BRADY FLANIGANStaff Writer

If you’re driving down West Lincoln Street in the morning and 88-year-old Jerry Holden waves at you from a metal chair in his front yard, you should wave back.

He’s a sundial with more recorded sightings than the sun. Nobody says it outright, but there’s a silent order to things in this city. The sun rises in the east, the train rumbles down downtown, and when Jerry waves, as he always does, you wave back. No exceptions.

For two years now Jerry has spent two, three hours a day sitting in his chair, waving at any car, truck, dad with a stroller, passing by. Seeing his cane kicking in the air has become as regular as the freight trains.

A few months ago–peak of summer–Jerry’s morning waving started getting attention on Tullahoma Talk, the city’s unofficial Facebook pulpit. Somebody took a picture of him in his chair and told everyone to honk or wave if they passed by. The whole thing caught fire, and suddenly, Jerry Holden was everywhere. People started sharing the idea that he should be part of the Christmas parade. 

Last week, the Tullahoma Area Chamber of Commerce announced this year’s Grand Marshals were RJ and Sande Hayes. Although he didn’t earn the title, he was given a spot on the float with Santa.

“I don’t know. It surprised me,” Jerry said. “I don’t know; we’s supposed to be in this parade riding with Santa Claus—me and her both. I ain’t never done that, but I’m a Tullahoma boy. I been here all my life.” 

This side hobby wasn’t intentional. No, one day Jerry was just waiting to check the mail. He figured he’d post up by the mailbox and keep an eye out for the mailman.

“What happened to start with is, I was expecting some money in the mail,” he said as we sat around a table in his backyard with his daughter Leslie Holden and their dog Jesse James. “There’s only a few places a stranger can pull into a man’s driveway out of the morning and be received with a “pull ya’ up a chair. Leslie, get this man a cushion.”

If you do that in Tennessee it’s more common to be greeted with a Colt than a coffee. The morning was lukewarm, around 70, and that certain kind of cool gray, misty humidity that stops by these parts maybe twice a year. 

“I pulled me a chair up there by the mailbox, and people started waving and stopping,” Jerry said. Things escalated from there. “One man stopped and brought me a ham and biscuit, another one a sausage and biscuit, another one coffee, another one a milkshake, another one brought me a drink of beer—gave that away, though—and another one brought me whiskey. Didn’t take that cause I ain’t no whiskey drinker.” He shook his head no, and smiled the whole time. “It’ll just surprise you what goes on out there.”

And just like that, a man waiting on the mail turned into something else—a ritual, a small-town spectacle no one could explain but everyone understands. Two years later, in 2024, and Jerry’s still there with his cane, greeting the world like some kind of oracle on W. Lincoln St., presiding over a parade of passersby.

Jerry’s story is woven through Tullahoma’s like a pair of boot laces.

“I’m a Tullahoma boy,” he said. “I’ve been here all my life.” He pointed his cane east, down West Lincoln St. “I’ll tell you what, right up there where that church was, was our home place.” His cane hung in the air for a minute. It was wrapped in orange and black tape–perhaps for Halloween, perhaps for the Tennessee Vols. “We moved in there about 80 years ago. I’m 88–been here all my life.” He smiled like he was sipping on memories. “A lot more people live out here now than used to be. Tullahoma’s growed. I mean it’s growed. I’ll tell you what.” 

Like a wind vane in a breeze, he turned and pointed across the street. “My daddy owned seven acres over there, wasn’t nothing over there but one barn,” he said. “I raised horses and ran cows, and rode tractors over every bit of it. And now it’s full of houses.”

The world around him shifted over 88 years–grown taller, louder, an electric library of Alexandria in everyone’s hand. But Jerry stayed rooted in Tullahoma, waving hello and goodbye all at once, as he slowly saw fields replaced by houses.

His father, Charles W. Holden, evidently was a town fixture too. He ran a milk bottling plant over on Cumberland Springs Road called City Dairy. The Tullahoma News covered his operation in 1952 with an article so creatively titled, ‘Charles W. Holden Has 2 Dairy Firms.’ 

But before his dad made headlines, Jerry earned himself a spot in the paper. In 1949 he appeared in an article titled “Perfect Attendance Certificates Given to 107 Pupils of South Jackson.” He was in the sixth grade back then, when the school was surrounded by fields, and evidently wasn’t missing a day. 

Now the holiday season draws near. Jerry will take his place on the Santa float, waving like he always does. Only this time it won’t be from his front yard. The man who’s been a fixture on West Lincoln St. for years will be waving to the whole town. Tullahoma’s changed around him—fields replaced by houses, quiet streets replaced with humming cars and neon phones. But Jerry Holden stayed the same, sitting in his metal chair, waving at anyone passing by, just as sure as the sun’s still rising in the east and the trains still roll on.