquire magazine, Chris Wittle and Phil Moffit. Many of their publications in Esquire during the 1980s were came to light while living there.

Years later, a residential developing firm made claims on the land since much of it had fallen into disrepair or been left behind. The local Aslan Foundation stepped in to buy and preserve the land first.

They restored many of the old cabin sites and built the non-profit backed Loghaven Artist Residency that opened in 2020, and began hosting artists.

MARBLE SPRINGS STATE HISTORIC SITE was the final home of the late John Sevier who is widely revered and has a whole slew of places and highways named after him.

He earned his fame in the Revolutionary War, the Battle of King’s Mountain, as a member of US Congress, governor of the strange Lost State of Franklin, and then as governor of Tennessee.

Marble Springs is described as a rustic country estate that he owned until his death in 1815, and it has been a state historic site since 1940. This site is included on the Historic Homes (House Museums) of Knoxville tour and frequently hosts events and festivals.

JAMES WHITE’S FORT is credited as the Birthplace of Knoxville, and the original cabin was the first home to be built there. Founding settler, James White, built the cabin on what is now Clinch Avenue.

Years later, at the start of the 20th century, it was meant to be dissembled but the original hand-cut and carved logs were saved by a man named Isaiah Ford who used them to build a more modern home across the river at 4037 Woodlawn Pike.

Several different families lived there until 1960 when the home was dissembled and the logs were used to create a reconstruction of James White’s original Fort in 1968. This one looks out over the river and downtown Knoxville.

This is a pretty dramatic story for a bunch of logs, but it happened a lot back then.

Today you can visit the reconstructed cabin on the corner of East Hill Avenue and Hall of Fame Drive, just half a mile from its first incarnation.

It is an unwritten rule that you must have your photo taken in the pillory posted out in front of the cabin, or you will have bad luck or something.

WOODLAWN CEMETERY is a historic family owned cemetery since 1893. It is historically significant for its duration and for those buried within, rather than for its beauty.

SOUTH KNOXVILLE STEPS UP
South Knoxville was an early settlement in East Tennessee but was actually separate from Knoxville proper until after the Civil War when the first bridges were built to connect it to the city center.

General Ambrose Burnside and his Union troops built a stone bridge over the river to replace the previous pontoon bridge when the Union soldiers were occupying the area.

A few more versions of bridges were constructed and destroyed over time for various reasons until 1898 when the Gay Street Bridge was complete.

With the developments of Ijams Nature Center, the successful marble mining at Candoro Marble Works, and the construction of the Henley Street Bridge as the new “Highway to the Smokies” to reach the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, South Knoxville began to flourish from an agricultural community to a bustling area.

Main roads in South Knoxville include Chapman Highway, Maryville Pike, and Martin Mill Pike, among others.

One famous location is 5501 Martin Mill Pike, home of Cormac McCarthy in the 1940s and 1950s.

His famous novel The Road about life in this home won a Pulitzer prize in 2007, but the house burned down in 2009. Other novels by McCarthy including Suttree and The Orchard Keeper take place in well-known South Knoxville locations.

The notorious Kid Curry was once driven back to the Knox County Jail in 1903, after escaping on horseback and being caught on Maryville Pike. The first fatal traffic accident also occurred on Maryville Pike in 1909, when Will G. Price of the Knoxville Furniture Company sadly lost his life.

HISTORIC NEIGHBOURHOODS
VESTAL is the one remaining part of South Knoxville I just can not make sense of.

Unlike Old Sevier, Island Home, and other neighbourhoods I will tell you about later, Vestal has looked like a complete dump the whole 20+ years I have known about it.

I can always count on seeing an unholy amount of trash, burned and dilapidated buildings, and basically everything dreadful that I mentioned at the beginning of this blog.

I have read articlces about how wonderful this community is and about its rich heritage for decades now, but I am clearly missing out on something. I plan to attend next year’s Vestival, officially called the South Knoxville Arts and Heritage Festival and recurring each year since 2001, with an open mind.

If you feel strongly about the positive qualities of Vestal and would volunteer to show me, I implore you to do so.

I joined a couple online Vestal community groups to see what other members and residents there had to say but after more than six months, it was primarily complaints about how rampant drugs and crime have become, how the trash has gotten out of control, how everything that was once open has now become shuttered, and how there is nothing to do there.

From online research I learned that Vestal started as an operational base for the Vestal Lumber and Manufacturing Company around Maryville Pike and Ogle Avenue, which is called “downtown Vestal.”

That’s it. That is downtown Vestal.

When I was a teenager, I remember a few different visits to King Tut’s, a longtime staple until it closed several years ago. It had the nastiest restaurant kitchen I had ever seen in my life, no soap or running water in the bathroom, but also the best Greek salad I had ever eaten.

Portions were huge, tables were perpetually booked, and the whole experience was super silly.

The main draw was the owner’s gimmick of running around in crazy costumes, moving ridiculous hats from one person’s head to other and cracking jokes, while everyone laughed and prayed they did not get head lice or food poisoning.

Sarcasm aside, much respect to a vibrant, long-running, minority-owned business. I know how difficult it is to keep any kind of business afloat for years, let alone decades.

King Tut’s truly was a unique and fun restaurant, and I know that it is sorely missed.

Survivors of “downtown Vestal” include a church, a park, and an antique shop that I just realised is actually still open after thinking it closed years ago.

This church happens to be the Vestal United Methodist Church, infamous for its former attendee, Doris Sams. The late women’s baseball player who inspired the film “A League of Their Own” passed away in 2012 and is buried in Vestal.

Mary Vestal Park was named for the mother of the brothers who founded the lumber company. It has a community center and various outdoor courts that are, you guessed it, strewn with garbage.

