The board of directors of Keep Morristown-Hamblen Beautiful announced a pair of residences in Hamblen County received the organization’s Beautification Award.
The winners are Winnie McCracken’s home on W. 3rd North Street and Lousie Wisecarver’s home on Moore Road in Whitesburg.
151 Moore Road
No one is more deserving of the beautification award than a woman who has been working on her garden for the better part of a century. Louise Wisecarver lives on a beautiful farm in Whitesburg and her flowers will warm your heart almost as much as she will.
“My mom did, so it’s in my blood,” Louise said of her love for gardening, which she’s cultivated on her Whitesburg farm for 65 years. At 89 years old, she feels just as alive in her garden as she did in her twenties.
Louise has a story for every flower and each piece of art found around her property. The yard art is truly her history. The corner of the house has an original well bucket with petunias hung by the pulley system. There is also an old shovel hanging from the brick on her house that serves as a hanger for their address sign. A tuft of zinnias, her favorite flower, surrounds a quaint birdhouse made by her husband out of old wood and a horse hitching post. It’s a walk down memory lane.
Louise and her late husband Coy met in high school and moved to the farm in 1959. They were married for 68 years. They farmed black angus cattle, tobacco and hay as well as hogs for Lays Packing company while working other day jobs. Coy served in the Army and worked for BASF for 37 and a half years and in 1967, Louise became the first female mail carrier in Hamblen County. She loved what she did and the people she met on her route until she retired in 1998.
“No rhyme or reason about what I do. If I plant something somewhere and it does well, I leave it,” Louise said. She loves to move and transplant her flowers and collect their seeds.
Every spring Louise starts some of her flowers from seeds that she collected the previous summer in her beautiful sunroom. When it is warm enough, she takes her geraniums back outside after bringing them in for the winter. She then gathers her daughters and drives out to her favorite nurseries. At first, she just browses and gets ideas, and then returns to make her final decisions. No flower is a stranger to her, but she loves seeking out new species.
Think of any flower, and Louise probably has it — cone flowers, geraniums, shasta daisies, marigolds, lilies, roses, black-eyed Susans, petunias, irises, begonias — the list goes on and on. Even rare flowers, like the spider flower of the naked lady, are among the blossoms. She’s branched out into growing pineapples, cotton and a Chinese lantern, even reblooming a poinsettia.
Louise loves to take care of her gardens and is adamant that she does not need help. She waters early in the morning and late at night with a hose from the well. Every night when she’s hitting the hay, she lets her three daughters know that she’s heading in. Her daughters, sons-in-law and grandchildren, who all live within a mile of her and share her love for the land of gardening, have taken over the farming duties.
There is an overwhelming feeling of love amongst Louise’s family, who nominated her themselves for this award. From the words of her grandson: “She could plant a tire, and it would come up as a flower!”
Louise makes sure to share the love, too: She always tells neighbors who put in the effort that she loves their yards.
914 W 3rd North Street
Even before its facelift, this blue bungalow’s inviting design and calming color drew the heads of passersby. Now, after some tender loving care, it’s a slice of domestic bliss in a central Morristown neighborhood.
Keep Morristown Hamblen Beautiful noticed the house back in the early spring after its remodel, which brought noticeable improvements. The flower beds had been designed and situated out front, and we could tell something special was going to be placed there.
Now, the mailbox has its own planter and is surrounded by beautiful yellow canna lilies. The flagstone sidewalk leading up to the house is landscaped and bordered by an adorable white picket fence.
KMHB is honored to give this beautification award to Winnie McCracken, who previously lived on Cherokee Lake with her husband, Charles. After his passing in 2015, the lake house was suddenly too big and required too much upkeep. She decided to look for a little place in town.
Winnie said the house looked “horrible” when she first visited the property on W Third North Street, just south of the Morristown-Hamblen hospital. Previous owners had attempted a remodel but abandoned the project during the pandemic. The insides were falling apart and the carpet was a mess, she says.
But Winnie saw the home’s potential. She had a vision for her new home as a single person. Her friends thought she was crazy, she says — but she proved them wrong.
Winnie did most of the renovations herself, working alongside her longtime handyman. She single handedly tore out her entire brick chimney, laid wood floors and installed new tile.
After months of hard work, Winnie moved into her beautiful new home in April 2022. Her son and his family now live in her former lake house.
A wheelbarrow filled with flowers sets the tone in the front garden and highlights Winnie’s attention to detail. Along the side wall, she grows tomatoes.
Her favorite part about the new house is her new neighbors. “Everyone helps each other,” Winnie said. She also owns the house next door and her tenant, Robbie Glover, shares her love for gardening.
Winnie’s lush, colorful yard is a product of the passionate, supportive community that surrounds her. She described a playful competition among the neighborhood’s fellow gardeners: If one person plants something, it inspires others to follow suit. Winnie loves the hobby and gets excited for new botanical opportunities every spring, she says.
When it’s not too hot, Winnie’s favorite spot to spend time is the back porch. She sits, watches cars roll by and enjoys the fruits — and flowers — of her labor.
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