Episode 3817

- [Narrator] "Tennessee Crossroads" is made possible in part by...

- [Narrator 2] Some of our biggest checks have also made the biggest difference. The Tennessee lottery, proud to have raised more than $7.5 billion for education. Now that's some game-changing, life-changing fun.

- [Narrator] Discover Tennessee Trails and Byways. Discover Tennessee's adventure, cuisine, history and more made in Tennessee experiences showcased among these 16 driving trails. More at TNTrailsAndByways.com.

- [Narrator 3] The co-op system in Tennessee consists of independently owned co-ops, driven to serve farmer owners, rural lifestyle customers and their communities throughout Tennessee and in five neighboring states. More at ourcoop.com.

- [Narrator 4] Middle Tennessee State University College of Liberal Arts helps students explore the world, engage minds, enrich lives, and earn a living. More at mtsu.edu/cla.

- This week on "Tennessee Crossroads", we'll be serving Nashville soul food, see what it takes to make great cutlery, visit a sculpture park in Chattanooga, and discover furniture that looks and smells fantastic. You'll have to take our word for the smell part. I'm Vicki Yates. Thanks for joining us. Southern comfort food may not be good for the waistline, but it sure seems to soothe the soul. Recently, Cindy Carter found a popular Nashville restaurant that's been serving soothing soul food for decades. It's called Silver Sands.

- [Cindy] Every day, bright and early.

- [Sophia] I get here about 3:30.

- [Cindy] Sophia Vaughn opens Nashville Silver Sands Cafe to anyone and everyone who loves great soul food, meat in 3s, or country cooking.

- It's gonna take a minute for them pig feet Eddy.

- [Cindy] And as heartily as Miss Sophia dishes out generous portions of her signature dishes, she also gives her customers a generous side order of love and friendship.

- All right baby, have a good day. All right. You working today? If this is not what you really, really love, you can't run a restaurant, especially a soul food restaurant. You can't. You have to have love, soul, family, all that inside of you. If you don't have all that, you're not gonna make it. You're not.

- [Cindy] But made it, she most certainly has. Sophia's aunt Blanche Seay opened the Silver Sands Cafe in the 1950s and later passed it down to Sophia's mother, Nelly Mecado. Then Sophia stepped in, but her mother wasn't impressed. She took it back before I can get my foot in the door 'cause I was being a hot girl, doing my thing, liking the boys. So she took. I'm always honest. She didn't even let me get my foot in the door. She leased it out. She retired. So, then when I grew up a little bit, she gave it to me.

- [Cindy] That second chance was all Sophia needed. Her commitment to hard work, as well as Sophia's dedication to her family's authentic recipes, keep this cafe open.

- 'Cause everything is homemade, everything is fresh. There's no opening up no cans. It's no doing none of that. Everything's fresh. So you have to be up early in the morning. You deal with all kind of customers, all kind of situations. And if you're not mentally there, you won't be able to handle it.

- I need two orders of pancakes, one order of egg scrambled, no cheese, and one order of eggs fried no cheese.

- [Cindy] The Silver Sands Cafe serves both breakfast and lunch in a serving line filled with soul food favorites.

- [Sophia] It's a country breakfast. Beef, liver, and gravy. Pork steak. We have pork chops every day. We have fried chicken in the gravy and out of the gravy. I'll cook you some catfish, some whitening. We also do pancakes, we do omelets, we do eggs any way you want it. I have the regular stuff, bacon, sausage, bologna, country ham, Polish sausage, turkey sausage.

- [Cindy] And many of those items are also available for the lunch crowd.

- [Sophia] Like today, we're gonna have pork steak, oxtails, beef tips, tilapia, catfish, whitening, hog maws, pig feet, beef liver, baked chicken, fried chicken.

- [Cindy] Everything is prepared the way it has been for generations. Seasoned, stirred, chopped or fried.

- Okay, so there's this one skillet, it's a black cast iron skillet and I would not use it for anything else but my liver. I fry my beef liver with it. My aunt used it, my mother used it and now I used it. I'd be crazy if somebody broke my skillet. I would. Don't put no soap on it to wash it the right way. So it's just a seasoned skillet that we passed on from generation to generation.

- Now having never eaten here before I asked regulars what should I get on the menu, and I had a lot of recommendations. Fried pork chop, cornbread, sweet potatoes, greens. But the one thing everybody recommended was the macaroni and cheese.

- We just like the food.

