The Dent House on Bonny Oaks Drive is the last standing antebellum home in Chattanooga. It housed a well-known orphanage from 1898 until 1988. I have operated a full-scale restaurant specializing in afternoon tea there for the last three years and value the location’s rich history.
Railroad contractor Jarrett Dent moved to “Tynersville” in the mid-1850s to expand the Western and Atlantic Railroad. As war clouds gathered, Dent sided with the South and took his family to safety in Dallas, Texas. His eldest son, Charles, left to fight for the North. His cousin, Julia Dent, was married to Ulysses S. Grant. After the Civil War, Capt. C.S. Peak, who had fought for the South in the Battle of Chickamauga, bought the Dent home. When the prosperous businessman saw the beautiful trees, he exclaimed, “Oh the Bonny Oaks!” Peak willed the spacious home to the city of Chattanooga when he died.
The Bonny Oaks Children’s Home was authorized by an act of the Tennessee General Assembly in 1895, and its first Board of Trustees the next year. Few of the founders could not have known their actions would inuence children so positively for more than 90 years.
In its heyday, Bonny Oaks housed more than 200 children who lived in four dormitories, known affectionately as those for the “big” and “little” boys and girls. “House parents” also lived there. Besides bedrooms and hallways, each building had a full kitchen and large dining hall.
When I first met returning alumni, I was surprised to hear them refer to each other as “brothers” and “sisters.” Those children cared for each other as much as those with the same last name. Even the children of house parents saw themselves as Bonny Oaks students. One alumnus told me recently, “I can’t even remember how old I was when I discovered that my mother and father were not just ‘my parents,’ but those of others too. And care for others those house parents did. And a superintendent guided children while numerous volunteers cooked, served and washed up. That day-to-day routine built strong character traits of service to all.’