Chattanooga Daily Times from Chattanooga, Tennessee • 41

fags six THE CHATTANOOGA SVNDAT TIMES MAGAZINE, JUNE 5, 193S. i IF CoV6 sad. Ifi Hiking club dropped in plump red apples, a dozen corks and at least one bottle containing a letter offering a reward for its return, if fcund in the Sequatchie river or in Sequatchie valley. Here two mallard ducks, each bearing a biological survey band, were photographed before they were dispatched as explorers, and then were carried a half-mile farther down the mountain where a second entrance guides one to the passing stream. If the ducks had been released at the main entrance, they surely would have been attracted by daylight and their exploring journey would have prematurely ended.

rapid rate that an they view Is the road ahead, and yet many of them travel a thousand miles to glimpse something not half as lovely as this exquisite nature spot. On the site of the old Stratton home now stands a modern residence, the home of Mr. James Clemmer. The sugar maples planted by the Strattons are the most beautiful and majestic of any trees of this species in Tennessee. At this place, hiking club members left their automobiles and walked for a half-mile through a fertile farm where winds the sparkling Cove creek to enter the mountain.

Through cultivated fields, through clover meadows and fields of grains it travels, and then it silently creeps into a natural rock tunnel. Here the limestone walls are curiously and cleverly carved and etched into strikingly handsome patterns, and at times limestone draperies hang pendant as stiff decorations most becoming to underground rooms that nature builds during many centuries. Prom the lips of native people we learned that when water runs low, persons who like underground adventures have walked with Cove creek for a distance of two and a hsTlf miles before turning back. At the main entrance of this unusual natural tunnel, members of the Cumberlands by RpBERT Sparks Walker xVT THE second entrance the floor is a mass of big rocks which have been dropping for centuries from the ceiling overhead, and there the stream widens, giving it a shallow bed, and blackest night prevails. At this point, DeForest Lowry, member of the Cumberlands Hiking club, and Marvin B.

Small, guest-hiker, of Gadsden, each took a duck in one hand and a flashlight in the other and waded through the water down the cavern until they had rounded two or more turns. When there had vanished every streak of Continued on Page Eleven. places, running through Swaggertys gap, on the west between Hinch mountain and Crab Orchard mountain. On each side of this road the stem creations rise to an elevation of 3,000 feet above the level of the sea. The road affords a short cut to the Sequatchie side of the ridges.

The mountain on the south of the cove has an altitude from 2,500 to 3,000 feet, and the same on the west. Black mountain lies to the north where the altitude ranges from 2,000 to 2,500 feet. The many flowing springs unite and form Cove creek, a dreamy little stream, and a fitting prototype of Tennysons famous brook. Through grassy meadows. Cove creek winds as gracefully as a blacksnake.

It never pursues a straight course far enough to form a monotonous scene, but breaks away from routine every few yards, giving one a new picture and a fresh program at every crook and turn. However, the most remarkable feature of Cove creek is where it strikes the mountain on the northwest of the cove, about a half-mile from the main highway. There it enters the mountain as gracefully as a locomotive plunges into a human-made tunnel, and gurges gleefully on Its way for a distance estimated to be about fourteen miles. When it strikes daylight it awakens from its slumber to find that its name has been changed to the Sequatchie river. W0M Wx 'W'f, "'k Vt- 6s: Photos by Harry W.

Granert. Right After flowing fourten miles under the mountain, Cove creek comes out at this end of the cqve where it is knoion as Sequatchie river. w. Below Clifton Wright, left, and the author holding the two ducks at the entrance of the cave where Cove creek leaves Grassy cove. a PEW years before the Civil war, citi- sens of New York City were hlgh-ly amused If not startled at seeing a man driving through their busy streets In a carriage drawn by two robust elks.

The driver was simply dressed, and his bearded face, perhaps, paused him to be mistaken for an Englishman. This man was Lorenzo Stratton, of Chatta-raugus county. New York, who, besides being a successful farmer, owned an elk farm. He bad recently sold a pair of these fine animals to the princess Imperial of Italy, and one of the condltlohs of the sale required Stratton to drive them hitched to a vehicle through New York Citys busy Streets before they left the States. In 1669 this farmer who thus highly entertained the people of New York City for a few hours became weary, if not disgusted at having to break thick ice so often to enable his live stock' to find drinking water in wintertime, sold out and moved to Grassy Cove, Tenn.

He shipped his horses, Devon and other live stock to Nashville and from there traveled by wagon, bringing his wife and six children With him. He purchased a tract of 1,600 acres of land In Grassy Cove known as the old Greer Stand, which lies a few miles west of Grand-View, on the mountain above Spring City. In this little' heaven had previously arrived -other well-to-do farmers, and the Strattons liked the place so well that their contentment Influenced a few other families to move to Grassy Cove. When the Grassy Cove academy was established it drew many young men and women, some of whom after life became prominent In the affairs of the country. It was in this miniature cove that David Wilson and John Sllsby, who had been college mates at an educational institution near Cincinnati, came together, after the former had served as a missionary in Syria, and the latter at a similar post in Slam.