- Belinda McClenn is a Silver Sands regular. She says they call her the turkey lady because she orders so much of it.

- So I've been with Silver Sands, oh my goodness, almost, ooh 60 years plus.

- [Cindy] For Belinda and many locals, it's not just the great food that keeps them coming back.

- [Sophia] It's family, it's a community. They've been here, they're part of community. We don't know what they would do if they left.

- At the Silver Sands Cafe, you'll never be a stranger or an outsider. Miss Sophia simply won't allow it.

- [Sophia] How you doing love? I'm okay baby.

- [Cindy] She has a genuine interest in her customers, their lives and wellbeing. Many of their pictures are on her wall because for Miss Sophia, they are the souls that make her soul food cafe so very special.

- It's about getting to know people. I love it. That's the best part for me. I love seeing them eat my food and enjoying it.

- Thanks Cindy. If you've ever tried to do a household chore, you know having just the right tool can make the task a lot easier. Well, making a great meal, no exception. In our next story, Miranda Cohen found a true master craftsman in Knoxville, who's sharpening his skills by making exquisite works of culinary art.

- [Miranda] John Phillips, the founder of Phillips Forged in Knoxville, has always loved working with his hands. With a degree in fine arts from the University of Tennessee, he learned his passion was working with metal. As his natural talent grew larger, his works grew smaller.

- I've always had a love for things that you can hold in your hand and you can look at and see the small details in. And so it felt really good to be able to take all the skills I learned from blacksmithing and from making big sculptures and big piece of furniture and just kind of shrink all that down and take all those details and just compress them into one object that you can hold in your hand.

- [Miranda] As an artist, John started funding his dreams by working as a line cook in the food industry. And suddenly, he had three real interests and found a way to forge them all together.

- A certain point I decided that I wanted to combine the woodwork, the metal work, the love of food, and make my own knife. And I had these chefs that worked with me that would bring in these knife rolls with all these knives that they'd collected through their careers. And I thought it was so cool that they had magic tools that they would come and unveil and they would never let anyone else touch.

- [Miranda] Now celebrity chefs and culinary stars from places like the exclusive Blackberry Farm are taking notice of him, using his blades in their kitchens and featuring his knives in their catalog.

- [John] So I make big chef's knives that are traditional, kind of rolled belly knives. I make long slicing knives, I make bread knives with serrated edges. I make pairing knives, I make meat cleavers.

- [Miranda] Each one of Philip's edgy creations is a masterpiece of style and function. He has perfected the meticulous craft of forging the finest steel into precise blades and carving native wood into ergonomically designed handles. Philips starts each knife with raw steel cut on a band saw.

- [John] Next thing we do is we take all those pieces of metal and we clean them up and stack them together in the vice.

- [Miranda] Each metal brings its own metallurgical content.

- So I'll just put this in and let it cook.

- [Miranda] Then he will place the steel in this custom-designed machine where 84,000 pounds of pressure on this hydraulic press at 2,000 degrees will weld the metals together.

- So we just keep on reducing it down to about an eighth of an inch.

- [Miranda] Next is hammering, grinding and dipping into an acid to reveal the mixed metals' natural beauty.

- You see that pattern already starting to pop out there. Those layers are starting to pop out.

- [Miranda] Then will come sanding, sharpening and adding the custom-made wooden handles.

- [John] All the handles I make from a special piece of wood where I select special woods that have beautiful burls or spalting, which is a fungus that can form in the wood that creates really beautiful patterns. So I try to always find woods that are gonna compliment the steel that they're going along with.

- Each knife will take anywhere from 10 to 40 hours to create and no two pieces are ever alike. One of the most important things to John is that his beautiful works of art not be hidden away or put in a drawer. In fact, he would love for them to be used in the kitchen every day.

- [John] Usually the first thing that people tell me is that they're too beautiful to use, which I take as a compliment, but I hope that people do use them as much as possible. Most of the knives that I make are a combination of European style and Japanese style and I'm pretty much making a knife to take care of any chore in the kitchen.

- [Miranda] Guided by the master's hand, the metal and wood come together to create something much more than a culinary tool. It is said that steel sharpens steel, meaning people make other people better. John Phillips is trying to do just that.

- [John] So I specialize in just making culinary knives. I don't really have much interest in making weapons or making anything used for destruction. Instead, to me, knives are things that can create beautiful works of art. I'm more interested in creating a piece of art to create more art and to kind of keep this cycle of inspiration going.

- [Miranda] A true passion, creating unique, custom-made culinary tools that will carve out their own legacy.