Vestal Gateway Park is located beyond the white arches you can see from the “downtown” intersection.

ISLAND HOME is the coolest residential neighbourhood, second to Old Sevier and the closest to it. I have friends who live there and I love the old houses, cute gardens, and general vibe of its residents.

Williamswood Castle, the Island Home Airport, and Tennessee School for the Deaf are also located in the Island Home neighbourhood, and it shares many of its features with the Old Sevier neighbourhood I wrote about in this blog.

WILLIAMSWOOD CASTLE is a nearly 5,000 square feet castle built in the early 1990s on the former Girl Scouts grounds. It was built with love, grief, and dedication by a local woman who tragically lost her son to AIDS.

This faux Scottish castle represents their family heritage and shared love of historic preservation and antiques, and it was the most dreamy getaway for following generations of the family.

The original creator and owner is still alive and now that her grandchildren are grown, she rents the space out for events and overnight stays.

You can read my blog about the Williamswood Castle here.

LAKE FOREST is a suburban neighbourhood in a forested territory with an actual lake. A tiny one, but I will accept that.

I did not venture too far in to see the lake up close because there were a whole lot of residents outside and I had no real business being there.

The founder/first pastor of the Lake Forest Presbyterian Church was also behind the founding of the Webb School in West Knoxville, and this site is considered its birthplace.

LINDBERGH FOREST is really cool because of its unique 1920s-1930s homes with creative brickwork and design.

Lindbergh Forest was named in honour of Charles Lindbergh whose famous flights took place around the time of completion.

The neighbourhood is known to be the former home of John T. O’Connor, an Irish-Catholic boxer, politician, and union organizer who lived there later in life, and the home of Knoxville’s first female mayor, Madeline Rogero.

I also learned that Lindbergh Forest has two prefab, post-war steel homes called Lustron Houses located at 222 Chamberlain and 3510 Glenhurst.

They are rather small and plain compared to the gorgeous stone homes, so I have not prioritized a return to track them down.

Other neighbourhoods like South Woodlawn, Eagleton, and Kimberlin Heights are mostly residential and nice but without much historic or architectural significance.

FOOD & DRINKS
First up is South Press Coffee, Knoxville’s most LGBTQ+ friendly and eco-friendly cafe. 

The owner and her staff are all as sweet as peaches and you will not find a more inclusive, welcoming public space in town.

Check out their open mic nights, game and trivia nights, drag shows, and other events.

CommonPlace + Community Coffee is another chill choice for coffee, and I love their South Knoxville mural.

SoKno Taco Cantina has an extensive selection of tacos, burritos, and other delicacies.

I love that they offer Thai portobello mushrooms, tofu, and a few different kinds of fish or shrimp for protein options.

One of my favourite items is their Cast Iron Beans, kind of a beans-refried beans hybrid with special seasoning and queso on top. It doubles as a filling dip for tortilla chips if you are just feeling a bit peckish.

All of their cocktails are fresh and juicy, too.

71 South is a new restaurant in an old church, and I am so glad to see something both useful and delicious fill this space.

It is located within the Baker Creek Preserve at the very heart of the Urban Wilderness.

Everything from the tomato soup, roasted Brussels, and Urban Cowboy fries, to the Smashburgers and Spicy South tofu sandwiches, was spot on.

I need to know who they think they are serving fries that golden and crispy.

Love That BBQ was recommended by a friend and local, and dang he was right!

It looks pretty run-down but the food is delicious and one entree with dessert was enough for me to make three meals out of.

The owners/staff are a really sweet Southern family. You can tell their neighbours adore them by the way they pop in and yell hello, greet each other by name, and smile knowing that their “usual” is already being written up on a ticket as soon as they arrive.

Aretha Frankensteins is a newer addition to South Knox, and they have another location in Chattanooga. I love their quirky menu that references spooky pop culture and other icons.

Apparently I liked their breakfast burrito too because we wolved our meals down before taking a photo. It happens.

Thai Time and Sugar Queen are both positively reviewed restaurants. Recently, a car crashed through Thai Time and they are in the process of rebuilding, but I will be visiting as soon as they reopen.

KERN’S FOOD HALL is closest to downtown, right at the Henley Street Bridge.

The site used to be home to Kern’s Bread factory, founded by a German immigrant named Peter Kern and also the namesake of the Peter Kern Library / Speakeasy in Market Square. The speakeasy is where Kern originally sold his lustful confections, by the way.

The site has been on the National Register of Historic Places since 2017.

Now, decades later, the factory has closed, the building has been renovated, and the food hall now offers local goods and cuisine from all over the world.

We had a wonderful time with Knox Trivia Guys and trying different brews there at Monday Night Brewing last week, and I am looking forward to returning.

ANCIENT LORE VILLAGE
One last place I want to tell you about is the Ancient Lore Village.

This may cause a bit of a controversy because of the family that owns it, their political moves, destroying historic sites and any trace of real culture in order to turn Knoxville into a commercialized sports arena, and other stories I will spare you from.

All I am saying is that this is such an idyllic setting for a peaceful walk, meditating, or a bit of reflecting by the waterfall.

The property is available for overnight rentals and special occasions, and they host various events throughout the year.

This may not be an official permit but in my experience, polite and respectful guests who are not staying overnight are still welcome to take a stroll.

Keep your eyes open while cruising around for this mural of the official flowers of Tennessee by artist Kellene Turner.

In the area for a while? Follow me to South Knoxville’s Old Sevier District or to other cool Knoxville neighbourhoods like Marble City, Inskip, Fountain City, Parkridge, and Old North.

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