People shop Friday in Ringgold, Ga., at The Dixie Highway 90-Mile Yard Sale. The yard sale is an annual event.
Staff Photo by Allison Carter/Chattanooga Times Free PressIF YOU GOThe Dixie Highway Yard Sale will continue today and Sunday from 7 a.m. to dusk each day.
RINGGOLD, Ga.-Every year, Fred and Doris McAllister set up their tan tent under a shade tree in downtown Ringgold and spread out their wares for the annual Dixie Highway 90-Mile Yard Sale.
This year they’ve got comic books for a dollar, a bird cage and a hand-painted lemonade set. But the view from their tent as they welcome browsers is changed.
The United Methodist Church next door is covered in blue tarps after an April 27 tornado tore its roof off. Dozens of businesses along the street are closed, the buildings still little more than heaps of splintered wood.
The annual yard sale, stretching along U.S. Highway 41 from Ringgold to Kennesaw, is one way for the town to return to normal and to infuse money into the businesses that are still open, Fred McAllister said. As he talks, he picks up a shingle fragment, just one of dozens still littering the ground around the rubble.
“This is normal and will help ease people back in to the way things were,” McAllister said. “There has been so much devastation.”
Georgia’s Dixie Highway Association began the mega-sale – now in its fifth year – to promote a historic driving tour along U.S. 41. The highway was built almost 100 years ago and twists south near Interstate 75, the road that is now the main route to Atlanta.
The vendors are a mix of people who buy and resell as a business and residents emptying their closets.
“We meet so many nice people,” said Doris McAllister. “That is the best part. And hopefully we’ll make a little money.”
Just down the road in Rocky Face, Steve Rutledge shows off a “Hello Kitty” pink alarm clock and an “I Love Lucy” anniversary clock, set out amidst a microwave and coffee maker. Rutledge, who lives nearby, is a new vendor.
“If anybody is going to a yard sale, this is the one you need,” Rutledge said.
Donna Woody agrees. Every year she and her daughter, Trinity, now 5, join friends to shop the sales from beginning to end. The group, armed with cups of coffee and dollar bills, spends the day wandering south.
She buys toys and clothes for Trinity, Woody said. But it is also a day of adventure.
Trinity tries on pink and purple hats as Woody talks, then brings her mom a red-and-black belt to try on. Nearby is a bike that has been attached to a push lawn mower, creating a pedal-powered mower.
“My husband would love that,” Woods said. “You find all kinds of weird and strange things. It’s just a fun day.”