Memories of Mosheim

Greene County, Tennessee
Memories of Mosheim

       I won't pretend to know a lot about Mosheim, Tennessee.  My mother and her sister and brother were born near Baileyton and the family moved to Mosheim around 1923.  The old photos shown here are copied from my aunt's collection, and I believe they originally were published as part of a history of the Mosheim School.

        My grandmother, Jennie White Davis, was a school teacher, and my grandfather, Charles "Starchy" Davis,  ran a hardware store with Alec Bible.   It later closed, and he worked in Greeneville until his death in 1946.

        My memories are of summers in Mosheim in the 1950s and 60s.  We usually stayed at my aunt's old farmhouse, which was separated from the railroad tracks by a small field.  By that time Mosheim was just a whistle stop with no depot, and when the train came through in the middle of the night it shook the whole house.  At 5:30 a.m. we awoke to the sound of the cows going out to pasture.

        We loved that old house, with its uneven wooden plank floors and high ceilings.  It didn't have an indoor bathroom until the mid 1960s, and the outhouse was in the chicken yard.  We city kids were petrified of what we would encounter inside the outhouse, but I was most afraid of the chickens and cows!


The house just before it was torn down

         Some of us would stay at my Granny Davis' house on Main Street.  What a wonderful house, we thought,  with french doors between the living and dining rooms, and one and a half bathrooms.  I'm sure it was the latest thing in 1923!  Unfortunately,  it had running water but no hot water.

        From my aunt's we could walk down the hill to Bob Price's store for a popcicle.  At that time it was just across the creek ("branch") and on the other side of Main Street.  The original location of the Price Store was just a little bit up the hill, where the Mosheim Town Hall is now.

        Sometimes when the train came through, slowing down to drop off the mail, we kids would jump into an open car, run through, and jump off on the other side. (Don't tell our parents!)

          In the early evenings we played outside in the Conway's front yard.  I remember it filled with lightening bugs and the hosta blooms that glowed  so white in the twilight.  Years after the house was torn down to make room for the new Highway 11-E, Mama still talked about the sweet scent of those hostas. (Memories so tender that I couldn't bring myself to go back to Mosheim for many years after the two houses were demolished).

        I'm showing the old photographs without much explanation, because the landscape of Mosheim has changed so much through the years, I don't recognize the scenes.   Most of the buildings shown in these early-1900's photographs are no longer in existance, and even the "new" Mosheim High School has been torn down and a new elementary school built in its place.  If anyone has any additional information about these scenes, please let me know!
 

To see a map of Mosheim today, search MapQuest
Mosheim, TN, Zip 37818

Mosheim's original name was Blue Springs, and a major Civil War battle was fought here.

The Battle of Blue Springs - Town of Mosheim

Some of the color photographs I took in January 2000 (I'll upload them a couple at a time)
 


 
 
 
 
 
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