Old marker stone from the First World War
Photo by John Shearer
Former funeral home Wann
Photo by John Shearer
Former funeral home Wann
Photo by John Shearer
Former funeral home Wann
Photo by John Shearer
Former funeral home Wann
Photo by John Shearer
A familiar building for those driving down Lookout Mountain or through St. Elmo is the former Wann Funeral Home building.
For many residents of this part of Chattanooga and beyond, the building at 4000 Tennessee Ave. is known inside and out. Not only have many people driven past it on their daily routes, but it has also been a place where they stopped and received comfort and help when their own lives came to a standstill due to the death of a loved one.
And many of these deceased were once important personalities on their way to their final resting place.
The historic building — parts of which date back to the 1930s — is also getting a new chapter, as it was recently leased. Florida-based real estate firm Strategic Sites/Clifford Commercial recently advertised the sprawling brick building with ample parking in the back.
A recent advertisement for the property on the company’s website stated: “Great opportunity for restaurant occupier. This building is available with outdoor patio and is a blank slate for the restaurant entrepreneur. Parking is available on-site. The property is well located in the heart of St. Elmo.” The leasing agent was John Jewell.
After a quick check, the exact status of rental availability could not be determined at the moment. But there is still a sign at the front saying “For Rent” and the building was still empty on Sunday. Surface parking spaces could still be rented by the hour in the parking lot via an app.
The Wann funeral home and cremation center is now located a few meters further north.
A look at the history of the former saloon building reveals that Wann Funeral Home leased the building in 1964 and completed the addition of a chapel wing on the south end in 1965. The new portion was reportedly designed by Rufus Holt of Selmon T. Franklin Associates.
This is said to have happened at a time when funeral homes were beginning to locate outside the heart of downtown Chattanooga.
At the beginning, the building was also about paying final respects to someone who had passed away, although not through the services of a funeral home. In 1937, the building opened as the James Craig Lodor American Legion Post No. 148 in memory of Lt. Lodor. He was one of the first Chattanoogans to lose his life in World War I when he was killed fighting on the Marne in France in July 1918.
The post was initially housed in a modest clubhouse with a large porch on the north side of the Incline Railway, beginning in 1922. When the new clubhouse opened across the street and closer to Forest Hills Cemetery in 1937, the post had about 85 members.
During this dedication ceremony, when the Great Depression was still ongoing, Legion Commander Tom Morris gave a speech. He praised the new facility and told members, “You are making history in 1937, just as you did in 1917 and 1918.”
Over the years, members met there for meetings and events both in happier times and in darker times when they saw their younger comrades fighting in World War II and Korea.
When the American Legion began leasing the facility to the Wann company and using a smaller building nearby, Jimmy Wann ran the funeral home. Both his grandfather, JH Wann, and his father, Paul Wann, had been in the funeral business but died young, perhaps giving the family additional compassion for dealing with grief in their business.
James H. Wann, who was only 57 years old, was traveling in an automobile with his wife, Florence, near Loughman, Florida, in the interior of the state in March 1919, when a speeding roadster overtook them and caused an accident. The driver of the other vehicle apparently left the scene before police arrived. Mr. Wann’s wife was injured.
In 1928, her son Paul H. Wann died, presumably of a stroke or aneurysm, after feeling unwell downtown and deciding to rest at the Read House. He was only 40 years old and was considered kind and compassionate toward people and families who needed the services of a funeral director.
His wife, Ethel Creekmore Wann, then led the company as a pioneering female entrepreneur before his sons, James C. “Jimmy” and Paul H. Wann Jr., took over. Jimmy Wann was president when the St. Elmo location began operations.
When Funeral Home began around the turn of the 20th century.th Century, when the elder JH Wann took over the Sharp Funeral Home after it was relocated closer to the Georgia border. Subsequent mergers and moves resulted in it being located at 541 McCallie Ave. by the time of World War II.
A newspaper headline under a 1937 photo of the company stated that it had a fleet of 12 Cadillacs and Packards.
In the late 1950s, they moved to the former Central Baptist Church premises near McCallie Avenue and Palmetto Street, before later securing the additional St. Elmo location.
Jimmy Wann – the father of Broadway musical actor Jimmy Wann and former Chattanooga Times journalist Libby Wann Duff – sold the business to John Hargis in 1972, but remained associated with the funeral home for several years until his death in 1984.
Cade and Shawn Williamson of the former Williamson Funeral Home family in Soddy-Daisy, who also operated Legacy Funeral Home, bought the building in 2013 before closing and selling it in 2020, old news reports say.
At that time, the company was looking for another location and is now located a little further north at 3918 Tennessee Ave.
And now the old building — which has a memorial honoring World War I soldiers on its property — is waiting for a new tenant, possibly a restaurant that could be more of a casual business than a morgue. And maybe the restaurant’s name could play a little on the building’s previous use, for example, Doughboy’s Doughnuts, Death by Chocolate, The Die-Ner, The Crematory Creamery, The Chicken Casket Basket, etc.
Regardless, the building, which originally served as a home for war veterans who had served their country, has stood for decades like a proud brick sentry on a slightly elevated spot at the base of Lookout Mountain.
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