Greg Tucker, The Murfreesboro Post, August 21, 2016
Old concrete signposts in use around the parking lot of Demo’s corporate offices on North Maney Street.
Jack Jones supervised the removal and replacement of Murfreesboro’s concrete street markers in the early 1970s, and built some unique steps for his home at 503 North Maney Ave.
The earliest known road markers were part of the system of paved roads built across the Roman Empire in ancient times. These early signposts were stone obelisks weighing a ton or more, set on end, with distance and destination information engraved on their surface. The mile markers used on the early Tennessee turnpikes were very similar to these Roman stones.
(A surviving mile marker from Rutherford County’s first turnpike–Nashville to Murfreesboro–is on display at the entrance to the county archives on Rice Street in Murfreesboro.)
American city street markers in the mid-1900s were also reminiscent of the ancient Roman stones. Street corners in Murfreesboro were marked by seven-foot concrete signposts engraved with the names of the intersecting streets. Set two to three feet into the ground, these obelisk-shaped markers were apparently meant to be permanent. The concrete was formed around heavy, steel rebar that extended the full length of the post. Andy Dement remembers seeing street department personnel forming and casting the posts.
Jones began employment with the City of Murfreesboro as a policeman in the early 1950s. His law enforcement career ended in or about 1964 when he joined Bowen Motors as a car salesman and moved his family to 503 North Maney Avenue. The sales career ended in 1968 when Jones took employment with the city street department as a driver.
Ralph Puckett remembers Jones drove the city’s first street sweeper. “He would start sweeping just after midnight and would go into the morning. It was a big machine and he expected other traffic to get out of his way.”
During the 1970s the city street and sanitation services were merged and Jones was named superintendent of the new department. Responding to federal and state programs, the city was also making efforts to comply with recommended standards for uniform traffic controls and signage. Federal highways were standardizing signage using white lettering on a green background. The 1971 Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (published by the Federal Highway Administration) also recommended the new signage for urban intersections.
As the old concrete signposts were removed, Jones had three or four dozen delivered to his home on North Maney. “I remember when they were unloading the old signs,” said E. C. Tolbert, MD, who observed the activity near his medical office on Bell Street. “Jones used the posts to make steps up to the porches around his house.”
(Jones once boasted to another neighbor that he had added an outbuilding and various improvements to his property without ever having to buy materials.)
Several signposts went to a home on Diana Street where they were used as liners for flower beds and the gravel driveway. Another lies on the porch of the old tavern at 950 Northwest Broad. A signpost still standing at the intersection of Wren and Thrush Streets is believed to be the only concrete street marker still in its original place in Murfreesboro.
In November 2011 Demos Partners, LP purchased the North Maney property. Shane McFarland Construction was hired to renovate and remodel the home into commercial office space. Among other concerns, it was apparent that the porches and steps would have to be reworked for access and regulatory compliance.
“I was using a Bobcat to remove the steps,” said McFarland. “The old posts weighed such that it would take more than two men to move one of them. Each step was made of three posts and I counted a dozen or more steps around the old house. Recognizing what they were, I got the idea that maybe they could be saved and used for a decorative fence around the property.”
According to McFarland, the property owner was interested in local history and willing to pay for a fence project using the old signposts. “Peter Demos was actually enthusiastic about the idea,” said McFarland.
The old posts were cleaned and bleached. Hooper Fence Company was hired to provide the aluminum fence panels and to set the posts. Getting the fence straight and level was a challenge, noted McFarland. Individually cast in a previous era, the posts were not exactly uniform. Each post was set two to two and a half feet into the ground.
The signpost fence borders the office parking area to the north and west. On display are street names from all across old Murfreesboro. A few names no longer exist, such as Sanbyrn Drive, recently renamed Middle Tennessee Boulevard.
Rutherford County Historian Greg Tucker can be reached at [email protected].
A special thanks to Bonnie Black for research assistance.