10/04/2026
EDIT: It would have helped if I had put the story in, huh? I typed it in Word and then just didn't copy it over here. LOL
I am going to veer of the path of the countdown today. Someone asked me to tell a Fannie Moffitt story. I do not fancy myself a story teller, but apparently, I play one on Facebook :)
DID YOU KNOW Fannie Moffitt.
If you're from Altamont, you've probably heard the name Fannie Moffitt.
Maybe you heard about the hats. Maybe you heard about the money. Maybe somebody told you about the big house on the hill, the strange things she did, or the enormous auction after she died. Depending on who told you the story, you probably heard a slightly different version.
That's part of what makes Fannie so interesting.
Frances “Fannie” Moffitt grew up in the Northcutt family home we now know as The Manor. Her family wasn't just wealthy by Altamont standards—the Northcutts owned thousands of acres of timber and coal land, and Fannie eventually inherited the family fortune. She was educated, loved to read, played piano, and became one of the wealthiest landowners in Grundy County.
That's not the Fannie Altamont remembers, though.
Altamont remembers the cranky, eccentric woman with the hats.
The woman who could be extraordinarily generous—and extraordinarily tight with a dollar. One local historical account says people even jokingly described her as a “Robin Hood in reverse.”
She never married. She had no children. And despite having a considerable estate, she never made a will. According to one story handed down about Fannie, when someone questioned her about that little problem, her answer was essentially: “That's alright. Let 'em fight!”
And ... they did. 😂
When Fannie died in 1955, what followed became one of those events Altamont talked about for years. Her belongings and property were auctioned. Cash, royalty checks, jewelry and antiques were reportedly found in the house. One account describes the sale as such a spectacle that the Chattanooga Free Press called it a “media circus.”
But one of my favorite stories isn't about the fortune or the money in the mattresses. It's the fried pies.
One Altamont recollection says local PTA members were at the old school making fried pies to sell to the crowds. Two girls, Wilma Northcutt & Susan (Scruggs) Ramsey — the Great Fannie Moffitt Fried Pie Delivery Team of 1955, were assigned to carry them down to the Moffitt house—and apparently ate a pie on every trip.
That's the Fannie Moffitt story I want us to tell.
Not just “wealthy eccentric heiress who liked hats.”
The woman Altamont still tells stories about more than 70 years after she died.
And that is why, once a year, everybody comes back to Cumberland Street, puts on ridiculous hats, eats too much food and calls the whole thing the Fannie Moffitt Autumn Stomp. The festival itself describes Fannie's wealth, eccentric lifestyle and love of hats as the inspiration for its name and its celebration of Altamont's mountain heritage.
