Cooper: Proposed new name 'midTown' doesn't quite fit Brainerd

The grave marker of the Rev. Samuel Worcester, M.D., stands in the Brainerd Mission Cemetery amid other tombstones and ceremonial plaques.
The grave marker of the Rev. Samuel Worcester, M.D., stands in the Brainerd Mission Cemetery amid other tombstones and ceremonial plaques.

We're scratching our heads a bit on the drive to change the name of the Brainerd Road corridor community that stretches from Missionary Ridge to Highway 153 to the name midTown.

We don't quibble with the hope to revitalize the roughly five-mile stretch of road, which is an unsightly mess of tall signs, strip centers and telephone poles. But it seems unnecessary to dismiss the name of a community, which has been related to the name of Brainerd for two centuries.

Even if the midTown name were to catch on - most residents have never heard the moniker used - what would the area between midTown and Interstate 75 and between midtown and Shallowford Road be called? Currently, that entire area is Brainerd. Would they become South midTown and North midTown?

And what of Brainerd Mission, the island of history and cemetery dwarfed by the sprawl of Eastgate Town Center and Brainerd Village? Would it become midTown Mission? Or midTown misSion? That sounds more like a trendy neighborhood bar that midTown proponents might hope would spring up along the corridor.

The mission, a Christian mission to the Cherokee Indians that was established on the side of Chickamauga Creek in 1817 and lasted until the Cherokee removal in 1838, and the area were named for missionary David Brainerd. It is said to have been visited by former President James Madison in 1819. Today, the cemetery is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is recognized as an official stop on the National Park Service Trail of Tears.

midTown itself is a bit of a misnomer. Geographically, the corridor is in the southern portion of Chattanooga proper and at one point is just a mile or so from the Georgia border. Chattanooga Councilwoman Carol Berz said "the reason we came up with" the name is that the area is "midway between Enterprise South and downtown."

But that's not quite true. However, a straight line between downtown and Enterprise South would run through an area that would approximate the midpoint of Chattanooga's boundaries. It would be near the Riverside neighborhood off Amnicola Highway.

We're all for organizations that help repackage the Brainerd area into something more than fast-food restaurants, nail salons and quick cash shops. We're also supportive of the Brainerd Road Overlay Zone, which directs new builds and extensive renovations along the corridor from Spring Creek Road to East Brainerd Road to add sidewalks and landscaping. But we don't see the necessity of the Brainerd name going away, even after approved street side midTown banners are put up by the end of September.

Brainerd midTown, we can live with. Dismissing 200 years of history, we'd rather not.

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