Signal Mountain's mystery bowl of fruit piques drivers' interest

photo A bowl of fruit and dried beans rests atop a rock alongside Signal Mountain Boulevard.

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Alert: An abandoned bowl of apples and oranges has been found on the edge of the highway coming down from Signal Mountain.

If you know the owner or why the fruit is sitting so neatly inside a wok perched precariously high on a rock between the two-laned road and a deadly drop of several hundred feet to the Tennessee River below, please reveal yourself.

Were they left for the birds? Was it a teenage prank? Or some kind of cult sacrifice? Was it left by a bargainer shopping at the world’s longest yard sale?

Just spill the beans. The mystery is maddening for some mountaintop residents.

Sure, there are more important things to fret about than fruit. But you have to understand: On Signal Mountain, people usually know what’s going on. And they know it fast.

“Nobody knows how it got there,” said Pam Morrison, who lives in Walden. “A lot of people have seen it and nobody knows anything about it.”

When traffic is backed up on Signal Mountain Boulevard because of a wreck, everybody seems to know the cause, Morrison said. And when someone’s yard gets rolled with toilet paper, it doesn’t take more than a day to find out which teens were responsible.

“But with the bowl of fruit, people just don’t know anything,” Morrison said. “It’s an oddity.”

The fruit’s appearance has sparked phone calls between neighbors and Facebook statuses from curious drivers.

We saw this east of our office in north Springdale.

Posted by NWADG on Wednesday, March 25, 2015

City Hall has no answers.

“No, don’t have a clue,” said Town Manager Chris Dorsey.

Not even the owner of the local Accents gift shop knows the back story.

“We always know the gossip,” said owner Carey Holmes.

After spotting the bowl in her rear-view mirror, Signal Mountain Vice Mayor Susan Robertson is asking everyone around town. But so far, nothing.

“We’ve got to find out about that fruit,” she said. “We’re all talking about it. We’re all looking for it. And not a word.”

Contact staff writer Kevin Hardy at khardy@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6249.

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