Downtown Elizabethton dedicates newest mural

ELIZABETHTON — Downtown Elizabethton celebrated its latest, and most visible mural on Monday afternoon. A large group gathered to dedicatenthe new mural depicting "The City of Power". The work of art was created by muralist John Murrill and highlights the industrial history of Elizabethton and Carter County. This is the fifth mural that has been placed in downtown Elizabethton in recent years by Main Street Elizabethton. These paintings have been funded with Tennessee Arts Commission Rural Arts Project Support grants. Part of the funding for the "City of Power" grant comes from matching funds provided by Main Street Elizabethton and from Tailored Hair Company, owned by Tayler Nidiffer, in partnership with the City of Elizabethton. The dedication included a couple of short lectures from men who have either studied about the history of industrial Elizabethton or who were part of that history. The lecturer who was a part of the history was Charles Dean Von Cannon, who operated the Bemberg plant back when more than 900 people were employed there. Von Cannon said it was appropriate that a woman was depicted as representing the industrial workforce. He said at the time he operated the plant, it was made up of 300 men and 600 women. The speaker who has studied Elizabethton's industrial history was Jonathan Pleasant, general manager of the City of Elizabethton's Water Resources. Pleasant told about how many of the women in the Elizabethton work force went on strike in March of 1929. One of their chief complaints was the unfair wage structure, where women were paid less than men for the same work. Pleasant said that while the Elizabethton strikers did not achieve the results they wanted, it was the harbinger of a series of industrial strikes throughout the South later in 1929 He said that unrest would lead to a national solution in the coming years. While women from the city's past were being celebrated, a woman of the present was also thanked for her role in establishingIt was also a woman the latest mural. Tayler Nidiffer is the owner of Tailored Hairdo, 405 E. Elk Ave. She has owned the building for eight years and wanted to have a mural put on the blank brick wall which is at the very beginning of the entrance to downtown Elizabethton. Nidiffer had talked with Courtney Bean, director of Main Street Elizabethton about her desire to have a mural depicting the county's history on the exterior of her building. Nidiffer said she was pleased with the result and with Murrill's work. The centerpiece of the mural is a depiction of an old sign that once stood at the place where Elk Avenue crossed the Doe River in Downtown Elizabethton. That sign celebrated the fact that the Wilbur Dam had brought electric power to Elizabethton, which was a very rare resource back in the first decades of the 20th century. The mural has three main division. To the right of the "City of Power" sign is the image of woman factory worker standing outside, with the tall chimney with the word "Bemberg" painted on it. On the left side of the mural, Engine No. 11, the narrow gauge locomotive that was part of the East Tennessee and Western North Carolina Railroad fleet. One of the main reasons for the creation of the railroad was to haul iron ore from the Cranberry Mine in North Carolina to Johnson City. On the far right of the mural stands a water mill, depicting the many early mills that operated on the Doe and Watauga rivers in Carter County. Murrill said the woman, now named Dottie, on the right side mural represents both the men and women who have toiled in the industrial plants of Elizabethton. He said that while both worked in the plants, at one of its most critical times, during World War II, many of the men went off to serve in the nation's armed forces. He said the women stayed on and were joined by other women to keep the plants going at full capacity. He said the woman figure also honors the many women who are downtown business owners in Elizabethton. On the left side of mural is the train that came to be known as Tweetsie. Locomotive No. 11 was more than a transporter of materials and cargo to and from the plants. He said many of the men and women who worked in the Elizabethton plants used the train to commute from their homes and farms. The train may have been called a short line railroad, but it travelled through some of the most spectacular scenery in the Eastern United States, including Doe River Gorge.