After leaving Atlanta, our first stop was Marietta GA, where we found the gravesite of Mary Phagan, the young girl killed by Jim Conley in 1913 (a fact not discovered until after her Jewish employer, Leo Frank, was accused, convicted, and lynched).
From there we went to the Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park. We saw a demonstration shooting of a civil war cannon (boy, those are loud), and learned a bit about the battle.
From there it was on to Nashville, driving through an extremely severe storm—so severe that traffic on the freeway was pulling over to stop and wait it out. It was as bad as Tule Fog. The weather eventually cleared up, and we made it to Nashville… just in time to see the Parthenon before it closed. This is a fascinating building. It was built originally out of plaster for the world’s exposition in Nashville (just like the Palace of Arts in San Francisco or the Jefferson Memorial in St. Louis), and then rebuilt out of stone. It now houses an art museum, along with a gigantic statue of Athena, just like the real Parthenon.
Lastly, we had dinner at Demos in downtown Nashville, a wonderful steak and spaghetti restaurant (that is remarkably affordable). What made the dinner even more special was being able to see two cousins we first met at a family reunion in Nashville in 2007. Jim and Bernita are a blast to be around—I wished they lived in LA so we could see them more.
Tomorrow, we will be visiting The Hermitage in Nashville and taking a quick look at the Opry hotel before we drive on to Louisville.
