Content

Browse content in this Category:

Entries

Lynching
One of many expressions of violence directed mostly towards African Americans following Reconstruction and lasting well into the twentieth century was lynching. According to one set of statistics, lyn... Continue Reading »
Marbles Competitions
The game of marbles is an ancient and universal pastime, with Roman, French, and British roots. In Tennessee, Indian burials of the Mississippian culture have yielded clay and stone spheres speculativ... Continue Reading »
Medicine
A rich source of herbal and root remedies derived from indigenous American plants greeted newcomers to the Tennessee backcountry in the eighteenth century. James Adair, an early white Indian trader of... Continue Reading »
Memphis Music Scene
The musical legacy of the Bluff City is exciting, diverse, and extremely significant in the history of American culture. Today Memphis's best known landmarks are two places--Beale Street and Grac... Continue Reading »
Mining
Tennessee has a long, rich, and varied mining history. Although the industry today accounts for only about three-tenths of a percent of the state's gross products and two-tenths of a percent of n... Continue Reading »
Minor League Baseball
Although Memphis fielded a professional baseball team in 1877, organized minor league baseball in Tennessee dates to 1885 and the founding of the Southern League of Professional Clubs (SL), a circuit ... Continue Reading »
Mississippian Culture
The late prehistoric cultures of the southeastern United States dating from ca. A.D. 900 to 1600 comprise the Mississippian culture. In general, Mississippian culture is divided chronologically into e... Continue Reading »
Moonshine
Simply stated, "moonshine" is untaxed liquor, furtively produced quite often by the light of the moon, or at least out of the immediate reach and oversight of law enforcement. Nicknamed &quo... Continue Reading »
Mules
Until the widespread adoption of motor-powered machinery in the mid-twentieth century, mules powered most farm activities in Tennessee. Middle Tennessee was a major mule market. At annual "Mule D... Continue Reading »
Music
Folk music expresses the oldest and most basic forms of Tennessee music carried into the region by its earliest settlers and usually passed on from generation to generation by oral tradition. Though i... Continue Reading »
Musseling
Typically, musseling has been a part-time, seasonal occupation to supplement the income of timber workers, farmers, or fisherman living near Tennessee's great rivers, though it always held the al... Continue Reading »
Nashville Recording Industry
The Nashville recording industry actually began after World War II, although there were several earlier events and factors that played a significant role in its success. During the 1920s and 1930s rec... Continue Reading »
National Cemeteries
The Department of Veterans Affairs maintains 114 National Cemeteries in thirty-eight states and Puerto Rico (as well as thirty-three "soldiers' lots" and monument sites). Five cemeteries are in T... Continue Reading »
Native American Trails
Animal trails crisscrossed the Tennessee region long before the arrival of humans, and the same large game animals that created the trails attracted prehistoric hunters. Early trails tended to follow ... Continue Reading »
Negro Leagues Baseball
As early as 1871 Nashville had African American baseball clubs, but it was not until 1886 that the nation's first professional league of black teams was organized. The Southern League of Colored ... Continue Reading »
Nineteenth-century Furniture and Cabinetmakers
Although Tennessee furniture has been an overlooked and forgotten regional treasure, the simple and straightforward functional pieces produced by Tennessee craftsmen before 1850 reflect an era of outs... Continue Reading »
Nursery Industry
In 1905 horticulturalists officially established the Tennessee Nursery Association for the advancement of the state's horticulture industry and the professionalization of standards. From its very... Continue Reading »
Opera
Operatic music has long been performed on stages throughout Tennessee, although the establishment of permanent local opera companies is a far more recent trend. Famous stars and opera companies of the... Continue Reading »
Patterns in Presidential Elections in Tennessee
In the ten presidential elections from 1796 to 1832, Tennessee went for the winner eight times. In 1796 (Tennessee's first election for president), the state's three electoral votes were cas... Continue Reading »
Phosphate Mining and Industry
In 1886 William Shirley, a stonecutter, discovered phosphate on Gholston Hill near Columbia. This deposit proved to be too limited to be mined economically. In 1891 Shirley found a stratified blue roc... Continue Reading »