- [John] It's a lot of work. I don't hide the fact that I really sweat and bleed over these things, but I really love it and really enjoy it. And there's something really rewarding about all the process and all these small steps. And then at the end you have this thing that's gonna outlast all of us.

- Thanks Miranda. Sometimes we run across a place that we assume everyone must know about, but we are often surprised by how few actually do. Laura Faber found such a place while traveling through Chattanooga a while back. It's a peaceful oasis in the middle of the city that's full of international art.

- [Laura] In the shadow of Lookout Mountain in downtown Chattanooga in the heart of an industrial area sits 33 acres full of art, sculptures from renowned artists from around the world.

- Welcome to Sculpture Fields at Montague Park. It's a vision of John and Pamela Henry. It's owned by the city of Chattanooga. This is actually a Chattanooga public park that was deeded to the city in the early 1900s by Mary Montague as remembrance to her husband. And this used to be just a spectacular, beautiful piece of property with live trees, live oaks and hickory trees, a creek running through it. And she dedicated this piece of land to the city for the city residents to have an oasis and a place of peace and calm within the city of Chattanooga.

- [Laura] Board member Jay Haviland says that progress was not kind to the park. At one point the city used it as a landfill and it became a brownfield, an environmental hazard. It was actually shut down in 2003, but in 2006 the idea was born by an internationally acclaimed sculptor, the late John Henry, to transform this acreage with art.

- I think now it's a surprise to most people when they come out here and they're like, this is amazing. And it is amazing.

- After years of environmental repair, texturing of the land and John Henry asking his sculptor friends to help fill the park, sculpture fields open to the public in 2016. Now it is the largest sculpture park in the southeast. The first installation in the park is the work of John Henry himself. This is Betty Davis Eyes, 70 feet of steel, his medium of choice, but it didn't take long for one sculpture to become 40 and the park continues to grow. The most monumental piece in the park is Anchors by Peter Lundberg. At 75 feet tall, it can be seen from the interstate.

- [Jay] It was done a few years ago as a reaction to the fallen five. When we had the incident where the military recruiting officers were attacked here by a gunman and he killed five local officers. And so the community came together and did various fallen five remembrances. And John had one of his friends come down here and construct this actually in the park and then lift it and put it in place. There's a time capsule underneath it and a remembrance for the fallen five.

- [Laura] The park is open 365 days a year free and all are welcome, pets and kids included.

- Rowan, do you remember the name of this one?

- [Rowan] Yes. Lime Green Wedding Cake.

- Lime Green Wedding Cake.

- [Laura] Christopher Stewart is leading an annual summer camp at the park.

- The kids have really adopted this park as their own, which I find awesome. Chloe, you gonna crawl underneath it? So just about every week we do a tour of the statues. And then normally on Friday, they want to go do a second lap of everything. They've got their own names for them all. They love the little maps being able to try to figure out where they are. We've done some stuff with some compasses and landmarks as far as using the sculptures. They think they're great. They like trying to figure out what they look like. The statue's called Least Amount of Space. Let's see who can curl up into the smallest ball and take up the least amount of space. Who can take up the least amount of space?

- [Laura] As a nonprofit, the park relies on donations, a skeleton staff and volunteers to maintain the sculptures. It offers spectacular fundraising events like The Burn.

- [Jay] It's like a burning man celebration, where we have a local artist creates a small maquette of what we intend to build. And then he builds a large 20, 30 foot version of it. And we have bands out here and fire eaters and fire parade and we get a large crowd and at 10 o'clock at night, we light it on fire. And it takes a half an hour for the thing to burn completely up and crumble to the ground.

- [Laura] Sculpture Fields at Montague Park is a vibrant space to find peace, art, and community.

- [Jay] I think it's a beautiful gift to the community. I think this fulfills the Montague dream. The Montague family members that we know that are still in town think this is a beautiful use of the land and they support it very much. And we're glad to have their support and we hope they're proud of it as we are for the legacy of Mary Montague who started all this.

- Thanks Laura. A few years back, Joe Elmore visited a family-owned woodworking business just south of Nashville. The rustic shop is filled with the soft, sweet smell of the trees they use exclusively. It's known as the Cedar Place.

- [Joe] It looks good, smells good, and even repels insects. It's Tennessee red cedar and it's used for everything from cedar chests to traditional outdoor furniture. For one Middle Tennessee family, it's been the source of quality handcrafted furniture for several decades.

