Five Classic Americana Downtowns In Tennessee

The term "Americana" gets applied to everything from roots music to roadside diners, but in these small-town Tennessee communities, it means something different: a downtown built between the 1850s and the 1950s that still does the job it was built for.

Court has been in session in Paris since 1896. Greeneville's railroad hotel from 1884 still rents rooms, and Sweetwater's Main Street still runs parallel to the tracks that created it. Bell Buckle's general store is still trading from behind its original counters, and Winchester's Oldham Theater, built to double as a fallout shelter, still sells popcorn. All five are worth getting to know.

Paris

Court has been in session at the Henry County Courthouse since it was first occupied on October 2, 1896, making it West Tennessee's oldest working courthouse. Chattanooga architect Reuben Harrison Hunt designed the handsome brick building in the Richardsonian Romanesque style, with a central clock tower whose bell was cast using silver dollars donated by local citizens.

It stands in the middle of the town square which, along with the surrounding streets, makes up the Paris Commercial Historic District. The storefronts facing the courthouse went up between the 1890s and the 1920s, and a renovation project in the mid-1990s returned the square to its 1920s appearance, with brick-accented sidewalks, period lighting, and the overhead power lines removed.

Forty merchants are in this revitalized downtown core, most of them independently owned. My Favorite Things, a gift shop, has been on the square since 2012, while Jack's Java is the downtown's go-to coffee shop.

Other food and drink offerings include Uncle Billy's, LL's Bar and Grill, known for its cheeseburgers, and Perry's Barbecue for its smoked pork and ribs. For sweet treats, A La Mode Sweet Shoppe specializes in cupcakes and ice cream.

The alleys are as attractive as the storefronts themselves. Back Alley Paris is a series of murals showing scenes of local life from the late 1800s and early 1900s, created by local artists and school art classes with help from local historians.

Look out for the catfish statues that have been added to the street corners. They are a nod to the World's Biggest Fish Fry, held the last full week of April, when 12,000 plates of catfish are served alongside a grand parade, bed races, and yes, catfish races.

North of the square on North Poplar Street, the Paris-Henry County Heritage Center occupies Cavitt Place, an Italian Renaissance mansion completed in 1916. It still has its original painted-glass windows, marble staircase, and mahogany woodwork.

The town's other famous photo stop is the scale replica of the Eiffel Tower in Eiffel Tower Park.

Greeneville

The four-story brick hotel at the corner of Main and Depot streets in Greeneville opened in 1884 as the Grand Central Hotel. Built for travelers arriving by train, its marble trim, wide hallways, and street-level retail stores now all fall under the name of the General Morgan Inn.

A few doors away, the Art Deco Capitol Theatre opened in 1934 and is now run as a non-profit that screens $5 movies and hosts concerts, comedy nights, and the local theater guild.

Greeneville was also the hometown of Andrew Johnson, the 17th president, who arrived in 1826 as a 17-year-old tailor. The Andrew Johnson National Historic Site preserves the one-room frame tailor shop he bought in 1830, while the house his family lived in until 1851 is across the street. The Homestead, where he lived before and after his presidency, is a short walk away on Main Street.

Most of the town's best independent shops are on West Depot Street, including the Greeneville Antique Market with its more than 75 booths on three levels. Tipton's Cafe is the local lunch counter, and Nickle Ridge Winery has a tasting room.

For the ultimate in old Americana, head to the City Garage Car Museum on South Main Street. You will be greeted by displays of restored vehicles, including a Ford Fairlane from 1957 and a DeLorean, leaving you yearning for days gone by.

Sweetwater

The East Tennessee and Georgia Railroad was built through Sweetwater in 1852, and the town grew beside the tracks. Incorporated in 1875, its Main Street still runs parallel to the railroad and is lined with brick commercial buildings from the late 1800s and early 1900s.

The parks along the tracks have a gazebo used for concerts, and there is even an old train car on display in Circle Park. A Tennessee Civil War Trails marker at the depot explains how control of the line passed back and forth in 1863 during the Civil War campaign for Knoxville.

