See Rock City
Classic Americana, a Civil War battlefield, and gnomes...lots of gnomes
The problem with good advertising is that it can sometimes overshadow the product: for example, without Googling it, tell me what the slogan “Where’s the beef?” is advertising. Okay, now you can Google it. See what I mean?
This is the case with the famous Rock City barns. Many people remember seeing the words “SEE ROCK CITY” painted on the sides and roofs of barns throughout the eastern half of the country; or, at the least, they have seen a picture or heard a reference to the barns. But how many of them actually know what Rock City is? Always at the service of Country Roads’ readers, I went to find out.
Since a writer’s schedule is generally flexible, a friend had asked me to fly to West Virginia, pick up a truck he had bought, and drive it back to Texas. I had time for one tourist attraction along the way. After some dithering, I chose Rock City because it was en route and because no one I knew had ever been there.
Just across the Georgia line from Chattanooga, Tennessee, Rock City sits atop Lookout Mountain, which, by the early 1900s, had become a getaway spot. Tourist development quickly followed, though the rock formations from which Rock City draws its name were known to Cherokees, exploring hikers, and Chattanooga residents well before.
The quirky piece of Americana that composes Rock City today owes its existence to miniature golf money. In 1932, Garnet Carter, Lookout Mountain real estate developer and inventor of miniature golf, sold the patent for that sport to a pickle manufacturer and used the money to develop a tourist attraction on the area of the mountain he owned. His wife Frieda, drawing a string behind her to mark her way, had laid out a path among the massive formations and lined the route with flowerbeds; Carter had the walk paved and started selling tickets. That’s what Rock City is, mostly: a long loop through the tunnels and arches that thread along the top of the mountain, with stops at various points of geological interest.
I didn’t actually see a sign for Rock City until I was halfway through Tennessee, which worried me. Maybe it was all hype, and I’d just end up spending a lot of time and effort going to a Z-grade tourist trap where someone would try to sell me racy greeting cards and ten-dollar Indian head pennies. Just south of Chattanooga, I found a new source of concern: it seemed getting to Rock City involved driving up a narrow, winding road that crept wormlike up the side of Lookout Mountain. Anxious by nature and in a borrowed truck, I wasn’t thrilled about this prospect; but I’d come this far and curiosity was stronger than fear. I inched my way up the mountain, crossing into Georgia along the way. If anyone doubts that the South has modernized or that capitalism will always triumph, I’m here to tell you there’s a Starbucks on Lookout Mountain. I passed it as I pulled into the Rock City parking lot, invigorated from my daring ascent. I paid the entry fee (a reasonable $22.95), got a map, and went in.
It was magical. The rock formations that cover the top of the mountain, formed when sandstone was pushed up by the formation of the Appalachian Mountains and then gradually and unevenly worn away by rain and wind, were far bigger and more beautiful than I’d expected. I had imagined little ankle- to knee-high crenellations, interesting but not majestic; but the formations at Rock City sweep and tower tens of feet in the air. The even, tasteful paving stones give the whole thing a vaguely Eden-like appeal—yes, it’s nature, but made convenient! And as an added bonus, little German-style garden gnomes occupy the entire area, peeping out from crevices and nestled amongst hydrangea beds.
This all sounds kitschy, and it probably is; but Rock City is also genuinely one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. The contrast between the clearly manmade landscaping and the natural, majestic rock formations just works. It’s counterintuitive, but Rock City really does marry the best of both worlds. (And as a congenitally clumsy person, I can’t tell you how nice it was to have the visual appeal of a hike without tripping over eleven thousand tree roots.)
At the front entrance, I picked up a map with a numbered itinerary of points of interest, and I marked them off as I walked. A couple of them were duds—a rock shaped like a mushroom is really of interest only to the most unrepentant Freudian—but overall, the guide provided a nice reminder to take in the surroundings and make a leisurely time of it.
About halfway through the route, I emerged onto a little plateau from which one can survey Chattanooga and the surrounding area. I looked at the city and tried to imagine it during the Civil War, when Southern troops bombarded the Union-held city from Lookout Mountain in a doomed, desperate bid to keep the Yankees out of Georgia. I couldn’t. It was too long ago and too beautiful a day; if the ghosts of the Confederate dead were around, they were probably just enjoying the sunshine. Allegedly, you can see seven states from this vantage point. Scientists have explained that you can actually probably only see Tennessee, Georgia, and with some neck-craning maybe Alabama and North Carolina on a good day; Rock City has ignored this and has helpfully provided arrows pointing out the sight lines toward the aforementioned states as well as Virginia, Kentucky, and South Carolina. I chose to believe.
