Inherit The Wind

Neither me nor Jackie had ever been to Dayton, TN despite the historical importance.  Inherit the Wind, the movie, would probably be a better introduction to the Monkey Trial than this article but since you’re here….

We went into the old courthouse — which is still used — and passed through the metal detector successfully.  The Sheriff’s Deputy working the door told us we could go have a look at the court room where everything happened since the court was on a lunch break.  The room is very impressive and looks like the one in the movie.  However, there were already family members of the people on trial that day (we heard the defendants getting marched in from the jail next door shortly afterwards) and a couple of attorneys chatting near the dock so we chose not to linger.

The trial was kind of set up to force a constitutional showdown between people that believe in evolution and, on the opposing side, morons.  Scopes was actually just a replacement teacher and volunteered to violate the law against teaching Darwin (said law being enacted a year or so earlier with the intent of protecting the souls of students, as so many laws are).  The trial descended into a media circus of the sort so frequent today but, at the time, unprecedented.

Jackie’s grandfather, Bill, was named William Bryan Cordell after William Jennings Bryan (above) who, despite this fiasco that stains his reputation right up to today, was a statesman and orator of incredible importance in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The museum exhibits on the Monkey Trial are extensive, interesting, and worth a visit if you just happen to be passing through.  Instead, I took one photo of the old clock mechanism … unrelated to the events for which this courthouse is famous.