When I was a kid, one of my favorite haunts was the University of Tennessee’s Frank H. McClung Museum. My dad and I usually found some excuse to stop by whenever we were in Knoxville so I could check out the fossils.
Back in those days, one of the smaller exhibits was a display on Knoxville [...]
Archive for the ‘Tennessee History’ Category
A belated exhibit endorsement
Posted in Civil War, Museums and Historic Sites, Tennessee History, tagged Civil War, Fort Sanders, Frank H. McClung Museum, Knoxville on December 8, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
A frontier outpost of the British Empire
Posted in Colonial America, Museums and Historic Sites, Tennessee History, tagged Cherokee, Fort Loudoun, Fort Loudoun State Historic Area, French and Indian War, Sequoyah, Tellico Blockhouse, Tennessee History on November 1, 2009 | 4 Comments »
It’s been a while since I’ve posted one of my historic site reviews, but the other day I tagged along on a trip to Fort Loudoun State Historic Area near Vonore, TN. This is another of those fascinating frontier-era sites in East Tennessee that I’ve intended to visit for a good, long while. (It’s funny how you’ll drive hundreds [...]
Saving a Civil War site in Knoxville
Posted in Civil War, Historic Preservation, Tennessee History, tagged Civil War Knoxville, Knoxville on October 1, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
I was down in Knoxville this evening and picked up an issue of Metro Pulse, a weekly paper on life in and around the city. There was an interesting story on an effort to preserve a site associated with Longstreet’s unsuccessful attempt to take the city in the fall of 1863. Here’s an online version if you’d like [...]
Digging up one battlefield, tearing up another
Posted in Civil War, Historic Preservation, Tennessee History, tagged Civil War, Civil War Knoxville, Fort Sanders, historic archaeology, Historic Preservation, Wal-Mart, Wilderness Wal-Mart on August 25, 2009 | 4 Comments »
Here’s a story that ran on the NBC affiliate out of Knoxville last night. Archaeologists are excavating the site of Confederate works from the siege of Knoxville and assault on Ft. Sanders.
Here’s another one about the Orange County Board of Supervisors striking a blow for low-wage, dead-end retail jobs; corporate competition for locally-owned businesses; and even more [...]
The State of Franklin, lost and found
Posted in Historiography, Tennessee History, tagged Lost State of Franklin, Tennessee History on August 23, 2009 | 3 Comments »
Not too long ago I posted about a recently-published book I’d run across, Kevin T. Barksdale’s The Lost State of Franklin: America’s First Secession (Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 2009). I’m always excited to see any new work on the Tennessee frontier, and I eagerly looked forward to reading it.
Franklin was a 1780’s separatist movement in [...]
Another book that needed to be written
Posted in Historiography, Tennessee History, tagged Lost State of Franklin on July 29, 2009 | 2 Comments »
This is turning out to be a good year for books that I’ve always wished somebody would write. Back in March we got the first full-scale study of the Battle of Guilford Courthouse, and it was everything I’d hoped it would be.
Today I ran across another new book that I’m frantic to read, Kevin T. [...]
Lincoln at Tusculum
Posted in Abraham Lincoln, Tennessee History, tagged Andrew Johnson, Samuel Doak, Tusculum College on July 16, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
If you still haven’t gotten your Lincoln Bicentennial fix, you’ve got two more chances this fall with a couple of interesting events at Tusculum College in Greeneville, TN.
Tusculum itself has a pretty interesting history. It’s the oldest college in Tennessee, and one of the oldest in the country. Andrew Johnson was a trustee, and one of [...]
Digging up Meriwether Lewis
Posted in History on the Web, Tennessee History, tagged Lewis and Clark, Meriwther Lewis on June 25, 2009 | 3 Comments »
I ran across an interesting story via The Posterity Project. Relatives of Meriwether Lewis are trying to persuade the federal government to allow them to exhume his remains, so they can settle the mystery of whether foul play was involved in his supposed suicide. Here’s the website they’ve set up. So far, the Park Service has blocked it, [...]
Hanging out at the Hermitage
Posted in Museums and Historic Sites, Tennessee History, tagged Andrew Jackson, The Hermitage on June 22, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
I’ve always had a soft spot for Andrew Jackson. Sure, he was about as politically incorrect as you can get: a slaveowner, a great foe of the Indians, and a guy with a notoriously bad temper. But he also had an unwavering faith in and devotion to the common man and to democracy. It’s fitting that [...]
Close to home
Posted in Historic Preservation, Museums and Historic Sites, Tennessee History, tagged Claiborne County, Local history, Tazewell, Tennessee historic sites on May 6, 2009 | 1 Comment »
I got a real shock when I read a new post over at the fantastic Posterity Project blog today. The Tennessee Preservation Trust has released its list of the state’s most endangered sites, and one of them is the Graham-Kivette House in Tazewell. This ca. 1810 home is by far the oldest house in the area, and it’s [...]
