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Knoxville's ever-changing street names

by Jack Neely

So Salvus Street, that little access road over near the Safety Building, is to become Honor Our Troops Street. Lest we lose something important, I scanned the library sources for the origin of the word salvus. I found no clues. It does not appear to be a notable surname. It's not an English word, though it does sound like something Cas Walker used to sell. It looks Latin, and may be some irregular participle of the verb salvere, to save. I tried to call the word up on Google, but most references to the word salvus are in German, and I couldn't quite make them out.

I won't miss it very much. For folks who love a good mystery, it's an interesting name for a street, but it's not a very historic one. The word was first applied to this street sometime in the latter '60s, when this was a neighborhood of urban-renewal rubble. It's easier to part with than several other losses of recent years—especially nearby Mulvaney Street, which had literary associations.

I wouldn't suggest that Honor Our Troops isn't a fine name for a street. Any disapproval of a name like that, or of the mayor himself, would be unpatriotic. And no one would want to hurt our troops' feelings. In fact, if we have further streets in need of renaming, we might consider other helpful advice: Write To Your Mother Drive. Or Abstain From Promiscuous Sex Boulevard. Will it really help? Just consider what the previous street did to promote Salvus.

The street formerly known as Salvus intersects with Howard Baker, Jr., Ave., alias East Church, and Historic Preservation Drive, alias Coliseum. They intersect with Hall of Fame Drive, alias Mulvaney. All four were streets renamed by the Ashe administration. If any military strategist were to examine these street-seizure patterns, he would conclude that the mayor intends to conquer the Civic Coliseum.

Last week, in an apparent quest to rename the rest of Knoxville's streets in the waning months of his administration, Ashe proposed rechristening several other streets after various living people. The practice is banned by law in certain European countries because of its unsettling fascist associations, but Victor is not a squeamish man.

Most of Ashe's favorite honorees are retirees. Leftish scholars complain that as a culture, Western Civilization too-often reveres Dead White Males. In Knoxville, we don't do that. We revere Retired White Males. They're nearly as safe a bet as naming a street after supporting our troops. Whatever these old guys might have done to annoy us in the past, well, they're not doing it anymore, and deserve some congratulation.

The beneficiaries this time are two ex-U.S. presidents, an ex-UT president, and an ex-city councilman. I can only assume that ex-Presidents Carter and Reagan were miffed that fellow ex-President Gerald Ford got an insignificant street in West Knoxville named for him and demanded a square deal.

Carter, I suppose, was thrown in with the Republicans to prove that Ashe is no favoritist. For Carter and Reagan we'll be losing part of Ball Camp Pike and Essex Rd., respectively. Ball Camp Pike is a historic road: it used to be the roundabout way out to Ball Camp, a tent-meeting locale in the northwest part of the county, over a century ago. However, its various segments, chopped into incoherence by newer roads, have confused people trying to traverse North Knox County for years, and maybe it's time to let go.

As for Essex, it may well sound classier than "Ronald Reagan." But whether it's a reference to the hot-blooded earl or the English county, I'm not sure it means much to West Knox. So if the folks out there like Ronald Reagan better, I say why not? Suburban West Knoxville seems a fine match of community and honoree. It was wise of Victor to propose Reagan there as opposed to Mechanicsville or Five Points, where residents may be less gratified to see that name daily.

At least Reagan, unlike the Earl of Essex, visited Knoxville occasionally. And it gives us an opportunity for some automotive revisionism. Will it be possible to turn left on Ronald Reagan? Does that road have a middle?

The new road renamings will have some local beneficiaries, too: UT presidential retiree Joe Johnson and businessman and ex-councilman Ed Shouse. (Do they have to be present to win?) Lost for their sakes will be Center Drive, on UT's campus, and 44th Street.

Few will mourn Center Drive, one of those names that suffered from a lack of imagination from birth. But 44th has always been a curiosity to me: a little bit of Manhattan's theater district out on industrial Middlebrook Pike. I always thought someone should open up the Knoxville Algonquin Hotel out there. Maybe it would draw the local literati, just like the one on that other 44th did.

I have to admit that 44th does look pretty lonesome. Did someone expect that there would one day be a 43rd Street? To be followed with more numbered streets stretching eastward to connect with 23rd Street in Ft. Sanders? And will Shouse, who always seemed so comfortable voting with the pro-Ashe majority, like it out there?

In any case, Shouse, Johnson, Carter, and Reagan will join all the other municipal honorees who have been immortalized with Knoxville street names: Ray Krebes, Ollie Davis, Ida Huntzler, and Bobs Gray, Kirby, and White. As long as their names are on perforated metal poles, they'll never be forgotten. Knoxville also has streets named for Verdi, Robin Hood, John Deere, Ben Hur, and Muhammed. Some of those honorees were fairly well-known before they got their names in white on one of our green metal signs, but the practice has done wonders for their reputations.