Chief Vann Motel part of bygone era

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January 31, 2009

By Mark Millican

CHATSWORTH — It wasn’t the first motel in town during the 1950s, but it was the only one that had a neon sign with an American Indian’s arm beckoning weary tourists off the road.

Torn down in late January, the Chief Vann Motel was a landmark on U.S. Highway 411 — once the primary route to Florida through north Georgia — before the national interstate system was developed in the late 1950s and 1960s.

The namesake Chief Vann House in Spring Place is one of the premier American Indian historic sites in the Southeast. Early in the 19th century, James Vann, the son of a Scottish trader, and his Cherokee wife built the house and a 200-acre plantation along the Old Federal Road. The house fell into disrepair, but a 12-year restoration project by local preservationists was finished in 1963.

Ravaged by fire on a couple of occasions through its 50-year history, the Chief Vann Motel finally fell to demolition in late January. The city worked with the Martha Young estate to demolish the building after the latest fire around three years ago left it uninhabitable, said Mayor Tyson Haynes. The cost of the demolition was $2,475 to the estate.

“We were able to salvage $375 worth of steel, and that went into the city’s coffers,” he said. “All of the bedding material that was still good was donated to Providence Ministries. We did borrow a couple of trucks from the county to haul it off.”

Donald Bradley, whose father W.C. Bradley built the hotel around 1955, said his father owned the hotel “for 15 to 20 years” and had his late brother, Cecil Bradley, serve as manager.

“It was a booming business in its day before I-75 was built,” said Bradley. “A lot of salespeople stayed there on a regular basis, and in the summer when the tourists came down from Ohio on the way to Florida it was about the halfway point. When I drove by there and saw where it was gone it brought back a lot of memories from that time. It had the first swimming pool among the local motels and hotels, and also the first animated neon sign.”

Murray County historian Tim Howard said some of the early inns along Highway 411 were The Pines, Fort View Motel, The Colonial Pines, National Motor Court and The Adco Motel, which is still in existence.

Hannah Carter remembers her Aunt Nina Middleton managing the motel.

“We’d go down to visit her when I was with my mother,” she said. “One of my memories is of Aunt Nina going behind the maids and remaking the beds. None of us could make up a bed like Aunt Nina.”

Connie Winkler, the daughter of Martha Young, said her mother purchased the Chief Vann Motel around 1972.

“My mother went shopping for groceries one day, and someone told her there was an auction downtown,” she recalled. “She went and bid on it and won it on a fluke. But my family enjoyed going down there and spending time with my mother, and of course it had a swimming pool. It was her life for over 30 years.”

Winkler said her mother’s estate has no plans for the property.