About 65 residents of Lookout Mountain met on Wednesday evening, Jan. 7, 1939, at the local elementary school to discuss a memorial to Adolph S. Ochs. The meeting began with the reading of a report from the U.S. Department of Interior recommending the construction of a remembrance to the renowned publisher of the Chattanooga Times and The New York Times, who had died four years earlier. The memorial would rest within the boundaries of Point Park.
John A. Chambliss presided. The proposal ignited lengthy debate. William Crutchfield, architect for the proposed memorial, as well as W.V. Milligan and Joe H. Roberts, supported the project while others were opposed. Chambliss, Arthur Allen, Mrs. Joseph W. Johnson, Chester Richmond and Mr. Watkins were united in their belief that the old rock quarry re-envisioned as Memory Place by Ochs was a more fitting site. (The quarry was on the slopes of the mountain just southwest of Point Park and within the boundary of the Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park.)
Chambliss explained that he had been working on the project for two years and that an amphitheater at Memory Place would benefit the community. He envisioned a seating area of about 140 square feet in the “natural space.” A test by Cadek Conservatory’s Arthur W. Plettner and J. Oscar Miller showed the site to provide “virtually perfect acoustics for both musical performances and broadcasting.”
Milligan then asked Crutchfield to explain his plans for the Adolph S. Ochs Museum and Observatory in Point Park. The architect shared that the National Park Service had approved the plans but lacked sufficient funding, even after the $12,000 for the project allocated by the Chattanooga Times and The New York Times. He added that the memorial as designed would not obscure but instead complement the features of Umbrella Rock and the New York monument.
Mrs. Johnson rose to speak: “Adolph Ochs was one of our greatest citizens and deserves all the honor we can give him. But it would be more appropriate to have his memorial where there is plenty of space for music, plays and parking. It is beyond belief that such a thing could happen at Point Park.” Her final volley was, “[It] is a strange thing that the original committee of five could not call a public meeting to discuss the plans” before submitting them on behalf of the community. Allen added that he believed Ochs would have found it more appropriate for “his memorial to be down in the midst of what he did than on the top of Lookout Mountain.”