Soddy-Daisy museum is latest in network of facilities exploring region's history

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Pursuing the past: Soddy-Daisy museum the latest to explore area's history

Another chink in the story of the area's mining history will be filled in today as the Good Old Days Museum opens in a historic building in Soddy-Daisy.

The 1,600-square-foot museum is a dream come true for core members of the Soddy, Daisy & Montlake Historical Association. The association officially organized in September 2015, but for years several key players in the effort have been accumulating artifacts and information that tell the story of Soddy-Daisy - its Indian and pioneer settlers; history of coal mining and other industry; the expansive branches of family trees.

"We've got a lot of stuff to show for as small as we are," says Steve Smith, president of the 100-member nonprofit association.

The Soddy-Daisy facility is just the latest in an unofficial network of museums around the region that tell the stories of their communities. While each collection may be hyperfocused, together they represent key components of the history of the region at large.

Coal mining is a big part of that look back.

"Mining is what started the industrial revolution in this area," says Carson Camp, vice president of the Sequatchie Valley Historical Association and a board member of the Dunlap Coke Ovens Museum, which opened in 1989 to preserve Sequatchie County's mining history.

"Until mining came along - as good or as bad as it was - it was the first time people saw a paycheck," he says. "It was a barter system prior to that."

Online histories detail coal mining's radical transformation of Southern Appalachia following the Civil War. The U.S. had entered into a frenzied period of industrialization, and coal was needed to fuel the factories and railroads that were spreading across the country.

The Moonlit Road, which chronicles Southern culture, history and travel at themoonlitroad.com, records that the first coal mines in the region were run by small local operators with little financing. After the war, "independent coal barons from outside the region set up shop throughout the hills, with better equipment and deeper pockets."

Demand for coal increased with World War I, triggering a coal boom that, at its height, had nearly 12,000 mines operating in Southern Appalachia, employing more than 700,000 men, says the website.

Smith can easily rattle off the names and dates of the coal companies that figure into Soddy-Daisy's mining history, as well as the local lore that accompanies the documented stories. Durham Street, for example, named for the Durham Coal Co., was known by old-timers as Black Track, a reference to the coal dust that collected along the route as coal was brought from the tipple at the foot of the mountain to be loaded onto barges where Big Soddy Creek flows into the Tennessee River.

One of the highlights of the museum is a rebuilt coal car set up to look as if it's coming out of Soddy Coal Co.'s old No. 7 mine.

Much of the car is original, "and parts we couldn't find we made to exact specifications," Smith says.

Though now considered a single city after incorporating in 1969, Soddy and Daisy have their own identities in early records. Both were thriving coal towns until the 1930s. A hosiery mill, turpentine plant and several pottery and tile kilns also were active in the towns' industrial days.

The museum is housed in the old Soddy Bank building on Wall Street, at one time the center of the Soddy business district. A section of nearby highway was the first in Hamilton County to be paved, and Smith says people came from all around to drive on the new concrete road.

One of Daisy's claims to fame was Poe's Tavern, the first seat of Hamilton County government in 1819. A replica of the historic structure was completed in 2013 about a block from where the original sat.

Now retired from TVA, Smith, 60, says he has been actively gathering records and relics since 1983, filling his basement in the process. The group's public outreach so far has included three history fairs at Soddy-Daisy High School and displays for Pioneer Day festivals at Poe's Tavern.

"We have yet to not have someone come to us and tell us about old photographs or relics they'd like for us to take," Smith says. "They'll say, 'My kids, or my grandkids, don't care about this stuff.'"

Even with his basement bulging, Smith is inclined to accept any gift that pertains to the group's historical mission, which also encompasses the Montlake, Mowbray and Flat Top communities.

"People like to see things they've donated," Smith says, "in hopes somebody can enjoy it or learn from it."

Smith says he's mindful of preserving recollections associated with the relics, a practice he attributes to John Rice Irwin, founder of the Museum of Appalachia.

"The story," Smith says, "is more important than the artifact."

Contact Lisa Denton at ldenton@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6281.