The Rev. David M. Wilson was the father of the beloved Dr. Samuel Tyndale Wilson, president emeritus of Maryville college. Miss Hattie Sllsby, daughter of Prof.

John Sllsby, became the wife of Dr. Samuel T. Wilson. Brief and most interesting sketches of other well-to-do persons and' families are cleverly told in a. lovely bound brouchure, just off the press.

It is entitled, And This Is Grassy Cove," and was written by Misses Cora S. and Nettle M. Stratton, of Chattanooga, daughters of Lorenzo Stratton. After establishing themselves in Grassy Cove the Strattons built a grist mill and sawmill on Cove creek. Grassy Cove is a natural gem held near heaven in the palm of natures hand in the Cumberland mountains about seventy miles from Chattanooga.

It is a vest-pocket edition of a rustic cove, measuring about five miles In length and two miles at its greatest width. It has an altitude of 1,634 feet above sea level. There is a trunk road, though steep in HEN it enters the mountain it does not leap Into a hole in the ground, as streams of this kind are generally in the habit of doing, but it maintains a steady dignity by retaining a gravellybed, uniformly level, and chuckles on in the and where it leaves the mountain it is estimated that it has lost at least 300 feet elevation from its starting point At the time the Strattons operated the grist mill in Grassy cove there was also a miller grinding grain on the other side of the mountain, who depended on the current of Cove creek to furnish power. In late summer and early fall, when the water was too low to grind in Sequatchie river, the miller would send a plea to the Strattons to please throw a few bucketfuls of water over their dam and give him a lift. When the plea of the miller was granted, and the Strattons opened up their dam and let the water go through at night, the- next morning the recruiting currents arrived and the Sequatchie miller started his mill grinding his cprn into meal.

Thirty years ago I heard much of Grassy cove from Messrs. Charles L. Stratton, who now lives on Missionary ridge, and the late Henry H. Stratton, sons of Lorenzo Stratton. Many tales have reached my ears during the last quarter of a century reporting how people have thrown bottles, apples, pumpkins and other light objects into Cove creek as it bid good-bye to Grassy cove, and how these floating objects reappeared in the Sequatchie river.

Indeed, even a real feathered goose, and not one of the human kind, was said to have made a successfuljourney of its own choice through the mountain. Each time one of these stories came to my attention I made a fruitless effort to have it verified. And so, not only to provide a normal hike for members of the Cumberlands Hiking club, but for the purpose of proving the truth of these old tales, a trip was planned for Grassy cove on Sunday, May 15, 1938. Most any place where thoughtful people have not destroyed the native vegetation is a beautiful spot in May in East Tennessee. But Grassy cove is truly a masterpiece of loveliness.

The road is well paved, and draws many automobillsts. It is doubtful, however, that one person out of every twenty-five who passes through the cove ever sees any of its beauty, because they fly through at such a Are You Allergic? Continued From Page Three. noncontagtous, and is in no way connected with one of those dangerous, lurking which every one dreads so heartily. Statistics, and a facts on the bright side of the subject may aid your talking point and also prove of some comfort between the attacks of nervous "heebie-jeebies created by prolonged rash, hay fever and asthma. Scientists offer consolation in the fact that i.

the medical profession is slowly but surely going forward to eradicate this ailment. Relieving discomfort all the while and gradually finding elimination mediums, by skin tests, and trial and error diets. It is also encouraging to know an allergic person, in a great, percentage of cases, is less apt to contract other ailments than the average one. Then, tie said, this sensitivity grows less active as the person advances in age and High altitude and seashore resorts have been known to relieve some of the most tenacious forms, but the immunity does not extend to every case, as unmistakably has been proved. In the most desperate conditions, however, there is always instant relief (at least in the greater percentage of cases) by the injection of as little as a half cubic centimeter of adrenalin.

This contacts the blood vessels that are bringing on the swelling and relaxes the muscles causing the spasms. In the meantime and until medical science discovers a way of immunizing against everything to which the allergic person is sensitive, his chief source of relief remains in everyday treatment, avoiding and eliminating from his diet those things for which skin tests and trial and error experiments reveal he has a positive sensitivity. though it is not an iron-clad rule, in most cases it disappears around the fortieth year. Medical journals cite the fact that the ailment is of an aristocratic nature and normally occurs among the more learned and educated groups, frequently among persons whose daily life or profession is conducive to produce high mental and nervous strain. The day laborer and farmhand, with their simple, healthy life, are far less susceptible than their town and city relatives.

It is most generally agreed that the great increase in numbers of persons becoming afflicted with this distressing sensitivity is undobutedly the result of the many unnatural and irritating complexities of our modern civilization. Reminiscence compels us to wonder how the good old-fashioned doctor who relieved our childish pains and ills by always being a cheerful giver of One pill for a shake, Two for a shiver and Three for that awful thine called the liver have dealt with this perplexing modern malady. Another outstanding peculiarity of this ailment, is its racial predisposition; statistics revealing that English and American races furnish the greater majority of cases, and curiously enough, occurrences in other countries are usually confined to these two nationalities, while native go unaffected. Rare indeed are cases found among Negroes or orientals..