One can also see, from this lookout, a magnificent waterfall and lover’s leap, from which many a lovelorn Cherokee is supposed to have jumped. If that’s too morbid a thought on which to reflect, there is always the view of a grassy area near the base of the falls, which has been stocked with a breed of small European deer especially chosen for their fairytale quality. American deer are, apparently, too realistic.
Continuing along the path, I passed a little café—closed for the day before I arrived—to reach Fat Man’s Squeeze, a narrow path between two tall granite shelves. I had to wait for a few minutes to get through, since the family in front of me had a generously built father and claustrophobic mother who each wanted the other parent to flush the kids through so he/she could struggle along unobserved. I, of course, watched every minute of it, though I pretended to look at my phone out of politeness.
Finally, about two-thirds of the way through the route, I landed at Fairyland Caverns. In the late ‘40s, as the baby boom began, the Carters added a children’s attraction called Fairyland Caverns to the end of the route, in which sightseers pass through a partly natural, partly manmade series of tunnels decorated with sculptures depicting characters from fairy tales and children’s books. All told, the attraction took six years to complete. Frieda Carter’s fondness for children’s literature and European folklore, gently woven through the rest of the attraction, is dialed up to eleven here.
The entrance is marked with a large metal sign that reads “No Smoking in Fairyland Caverns,” which will absolutely be the title of my memoir. Naïve man that I am, I imagined Fairyland Caverns as a cave graced with little rock formations given whimsical names like “Fairies’ Tea Set” and “Pixie Hollow.” A single step into Fairyland Caverns dispelled that image completely—it is a cave, but the weirdest cave in the world. The walls of the foyer have been intentionally covered in some crushed, reflective stone for a sparkle effect, and there are more gnomes in here than any one person should be comfortable with. It is a colony—a nest—of gnomes: gnomes on swings, gnomes mining the cave, gnomes riding little miner’s trains, gnomes generally cavorting. It is difficult to overstate the Gnome Factor. This goes on for a few rooms…and then things get odd.
Fairyland Caverns consists of scores of glow-in-the-dark dioramas of scenes from fairytales, nursery rhymes, and well-known children’s books. They’re set into glassed-off niches along long corridors where you can peep in to see, for instance, a dusty fifty-year-old Mother Hubbard sculpture heavily accented with screaming orange. The psychedelic colors made me assume the attraction was a mod ‘60s creation, but Fairyland Caverns was opened in 1948; so things were apparently starting to get weird even during the Truman administration. I cannot overstate how bizarre Fairyland Caverns is. If you like squinting at high-contrast objects while trying to figure out what public-domain characters they represent—and you’re kind to your fellow man, of course—this is where you go when you die.
After, conservatively, forty or so Misses Mary Mack and Little Boys Blue, I reached Mother Goose Village, an open area the size of a hotel meeting room, illuminated with black light, containing an enormous diorama of thirty or more additional nursery rhyme scenes, which one is encouraged to circle to get the full effect. I went around twice. This is the very last thing one sees at Rock City; the exit from Mother Goose Village spat me out a few yards from the entrance, leaving me to stagger through the gift shop, squinting in the light, wondering if I could ever really convey the weirdness of Fairyland Caverns in prose.
I’ll be visiting Rock City again—it’s a great attraction for history buffs, nature lovers, and fans of Americana. There are a number of events throughout the year, including a fall corn maze and a haunted house that take place on an adjacent property.
Rock City is near Ruby Falls, an underground waterfall, as well as Civil War battlefields at Chickamauga and Missionary Ridge; so there’s a very full day, or even weekend, possible. Lodging is available on Lookout Mountain; but Rock City is very convenient to Chattanooga, which has actively rebuilt itself into an attractive tourist destination. It could also constitute a day-trip from Knoxville, Atlanta, or Pigeon Forge. Make time to see it if you’re in the area: Rock City blends the natural beauty of the Appalachian foothills with classic, go-get-‘em American showmanship; the result is a spectacular roadside attraction you won’t want to miss.
Details. Details. Details.
Rock City Gardens 1400 Patten Road Lookout Mountain, Ga.
Six miles from downtown Chattanooga. Open year-round, but hours vary seasonally, so call (706) 820-2531 or (800) 854-0675 or visit seerockcity.com for details, events calendar, and more.
Note: Some facts on the origin of Rock City were gathered from Scenic, Historic Lookout Mountain by John Wilson, excerpts from which a lady at the Rock City office was kind enough to read this author over the phone.