Ellington

If Ron Littlefield wasn’t the mayor of Chattanooga, he might be a mad man.

While recently ripping “rapid fire” through the entire cable series “Mad Men” on his Netflix account, the mayor was reminded of when he was a commercial art major at Auburn University, fascinated by advertising.

The characters in the series—based on an advertising firm in the 1950s and 1960s—use creativity and inventiveness to solve problems with their campaigns. The ingenuity draws Littlefield into the show, just like commercial art drew him in back in college.

“I always wanted to be in a creative field,” says the mayor. “I was really interested in advertising. It was a different environment then.”

In the show, the character Don Draper claims advertising is really just about one thing: happiness. “Happiness is the smell of a new car,” says Draper during a 2007 episode. “It’s the freedom from fear.” That’s where Littlefield, 64, differs from the show. For him, happiness has often been found driving an old car, white-knuckled with fear from the speed.

The mayor remembers his youth as a North Georgia version of “American Graffiti.” In the classic 1973 George Lucas film, Ron Howard, Harrison Ford and other high-octane teenagers cruise around town in their modified hot rods looking for dates, a good time and an occasional drag race. In Littlefield’s real-life version, he and friends cruised to the drive-in movies and speed shops on Rossville Boulevard in his flathead-powered, emerald green ’53 Ford, and later his 1955 Chevy Bel Air. “I’d love to still have that one,” he says of the Bel Air.

As he drives around Chattanooga these days, he’s paying attention to campaign signs, glad his name isn’t on any of them. “There’s a lot of comfort in being on the outside looking in,” says the mayor, who is precluded from seeking reelection by term limits. “My wife has assured me I have run my last race.” Littlefield, however, has supported his friend and longtime supporter Zach Wamp in Wamp’s gubernatorial campaign. The mayor says he sees some parallels between Wamp’s campaign and his own. “I traditionally have run against a lot of money, too, and prevailed,” he notes.

Born near the Alabama line in LaGrange, Ga., and growing up in LaFayette, Ga., Littlefield speaks in a deliberate but surprisingly twang-less baritone. He blames his lack of an accent on his college roommate at Auburn who was from Massachusetts. “Hopefully, when he went back home they asked him where he got that southern accent,” the mayor jokes.

Littlefield started college as an engineering student before switching to commercial art. He finally graduated with a business degree because business, he says, gave him the most freedom to pick electives. He then married his high school sweetheart who he met in grammar school, moving to Chattanooga in 1968.

After years of city planning and a term-and-a-half as mayor, people rarely believe him when he brings up oil-stained memories from his hot rodding days. “They don’t think that I can actually get greasy,” he says. “I guess it’s because I wear a suit all of the time. I don’t know.”

Admittedly most of the mayor’s automotive stories don’t end with his cars winning drag racing glory like drivers in the movies. “I never had a car that was much of a contender,” he says sheepishly. When he got a little older, Littlefield abandoned street racing for a more versatile yellow Volkswagen Beetle, he says, as well as a red and white VW van, which he camped in and tinkered with. “We weren’t hippies but we sort of looked like it some times,” he adds.

He says he is not afraid to pick up a saw or hammer around the house. Earlier in his professional career, he says he relieved stress by dusting off his tools and building outdoor benches. Apparently, things could get pretty stressful because his wife, Lanis, put the brakes on his hobby. “She had to tell me to stop making benches because we didn’t have space for them,” he laughs.

While running a city can be a sun-up to sundown job, the mayor makes time to read newspapers, magazines and journals. He’s notorious for stopping and starting books, even taking years to finish some when interrupted by others. Currently he’s reading three books including “Atlas Shrugged,” which he started a decade ago.

He lives off of his EPB Fiber DV-R and Netflix, where he’s in the middle of Season Two in a Lost binge similar to that which sent him through “Mad Men.” “I hate reality TV,” he says disdainfully. “I want unreality TV, and “Lost” is about the most unreal thing out there.”

Despite his hectic schedule, Littlefield says he wouldn’t trade his duties for anything.

“I’m living my dream right now,” he says, explaining that running a city is a little bit like working on hot rods. They both take an analytical mind to diagnose problems, they both involve creative solutions and both involve “stealing” ideas from other models that you like.

Littlefield points to several local attractions including the Tennessee Aquarium and the Walnut Street Bridge that stemmed from ideas community leaders borrowed from other cities. When he was a child in LaGrange, Littlefield and his sister once visited Grant Park in Atlanta, riding a carousel that would eventually be moved to Coolidge Park, he says.

Officials from many of the same cities Littlefield visited as a city planner are now visiting Chattanooga to get tips for their own towns. When they do, they find Littlefield with his hands on the wheel.