Clarksville Living Magazine — September 2026
September’s Clarksville Living Magazine profiles APSU artist Dr. Jim Diehr at 85, celebrates the Nashville Kats’ first championship in Clarksville, marks the groundbreaking of a new $148.5 million Ascension Saint Thomas hospital, and begins a two-part account of the Bell Witch.
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The cover feature is Tony Centonze’s conversation with Dr. Jim Diehr, the retired chair of the Austin Peay State University art department, who left teaching in 2004 after 44 years and says he has become more productive as an artist ever since. Raised on an Oklahoma cattle ranch and dyslexic, Diehr began painting in a makeshift seventh-grade art room after his Missouri school burned, studied in Greenwich Village in the 1960s, and eventually collected four degrees, a Fulbright year in England and a guest semester in Linfen, China. He recently showed at River City Clay and swept Best in Show — painting and sculpture — at the Downtown Artists Co-op juried exposition. Living with macular degeneration, he now paints larger and has 20 fresh canvases prepared, several of them autobiographical, including a tribute to a grandfather who was a U.S. Marshal in Oklahoma territory.
On the field, the Nashville Kats turned their relocation to F&M Bank Arena into a title run, finishing the regular season 11-1, undefeated at home, and hoisting the 2026 Arena Crown. Under Coach Darren Arbet and quarterback Tyler Kulka, the Kats handled the Michigan Arsenal 92-76 in the semifinals, then edged the Albany Firebirds 59-53 when the defense stuffed Albany at the goal line on the game’s final snaps in front of a sold-out crowd of more than 4,000.
Hundreds turned out for the groundbreaking of Ascension Saint Thomas, a $148.5 million hospital and health campus rising on 96 acres of former farmland near exit 11 off Interstate 24. Slated to open in fall 2028 with 44 beds and room to grow to 132, it answers years of warnings that Clarksville-Montgomery County had outgrown its medical capacity; Mayors Joe Pitts and Wes Golden spoke alongside Ascension leaders Fahad Tahir and Eduardo Conrado. Two education pieces round out the civic coverage: a guest column from CMCSS communications officer Anthony D. Johnson tracing four years of rising test scores, shrinking teacher vacancies and four new schools, and a media tour of the district’s new Burt Innovation Center and Freedom Elementary near the airport.
Matt Schorr begins a two-part telling of the Bell Witch, the haunting that has drawn the curious to Adams, Tennessee since 1817; the conclusion, with an appearance by Andrew Jackson, runs next month. The issue also introduces Somos Cultura, a nonprofit founded this year by teachers Marie Santana and Marisol Marquez, whose month-long “Taco Trail” drew 500-plus voters and named Antojitos Mexicanos the city’s best taco. There is more: ten years of Arts for Hearts and its Christmas in July Gala, the Cumberland Winds Jazz Project reviving Dunbar Cave’s big-band era, the “Road to Emancipation” lectures on Clarksville’s Contraband Camp, back-to-school events at Civitan Park, Dotsonville and Kenwood, the Kentucky Bands, Bourbon and Wine Festival in Oak Grove, cover-band guitarist Edwin Sloan, Veteran Business of the Month Above Standard Building Maintenance, the stretched-out America 250 festivities in Clarksville and at Fort Campbell, and a USO welcome for Wawa’s first Tennessee store featuring Chef Robert Irvine.
Publisher Tony Centonze uses his note to argue for “the joy of being unproductive” — analog hobbies, slow mornings and unhurried time — ending with a 1912 line from Marthe Troly-Curtin: “Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.”
Table of Contents
- Jim Diehr: A Lifelong Journey in Art and Education (p. 5)
- Business After Hours and Expo at Clarksville Regional Airport (p. 8)
- Clarksville Celebrates the Kats Championship (p. 10)
- Edwin Sloan and Neil Brock and the Cover Up (p. 12)
- Clarksville Contraband Camp (p. 14)
- Arts for Hearts Fundraiser (p. 16)
- Letters from Leaders: CMCSS’ Four-Year Trajectory (p. 18)
- Ascension Saint Thomas Groundbreaking (p. 20)
- What’s New with CMCSS (p. 22)
- Bell Witch Legend — Part 1 (p. 24)
- Montgomery County Parks Back to School Splash (p. 26)
- Sugar Creek Baptist Church Back-to-School Event (p. 28)
- Somos Cultura (p. 30)
- Coolin’ at the Cave (p. 32)
- Kenwood Back to School Bash (p. 34)
- Kentucky Bands, Bourbon and Wine Festival (p. 36)
- Veteran Business of the Month: Above Standard Building Maintenance (p. 38)
- America 250: Clarksville, Fort Campbell & DAR (p. 40)
- Wawa at Fort Campbell (p. 42)
Regular Departments
- Apple Recipes (p. 44)
- Calendar (p. 45)
