A stuffed Barracuda fish was mounted on a plaque behind the bar at Daddy Billy's in Tullahoma during the 1980s and the nameplate read "Saber-toothed Snail Darter."

For those who don't know why that's funnier than a sight gag: There's a popular belief that environmentalists stopped TVA's construction of the Columbia Dam to protect a minnow-sized fish, the Snail Darter.

It becomes a worthwhile commentary now that TVA is conducting an environmental assessment on a request to restrict water released from Normandy Dam to conserve supplies during the current drought. There's another commentary that fits.

History only appears to repeat itself to those who don't pay attention to the details.

A state spokeswoman recently corrected me saying the Snail Darter was the issue and not mussels when the Columbia Dam was stopped. A week or so later, I was told neither stopped the dam and the man who said so is Frank Fly, the Murfreesboro attorney who represented opponents of the dam. I wrote other stories about Frank during the 1990s in Murfreesboro.

So, I called Frank recently because of a letter to the editor at the Marshall County Tribune, where he and his clients were sarcastically commended for stopping a dam that might have supplied water and recreation. Fly declined to reply by writing a letter of his own, so you are reading a staff column instead.

I took notes. Here's what Frank told me.

Location was the original problem with the Columbia Dam. Better dams are on the Highland Rim or where it spills into the Central Basin, because they're deep; much of Tims Ford Lake is an example. Shallow lakes like Percy Priest have temperature problems. The water gets warm. Water behind a dam at Columbia would have had more problems because of potassium permanganate. It's a nutrient that, when mixed with warm water, can lead to algae blooms, oxygen depletion, and fish kills.

Decayed algae could cause problems for treatment plants so the Duck River might not still be a good source of water for Columbia. Up to that point the city's utility would have to add chlorine. Added to water without oxygen results in a byproduct -- trihalomethanes, which cause cancer.

So much for Columbia Dam as a water supply.

As for recreation, Frank's recitation of his old case sounds familiar to me.

Since the lake would be used to control flooding, the annual draw down to have capacity to hold back flood waters would reduce a 12,600-acre lake to one of 9,300 acres.

If you built a house on the lake so you could jump in the water from a deck in the summer or into a boat in March, then come November you'd have to drive 18 miles to get to the water. The lake would be that shallow and the water's edge would recede that far. The exact location of the house, or whether the 18-mile trip was as direct as the crow flies were not verified; it's Frank's point, not mine.

Now, the Duck River Agency's Technical Advisory Committee has persuaded the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation to ask TVA to reduce the flow of water from Normandy Dam toward Shelbyville, Lewisburg and Columbia. It's to conserve water for those three cities, but even more so for Tullahoma and Manchester because if the water drops too much, water can't be drawn from the lake.

Frank reminds us that the original contract on dam operations had TVA guaranteeing Columbia, Lewisburg and Shelbyville would have adequate flow of water during the summer. That's to be 150 cubic feet per second in Columbia.

Another source last week says it's to be "150 plus five" in Shelbyville. That's 150 cfs to dilute sewage treatment plant effluent and another five cfs for water supply. Admittedly, we've not checked the contract, but one fact is clear. Without the dam at Normandy, the drought would be hurting more than it is.

Let's return to the Snail Darter.

Frank says the man who wrote to the Tribune is confused. Snail Darters weren't the issue in the Duck River. They were the issue for another dam in East Tennessee.

"In the Columbia Dam case it was mussels," Frank told me of the environmental issue.

Politics and money that started and stopped the Columbia Dam.

Ronald Reagan told his financial officer, David Stockton, to cut anything seen as surplus "and that was the end of it," Frank said. "We didn't file an endangered species complaint.

"Endangered species didn't have any part in it," he said of how the Columbia Dam fell. "TVA recommended it not be built, but Congress went ahead because of Congressman Joe L. Evins."

The Smithville man represented Tennessee's 4th Congressional District in the House during 1946-77 and chaired the Appropriations Subcommittee on Public Works Appropriations.

Al Gore succeeded Evins and was "lukewarm" on the Columbia Dam project, Frank said.

"Endangered species would have been impacted had the project gone forward, but they didn't stop it," he said.

"Politics pushed it forward and financial issues stopped the project," Frank told me.

Seems true to me, even if it's contrary to what's said in a letter to the editor published on an opinion page in Lewisburg where, as it is in Bedford County, the preponderance of public drinking water was once behind the Normandy Dam.

As for the quality of water in Tullahoma, I know an old sportswriter who'd purify it with a product from Lynchburg that he had at Daddy Billy's.

Cheers!