‘Grace’ inspired sale for schools
Horne ‘public service’ $4.89 mil 41-acre deal passes Board 7-1-1
With thoughts of honoring his mother while helping solve a serious overcrowding problem in Farragut kindergarten through eighth-grade public schools, Doug Horne and his wife, Brenda Horne, agreed to sell 41 acres of their property behind Ingles off Kingston Pike in Farragut to Knox County Schools to build a new primary, intermediate or middle school.
By a vote of 7-to-1 (with one abstention), Knox County Board of Education approved buying the acreage from Doug Horne — a highly respected Knox-area developer and owner of Republic Newspapers, Inc., parent company of farragutpress — and Brenda for $4,892,500 during its meeting Wednesday, Oct. 4 (See related story below).
Having originally sought to sell the land to an assisted living/memory care operation before that option was denied earlier this year by Farragut Board of Mayor and Aldermen, Horne said that selling price would have been “over double what we’re getting for the land” from KCS.
However, “Brenda and I decided to sell the land for quite a bit less money, than other purposes that we had discussed, for a public service to help the children at Farragut and have a new school,” Horne said. “… We decided to sell the land for the school because they were struggling to find a location for another school.”
Moreover, “My mother was a school teacher for 30 years in Mississippi and Tennessee. … She taught at Bluegrass for over 25 years,” he added about the late Grace Horne. “I was born in Mississippi.
“We’ve told the school board that if they need a good name for the school, they could name it Grace Middle School,” Horne added about honoring his mother if a special name was sought.
“That’s a good Christian name, Grace.”