One of the oldest commercial buildings in town now takes overnight guests. Remedies Inn on North Main Street is a five-suite hotel set in two buildings put up in the 1860s as a pharmacy. Apart from a spell in the 1880s as a printing and hardware business, they were home to family-run drugstores until 2011, before being turned into the inn.

In a nod to their heritage, the hotel's suites are named for people and businesses from the buildings' past, including Louise Dixon, who carved her name on a wall in 1920.

The inn's neighbors are all independently owned businesses. The Lily Pad Boutique is next door, Sweetwater Antiques fills two storefronts a little further along North Main, and Noble Curiosities is worth a visit.

For food and drink, Cup Runneth Over Coffeehouse and the Italian restaurant Vittorino's Cucina share the building at 111 North Main, and The Lazy Beagle pub has a rooftop bar. The Sweetwater General store and Sweetwater Creamery, which makes small-batch ice cream, are just a small walk away.

Bell Buckle

By far the smallest downtown of the five, and one of the most unusually named, Bell Buckle consists of a single row of Victorian storefronts called Railroad Square that faces the tracks of the old Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad.

The line was built in 1852, a depot followed in 1853, and the town was incorporated in 1856. By 1870, it was the major stockyard between Nashville and Chattanooga.

Now a historic district with more than 40 significant structures, downtown Bell Buckle is home to classic small-town businesses like Phillips General Store, an old dry goods store that Billy Phillips and his family have looked after for more than 50 years. The building is over a century old, and the original fixtures and even old millinery stock are still on display above the antiques.

Around the corner on Webb Road, Bluebird Antiques and Ice Cream Parlor is in a building that started out as a hardware store in the 1860s and became the City Grocery in 1871. It now serves hand-dipped Purity ice cream, made by a Nashville dairy, in homemade waffle cones from a turn-of-the-century soda bar. The original coffee grinder and ledger register are still in place.

The Bell Buckle Cafe on Railroad Square has been owned by the same family since 1992 and features a menu of fried biscuits, smoked pork chops, barbecue, and an oatmeal cake with caramel syrup. There is live music on Friday and Saturday nights, and a live radio show is broadcast from the cafe on Saturday afternoons.

The legendary Waylon Jennings performed here before his death in 2002, and he and his wife were once crowned king and queen of the town's RC Cola-MoonPie Festival.

Winchester

The Oldham Theater on the north side of the public square in Winchester opened on the evening of September 14, 1950, with the comedy And Baby Makes Three, starring Robert Young and Barbara Hale. The screening was preceded by a half-hour Hammond organ concert.

Built in the early years of the Cold War, the building was constructed to double as a fallout shelter, and owners found bottled water and other emergency supplies still in the basement in 1993. It was also built under segregation, with separate entrances for Black and white moviegoers and a balcony where Black patrons sat. Virtually unchanged in appearance since 1950, it is still showing first-run movies on two screens.

The theater faces the Franklin County Courthouse, completed in 1937 and topped by a central clock tower, with Art Deco details inside and out that set the tone for much of downtown before the Oldham's streamlined Moderne styling arrived.

Most of the buildings around the square date from after 1900, and plaques beside the storefronts explain those histories. The Walnut Hill Coffee Company occupies the former First Bank of Winchester, built in 1901, and Winchester Mercantile is part shop, part cafe, and part wine bar, selling regionally made crafts and pantry goods.

Downtown murals honor some well-known locals, among them the singer and television host Dinah Shore, University of Tennessee football coaches Johnny Majors and Phillip Fulmer, and American Idol runner-up HunterGirl. A Tennessee Music Pathways marker pays tribute to Grammy-winning singer Mike Farris.

Tennessee Downtowns Still Going Strong

Each of these Tennessee downtowns is worthy of being labeled a living history museum. The old courthouse in Paris still hears cases, the General Morgan Inn still rents rooms, and the Oldham still sells popcorn.

In Sweetwater, a pharmacy from the 1860s has found a second life as a hotel, and in Bell Buckle, a general store is still trading from behind its original counters. What these towns have in common is buildings that were never torn down and businesses that found new uses for them, which is why all five can be walked end to end in an afternoon.