NASHVILLE:  WHERE THE PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE COLLIDE

By Pam Serna

Carol Serna/Contributing photographer

   
                                                                            

Jerkey Shack

As someone whose family has a history of seven generations in Middle Tennessee, I still have very nostalgic moments when I stop and think about #Nashville today and the Nashville of days gone by.  Everywhere you look in Nashville, a new building project is being erected.  Parts of #history are being wiped out without any thought other than how much profit stands to be made in the deal.

I recently wrote a piece in Facebook about #THE#SPIN, the perspective with which a media outlet will air a story, in particular, reports relating to politics.  I mention 'the spin' as I am aware that there will be some who might view the story I am about to tell as my particular spin on the matter; however, it is for the most part, the truth.

What was it that brought so many people to this once very small, quaint country town?  Well, was it the music?  Was it the universities?  Was it the printing business?  Was it simply the fact that Nashville is a port city, which makes it a center of trade?  Is it because they had hopes of finding jobs and improving their lots in life?  Perhaps it was all of the above.  I recently read a very astute observation by someone whose name I'm afraid I don't recall.  But the gist of the statement had to do with the fact that when people from the north retire, they move south and people from the south don't usually move north when they retire.  So, as you can see, there are a multitude of reasons why someone may have become one of the growing numbers of transplants here in Music City.

However, with the rapid pace of growth which Nashville has experienced in the last decade, there are those who tend to forget some of the quaintness which so many people loved about Nashville.  Yesterday, I was returning from Kingston Springs via Highway 70 South.  The drive from Kingston Springs to Nashville along Highway 70 South is simply beautiful.  Many people who have had enough of the breakneck speed with which Nashville has become a boom town have fled the city for greener pastures in the outlying areas surrounding Nashville.  I've even read a recent article that it is getting more and more difficult to find original citizens of Nashville still living here.

I digress.  As I approached the Bellevue area, I could not help but notice the Jerkey Shack which in located on Charlotte Pike where Highway 70 South and Charlotte Pike become one.  It is obviously the small wooden shack pictured at the beginning of this blog.  Here is a closer shot of it taken by my sister Carol Serna.

And beside the Jerkey Shack is another vendor that has a tradition which has been practiced by farmers and vendors in Nashville forever, the roadside produce stand. This particular stand is better known as Fresh and Local Nashville.  The two small businesses are side by side and are literally at the edge of town as you are leaving the Bellevue area.  And if you are not from Nashville, you may not yet know that Bellevue is on the far west edge of Nashville.

 

 
After I passed the road side vendors, there was another sign which caught my attention.  This one was in the yard of a private home; so, to protect the individual's privacy, I have greyed out the phone number on the sign.  But quilting is such a timeless tradition, and yet, it is one which seems to be fading from the mainstream and often being left to the mass producers of goods. 

The thing that REALLY made all of these small businesses stand out to me was the next thing which I saw, directly contrasting with these signs of nostalgia I had just seen.  And if you know anything about West Nashville or the Bellevue area, you already know that the old Bellevue Center Mall has been demolished to make way for a new mall.  Only one mile up the road from where I saw the signs of nostalgia, some of the people who carry in their DNA the memories of a kinder, gentler Nashville, were the signs of 'progress' in the west side of town. Here are the signs of 'Progress' in the Bellevue area. I have also greyed out the name of the construction company.  If you want to know the name of the company, I guess you will need to drive by there and see for yourself or look it up.

The old Bellevue Center Mall Sign

AS NASHVILLE GROWS AND CHANGES

If you remember a little dive meat and three restaurant called the #CoffeeShop on #EllistonPlace in Nashville, then the odds are that you have been around here for awhile.  The Coffee Shop was a business that was once located at the same site of what has long since become better known as The Gold Rush.  #TheGoldRush itself is a longstanding institution of socializing over bean rolls and beer or your favorite mixed drink.  So, if I say that I was here in #Nashville and that my mother was once a #waitress at the Coffee Shop prior to its glory days as The Gold Rush, you can safely assume that yes, I have been in Nashville for infinity it would seem.  

I can remember my beautiful mother Margie in her white waitress uniform with her auburn colored hair, in her white waitress shoes with her hair often swept up in a fashionable do for women her age.  I can remember her penciled on eyebrows and her Raleigh cigarettes.  I can remember Mr. Anthony's Jewelry Store which was on the block, a few doors down from the Coffee Shop.  Just talking about those times elicits a sigh of nostalgia from me.  

I can remember when on Friday nights The Gold Rush was THE place to be.  You never knew what visiting celebrity from L.A. who had come to Nashville to collaborate on songwriting or to visit a recording studio would be in the Rush that night.  You never knew when you might just get invited to a showcase or to some artist's debut.  While it has been many years since I was hanging out at the Gold Rush, I can't help but wonder at this stage of earth-shaking and ground breaking growth in Nashville, who else might remember the time when the elements of Nashville that made it so inviting to everyone were still evident.

I still remember when one could walk safely down the sidewalks in the afternoons as children and on any neighborhood front porch steps you could see and hear the guitar pickers hanging out and just having fun.  They were not all here in the hopes of attaining fame and fortune because of their talents...they just were.  In other words, the talent was enjoyed and shared simply for the pure joy of it.  

The memories go on for a lifetime.  I couldn't possibly begin to share them all in this one post.  But, here is one more I will share at this time.  The site of the construction dig at the top of this page used to be a small church.  I attended there for awhile when I was married with two small children.  This was Bellevue Grace Assembly Church once upon a time.  I can only guess that it will now possibly become the home to more condos, of which Bellevue now has a plethora.  I took the photo while out for a stroll with my friend Hannah one day. The impact of how much things are changing and how rapidly they are changing in what was once a small, friendly colony of artists hit me like a ton of bricks.  I have obscured the name of the manufacturing giant on the tractors simply to avoid any possibility of liability, but I'm sure you know who they are.

Change is inevitable in the world today.  But with change, does a society also have to lose its soul?  Those of us who have been in Nashville most of our lives certainly would hate to see that happen to Nashville, and let's hope it's not already happening.