By Rhea-Frances Tetley
Staff Writer
The new neon sign in Top Town Crestline was installed and lit up just in time for the 2024 Jamboree Days parade. This neon sign has been in the works for over two years, getting it designed, colors approved and determining the location where it would create the ultimate impact to those arriving at the crest and entering the town.
The Top Town sign being installed just days before the Jamboree Days parade.
This sign is a result of the tourism committee of the Crestline Chamber of Commerce and the image they want visitors to see of the community when they come to visit. It has been installed on the northwest corner of the five-way intersection of Highway 138 and Crest Forest Drive, where Lake Drive begins, on the upper wall of the furniture annex of Ye Olde Thrift Shoppe operated by the Crest Forest Senior Citizens Club. A lift was needed to place it correctly from that steep inclined slope next to the building.
The new neon sign is placed on the side of the Crest Forest Senior Citizens Club furniture thrift store in Top Town Crestline, welcoming residents and visitors to town.
As the “Historic Top Town” sign indicates, the Top Town area is the oldest part of the community. It was established over 100 years ago when Postmaster Samuel Dillin moved the U.S. post office to the crest area, away from Skyland, and adopted the name of Crestline. The name had been chosen in a contest run by Henry Guernsey for that crest area in 1906 after the county purchased the Arrowhead Reservoir Toll Road and made it a free public county road to the crest area.
The name Crestline was submitted by Dr. Wesley Thompson who won a lot in Guernsey’s new vacation area for submitting the winning name. This free road opened up the Crestline area to more visitors. When the road was opened to auto traffic in 1915, the road went directly through the new Crestline area that has become current day Top Town.
By Dillin operating his store in the Crestline area, it encouraged others to establish businesses in the area that Charles S. Mann developed after WWI and promoted as a vacation destination the community of Crestline Village along the crest. The Crestline community was created and the business district remains today in those same blocks of town.
The nickname Top Town came into being after Lake Gregory was built, several decades later, and the Lake Gregory Village housing and business area was developed by Mann and others in the 1940s. For a while the area was called Olde Town in the 1970s, but the Top Town nickname is what has consistently been embraced by the community and merchants over the decades.
The neon artist for the Top Town sign is Crestline resident Karl Score, who also was also working on the neon sign for Goodwin’s Market last week. This third-generation neon art artist learned his skill from his grandfather. It took him a couple of months to create the Top Town sign.
The Crestline Chamber of Commerce hopes the community enjoys this new welcoming sign to Crestline and more people recognize the excellent shopping, dining, service businesses and other amenities that Top Town offers.
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