Gatesville
photo by Cindy Steele
~ by Julia Pearson
Comaraderie, food, and adventure with a timeless country flavor, can be found in Gatesville, just ten miles from downtown Nashville, or seven miles from Route 46. By pedaling you can get there in an hour, much sooner in the family car.
Gatesville, an unincorporated community in Hamblen Township is east of Bean Blossom. A mile north of Gatesville on the Sweetwater Trail is a small monument to honor the township’ s namesake, Job Hamblen. He was a Revolutionary War veteran who eventually homesteaded in the area. After serving in Yorktown, Hamblen and
44 Our Brown County • May / June 2019
his wife traveled the route of so many frontier settlers through West Virginia and then Kentucky. They landed in the far western edge of Bartholomew County in 1825 where they put down roots. In 1836 when the new Brown County came into existence, Hamblen’ s son, Eliakim, suggested that the northeast section forming the new township be named for his father, its first settler. The only post office that served Gatesville operated from 1855 until 1903 and was called Cleona.
The hub of the community today, the Gatesville Country Store, is located at 4525 Salt Creek Road. The store carries the expected staples of the all-American neighborhood grocery, plus hats, gloves, candy bars, chips, and ice cream. It also has freshly made deli items and a restaurant. There are daily specials on the menu. The Saturday and Sunday breakfast buffet is a welcome hug-to-the-tongueand-tummy with scratch-made home cooking. Biscuits and gravy and hash brown casserole that were served at everybody’ s grandma’ s table are big favorites.
Robin Stevens has been proprietor since 2001. She prepares the deli salads, daily specials, as well as handling the business details of the restaurant, such as ordering and bookkeeping. Robin loves her regular breakfast and lunch customers who are the construction crews, road workers, and residents and workers from the nearby lakes. Husband Doug is now retired and is a right-hand helper at the Gatesville Store. Their son, Jared, is grown and lives in Cordry Lake. He is married to Amber, works at Sub-Surface of Indiana, and is the father of fiveyear-old James.
Summer weekends bring vacationers, with youngsters being amazed at the monster display of Robin’ s rock collection.