I’m halfway between Chattanooga and Knoxville and I hadn’t heard about an uptick in gang violence. Chattanooga is a big city and I’m sure they have had gangs for a while.
After my husband had his bad wreck over 20 years ago, he was in Erlanger in Chattanooga for a long time. We had to detour due to construction once when we went to visit and ended up in one of the “hood” neighborhoods.
We saw a cop parked in the neighborhood and stopped to ask how to get to Erlanger from there. There was a homie sitting on the hood of the cop car. The cop told us how to get to Erlanger and said “you two are the wrong color to be in this neighborhood and I advise you to get out as soon as you can”. We did. When we started back on our way my daughter looked at me and asked, “are you packing”. I said “yes, are you”? She was. LOL I was carrying a .357 Magnum and she was carrying a 9mm. We didn’t have fancy smartphones back then, just flip phones without Google maps and GPS.
So, it doesn’t surprise me. If I have to go to one of the two big cities, I prefer Knoxville. It feels more civilized to me.
ha, good story!
Your post is a bit like old home week. I had an off-grid homestead above the Sequatchie Valley west of you... back in the late 70's and 80's. Chattanooga was the center of things generally for me. I kinda wish I had never left.