Albert Virgil Goodpasture
Albert V. Goodpasture, writer, editor, and Tennessee historian, was born on November 19, 1855, in Overton County. He attended school in Cookeville and New Middleton, and received his B.A. from East Tennessee University in 1875, having absorbed the view of the university's president, Thomas Hume, that young men should take an interest in Tennessee and southern history. Goodpasture received his law degree from Vanderbilt University in 1877, and a master's degree in history from the University of Tennessee in 1882; his thesis was a History of Overton County.
Goodpasture moved to the Oakland community in Montgomery County, where he became active in the Tennessee Agricultural Wheel and the Tennessee Farmers' Alliance and served as a state representative from 1887 to 1889, state senator from 1889 to 1891, and clerk of the Tennessee Supreme Court from 1891 to 1897. From 1897 to 1914 he and his brother William H. Goodpasture ran the Goodpasture Book Company in downtown Nashville, which often served more as a club for book lovers than a bookstore.
It was in this capacity that Goodpasture assumed editorial duties for the American Historical Magazine, the publication of the Tennessee Historical Society and the predecessor of the Tennessee Historical Magazine and the current Tennessee Historical Quarterly. The American Historical Magazine originated with Peabody Normal College American history professor William R. Garrett. Goodpasture edited the magazine for six years and served as secretary of the Tennessee Historical Society from 1903 to 1912. He became one of the original members of the Tennessee Historical Commission in 1919 and served on that body until his death.
In 1914 Goodpasture retired to his Montgomery County farm, where he continued to write about Tennessee history. His works include History of Overton County, Early Times in Montgomery County, and Life of Jefferson Dillard Goodpasture, coauthored with his brother. His most influential contribution was the school text History of Tennessee, coauthored with Garrett and sponsored by the textbook commission under Governor Benton McMillin. In later years, Goodpasture wrote numerous articles on Tennessee history, the best of which were a series in the Tennessee Historical Magazine entitled “Indian Wars and Warriors of the Old Southwest.” Goodpasture died in Nashville on December 3, 1942.