- Cedar is a great wood for outside. It will last a long time. Back in the day people would have cedar fence posts and it lasts forever. But the good thing about our furniture is you can buy an Adirondack chair and it'll be around 15, 20 years from now if you just take care of it.

- [Joe] Then there's the unmistakable aroma.

- Our cedar chest, if you open the lid, the smell just stays in there and people put their blankets and their keepsakes and things in there and the smell just stays.

- [Joe] That's Danny Greer, who proudly carries on a tradition started by his late father. Bobby Greer worked here a couple of decades before taking over the business in 1972. Today, his quality work ethic still rules.

- [Danny] The thing about our furniture is it's very well made. Now usually companies that make furniture, they'll make it and try to make it cheaper and cheaper as time goes on. But what we've always done is increase the quality in it and it may be thicker, heavier duty nails and bolts and things like that.

- [Joe] Although according to Danny, folks just aren't sitting outside like they used to.

- I think back in the day people spent more time outside with family and stuff. But as time has gone on, people are more staying inside with their air conditioning 'cause they just can't handle the heat. Myself included, I have a swing on my front porch, but I seldom sit in it unless it's just early in the morning.

- You know what they say, it don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing. And to turn out a swing this cool takes a lot more time, talent, and patience than you might imagine. Today, brother Nathan is making swings in the workshop. He's here full time doing a job he wanted since early childhood.

- Yeah, I was up here when I was five. I wanted to be a part of it.

- [Joe] All the wood used has to go through a planer to ensure its specified thickness from end to end. Next, Nathan's gonna make slats for the seat and back. After marking each piece according to a pattern, he uses a band saw to cut them to shape. Over at the drill press, he can make holes for the fasteners. Then he sands each piece carefully and completely.

- [Nathan] Cedar has a lot of knots in it and some are good and some are bad. Some will come out. Just have to be real cautious about it.

- [Joe] Now Nathan can start putting things together and because of its softness, it's important to drill pilot holes first before these galvanized nails go in. This swing will have a curve in the back for better comfort. And that's all thanks to a younger Danny and his dad.

- When I was, I'd say 13, 14 years old, it was time for us to make a new pattern for swings. So he sat me down and he traced my back. And that's the shape of the swing today.

- [Joe] With the body finished, Nathan nails on that swings arms. And after some hardware, a frame and a finish, this thing will be ready to swing into action.

- [Nathan] You can get two different type of finishes. One is an oil finish, which is a mixture of Thompsons wood preserve and we add boiled linseed oil to it. And the other finish is a varnish finish, which is a polyurethane exterior oil-based polyurethane. And we put four coats on it.

- [Joe] Saw milling makes for a lot of shavings, which never go to waste. The Greer's bag them up, weigh them, and sell them to customers like Paula Underwood Winters.

- I use the cedar shavings for my dog house because it keeps the fleas at bay. And I also use it for the chickens to lay on. So, a little bit of everything.

- [Joe] Speaking of animals, Cedar Place doghouses are another seller. Plus they make smaller items like checker sets, toys, and even a coat rack. Danny and Nathan both hope to continue the family business started by their father, even though things haven't turned out exactly as planned.

- So his plan was to get this business going and get us all into it. It didn't happen that way, but we've all worked here on and off at one time or another in our lives, and my dad would be very proud I'm sure.

- You find very few places that still exist like this. So just having that feeling of being back at the old times when you could get good handcrafted chairs and benches and swings, it just feels good. It's like stepping back in time.

- Well, that'll do it for this week, but please visit tennesseecrossroads.org for more stories and check out the PBS app while you're there. Until next time, thanks for tuning in.

- [Narrator] "Tennessee Crossroads" is made possible in part by...

- [Narrator 2] Students across Tennessee have benefited from over seven and a half billion dollars we've raised for education, providing more than 2 million scholarships and grants. The Tennessee lottery, game-changing, life-hanging fun.

- [Narrator] Discover Tennessee Trails and Byways. Discover Tennessee's adventure, cuisine, history, and more made in Tennessee experiences, showcased among these 16 driving trails. More at TNTrailsAndByways.com.

- [Narrator 3] The co-op system in Tennessee consists of independently owned co-ops, driven to serve farmer owners, rural lifestyle customers, and their communities throughout Tennessee and in five neighboring states. More at ourcoop.com.

- [Nathan] Middle Tennessee State University College of Liberal Arts helps students explore the world, engage minds, enrich lives, and earn a living. More at mtsu.edu/ca.