Newspaper Page Text
-
r Deeemb*r 7, 1994
Special Correspondent and Occasional
Beer Editor For The Flagpole.
WILLIAM ORTEN CARLTON = ORT.
Blue Highway
There are a few of you out there who seem
to take great delight in trying to categorize my
columns from week to week, so u gives me plea
sure to give you one here (and more rocome!)
that doesn’t readily fit within the genre of “Ter-
minal Hotel Fire Research,”
“Ort.’s Road Tnp Columns,"
nor even “Ort.’s Beer Col
umns.” Hope you enjoy.
Everyone needs a getting-
away place or three, so l set
out to discover myself a new
one. Driving west from At
lanta one recent Saturday
night, I ended up pulling off
I-20 and taking U. S. 78, the
old Bankhead Highway. It
skirts the northernmost part of Carroll
County, passing through Villa Rica, where an
explosion leveled parr of downtown Dec. 5,
1957 (someday I’ll research and wnte about that
disaster).
Villa Rica was the likely birthplace of W
J. Moms, an A.J5. C. Railroad engineer
who was killed in the Terminal Hotel fire, but
I am not absolutely certain. There used to be
a separate municipality called Fullerville on
the northwest edge of Villa Rica, but the cit
ies merged sometime after 1940 — and l in
tend to find out just when. I would have been
content to spend the night there and wake
up on Sunday to drink my coffee at whatever
local hangout struck my fancy, but no motel
seemed to avail itself, so l pressed on
Temple is off the highway, so I’ve never
seen the town .. just the outskirts. I pulled
in, grabbed a soft drink at a convenient mar
ket (and coin laundry and video rental place),
and pushed on, mindful that the library in
Temple is said to have an extensive genea
logical collection for such a small city. That
is for a return trip.
Soon the county line sign welcomed me
to Haralson County. I had seen that sign (or
its antecedent) once before, in March of I960,
when my fnends Terry and Mary and I drove
to Mississippi. I envisioned billboards that we
had noted on that journey, their paint now
fading, shouting their “HIPPIE CLOTHES AT
LOCO JOE’S, WACO. GA." message (a little
quieter by now) to the kudzu that was intent
on engulfing them, but it was pitch black night,
and l could only imagine. Lacking a fireside, it
was the best l could do for building my own
ghost story. But then again, I had only myself
and Blanche (the car) to tell it to.
Lights reared up, so l knew I was coming
to something. It was Bremen, which once had
been called Kramer in honor of an early set
tler who gave land to build the two railroad
lines that cross in the center of town. When
the post office was applied for about 1880, the
postal service hedged on Kramer and asked
for another name Mr. Kramer, altogether re
luctant to have the place named in his honor
anyway, suggested Bremen after the German
city of his nativity, and the postal folks agreed
The city grew up to become a sewing-plant
town; the radio station’s onginal call letters
were WWCC for World’s Work Clothing
Center (although detractors of its 500-watt
signal referred to it as Wish We Covered
Carrollton). It is WGMI now, and given over
entirely to Gospel music.
A person would indeed be hard-pressed to
try to find any Bremer Weissebier in Bremen,
Ga., although in her German
counterpan it is a predominant
local style (In another col
umn, I’ll tell you about that —
but I have to learn about it
myself first, so l won’t digress
here.) I made note of both
Beck's and S. Pauli Girl (light
and dark') on local shelves, but
didn’t tarry long enough to find
a proper tavern in Bremen,
Ga.’s, equivalent of The Snoor
(Bremen, Germany’s, Old Quarter) to make
myself at home Needless to say, obtaining
Haake-Beck Krausen Pils there would have
been downnght impossible
There does seem to have been a brewery
of sorts in Bremen around 1880, or at least
someone brewing beer at home and selling it
(which may have been legal then), but they
likely made only a lager and doubtless it had
little distnbution. The population there was
heavily German, and vineyards abounded in
the vicinity... in fact, the entire belt along
the state line between there and Heflin, Ala.,
was noted for local wines of great character
in the years before Prohibition, so a brewery
(however small) would be fairly likely and
would have a ready (if local) market among
the Germans
I have heard rumors of wild hops growing
willy-nilly on land where vineyards used to
be in Cleburne County, Ala ; in that era, some
varieties were grown as ornamentals... or per
haps they were shipped out to brewenes in
Birmingham, Columbus and Atlanta This
does bear further investigation, doesn’t it?
Those Waco Gold hops may go in my India
Pale Ale sooner than any of us think
I breezed through Bremen, noticing two
motels and taking note of the new U. S. 27
bypass at the west edge of town They never
built a bypass for U. S. 78 because by the time
it was needed all the traffic was out on the
Interstate anyway My research will lead me
back to one or both of those motels sooner or
later, but that night l needed a few more miles
under my belt before bedtime
The road sign hollered “WACO I,
TALLAPOOSA 8," and I knew it couldn’t
possibly be a football score. I drove on,
whamming through Waco ar or below the
speed limit, straining to see something signifi
cant at night in a next-to-nothing town. Giv
ing up all hope. I moseyed onward.
Those seven miles from Waco to
Tallapoosa are some of the loneliest on any
U. S highway in the Southern hill country,
rivaling the mileage between Cedartown, Ga.,
and Piedmont, Ala., on U. S. 278. When
Tallapoosa loomed up, by golly l was sleepy
— as I am getting now as I wnte this story.
Emulating my friend and mentor John
Seawright, l will tell you more next week.
(Not 30 yet.)
Cl994 William Orten Carlton.
Giving up
all hope,
I moseyed
onward.
>o You Have
Any Secrets?
Custom i
chains...
si
jewe
Art Of It
JEWELRY
FINE ARTS &
CRAFTS GALLER
234 College Avenue
Downtown • 549-6869
# * Sine© 1987 ^
r
R A6£-
UAiCC
>000000
oooooo
>oooo
ooopo
>oooo
ooooo
>oooo
ooo
<r>
o
BRIGHTEN YOUR HOUDAY!
Receive a FREE Redken Shades EQ
color enhancing shampoo with ony
color service thru December
M-F l OAM-6PM SAT 10AM-5PM
132 COLLEGE AVE
For Appointment Call 548-8178 mi
*
-k
❖
o
-k
ix
*•
«k
(garden
Christmas
Open House
Fri.&Sat. Dec 9&10
JAPANESE MOTOR
WORKS, INC.
Specializing in
Japanese Automobiles
Factory Trained.
ASE Certified Master
Technicians
Enjoy Hot Cider,
Food and
-k Free Gift Wrapping!
<x
*
211 Tallassee Rd.
Athens, GA 30606
549-5222
Next to the Gap
Open Every day til Christmas
353-3246
Free T-Shirt
w/ service
M
re re [hose tv
ho h
mow oo
it
A*
member folk.
ira
means
CjoocL Cjifats !
142 E. Clayton 613-8631 Open Sun