187-519: The Achievement School District (ASD) is a school system in Tennessee providing academic intervention in the lowest performing schools in Tennessee, with the goal of increasing student achievement in those schools. The ASD's assigned task is to move the bottom 5% of schools in Tennessee to the top 25% of schools in the state. The Achievement School District was created to cause "school turnaround,"
374-641: A Cherokee town preceding the first European American settlement. Tennessee was initially part of North Carolina, and later the Southwest Territory , before its admission to the Union as the 16th state on June 1, 1796. It earned the nickname "The Volunteer State" due to a strong tradition of military service. A slave state until the American Civil War , Tennessee was politically divided, with most of its western and middle parts supporting
561-413: A county seat . The state has 340 municipalities in total. The Office of Management and Budget designates ten metropolitan areas in Tennessee, four of which extend into neighboring states. Appalachia Appalachia (locally / ˌ æ p ə ˈ l æ tʃ ə / , elsewhere also /- l eɪ tʃ ə , - l eɪ ʃ ə / ) is a geographic region located in the central and southern sections of
748-430: A long hunter and surveyor instrumental in the early settlement of Kentucky and Tennessee. Like Boone, Appalachian pioneers moved into areas largely separated from "civilization" by high mountain ridges and had to fend for themselves against the elements. As many of these early settlers were living on Native American lands, attacks from Native American tribes were a continuous threat until the 19th century. As early as
935-574: A paramount chiefdom centered around a village complex in northern Georgia. By the time English explorers arrived in Appalachia in the late 17th century, the central part of the region was controlled by Algonquian tribes (namely the Shawnee ), and the southern part of the region was controlled by the Cherokee . The French based in modern-day Quebec also made inroads into the northern areas of
1122-683: A series of sit-ins at segregated lunch counters in Nashville organized by the Nashville Student Movement resulted in the desegregation of facilities in the city. On April 4, 1968, James Earl Ray assassinated civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. in Memphis. King had traveled there to support striking African American sanitation workers . The 1962 U.S. Supreme Court case Baker v. Carr arose out of
1309-636: A temperate deciduous forest biome commonly known as the Eastern Deciduous Forest. It has eight ecoregions : the Blue Ridge , Ridge and Valley , Central Appalachian, Southwestern Appalachian, Interior Low Plateaus , Southeastern Plains, Mississippi Valley Loess Plains, and Mississippi Alluvial Plain regions. Tennessee is the most biodiverse inland state, the Great Smoky Mountains National Park
1496-608: A "core" Appalachian region consisting of 164 counties in West Virginia, Kentucky, Virginia, Tennessee, North Carolina, and Georgia, and a greater region defined by the ARC. In the Encyclopedia of Appalachia (2006), Appalachian State University historian Howard Dorgan suggests the term " Old Appalachia " for the region's cultural boundaries, noting an academic tendency to ignore the southwestern and northeastern extremes of
1683-593: A Cherokee faction loyal to the British led by Dragging Canoe , opposed the settling of the Washington District and Transylvania Colony, and in 1776 attacked Fort Watauga at Sycamore Shoals. The warnings of Dragging Canoe's cousin Nancy Ward spared many settlers' lives from the initial attacks. In 1779, James Robertson and John Donelson led two groups of settlers from the Washington District to
1870-815: A French expedition led by missionary Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet explored the Mississippi River and became the first Europeans to map the Mississippi Valley. In 1682, an expedition led by René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle constructed Fort Prudhomme on the Chickasaw Bluffs in West Tennessee. By the late 17th century, French traders began to explore the Cumberland River valley, and in 1714, under Charles Charleville's command, established French Lick,
2057-549: A challenge to the longstanding rural bias of apportionment of seats in the Tennessee legislature and established the principle of " one man, one vote ". The construction of Interstate 40 through Memphis became a national talking point on the issue of eminent domain and grassroots lobbying when the Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) attempted to construct the highway through the city's Overton Park . A local activist group spent many years contesting
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#17327873455992244-798: A cooler mountain temperate or humid continental climate . The Gulf of Mexico is the dominant factor in Tennessee's climate, with winds from the south responsible for most of the state's annual precipitation. Generally, the state has hot summers and mild to cool winters with generous precipitation throughout the year. The highest average monthly precipitation usually occurs between December and April. The driest months, on average, are August to October. The state receives an average of 50 inches (130 cm) of precipitation annually. Snowfall ranges from 5 inches (13 cm) in West Tennessee to over 80 inches (200 cm) in East Tennessee's highest mountains. Summers are generally hot and humid, with most of
2431-1082: A distrust of religious hierarchies , both rooted in the evangelical tendencies of the region's pioneers, many of whom had been influenced by the Holiness movement and " New Light " movement in England. Many of the denominations brought from Europe underwent modifications or factioning during the Second Great Awakening (especially the Holiness movement) in the early 19th century. Several 18th and 19th-century religious traditions are still practiced in parts of Appalachia, including natural water (or "creek") baptism , rhythmically chanted preaching, congregational shouting, snake handling , and foot washing . While most church-goers in Appalachia attend fairly well-organized churches affiliated with regional or national bodies, small unaffiliated congregations are not uncommon in rural mountain areas. Protestantism
2618-700: A fur trading settlement at the present location of Nashville near the Cumberland River . In 1739, the French constructed Fort Assumption under Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville on the Mississippi River at the present location of Memphis, which they used as a base against the Chickasaw during the 1739 Campaign of the Chickasaw Wars . In the 1750s and 1760s, longhunters from Virginia explored much of East and Middle Tennessee. Settlers from
2805-739: A group of Overmountain Men from Fort Watauga to the Battle of Kings Mountain in South Carolina, where they defeated the British. Three counties of the Washington District broke off from North Carolina in 1784 and formed the State of Franklin . Efforts to obtain admission to the Union failed, and the counties, now numbering eight, rejoined North Carolina by 1788. North Carolina ceded
2992-577: A majority of southern Appalachians still supported the Union. Though with opposition by Southern Unionist , middle and southern Appalachia became components of the Confederacy . In 1861, a Minnesota newspaper identified 161 counties in southern Appalachia—which the paper called "Alleghenia"—where Union support remained strong, and which might provide crucial support for the defeat of the Confederacy. However, many of these Unionists—especially in
3179-662: A more diversified economy. This was aided in part by massive federal investment in the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) and the city of Oak Ridge , which was established during World War II to house the Manhattan Project 's uranium enrichment facilities for the construction of the world's first atomic bombs . After the war, the Oak Ridge National Laboratory became a key center of scientific research. The state's economy
3366-471: A movement among conservationists to preserve what remained and allow the land to "heal". In 1911, Congress passed the Weeks Act , giving the federal government authority to create national forests east of the Mississippi River and control timber harvesting. Regional writers and business interests led a movement to create national parks in the eastern United States similar to Yosemite and Yellowstone in
3553-569: A population of 35,691 in the first United States census that year, including 3,417 slaves. As support for statehood grew among the settlers, Governor Blount called for elections, which were held in December 1793. The 13-member territorial House of Representatives first convened in Knoxville on February 24, 1794, to select ten members for the legislature's upper house, the council. The full legislature convened on August 25, 1794. In June 1795,
3740-566: A resurgence in popularity across the country during the American folk music revival of the 1960s, when musicologists such as Mike Seeger , John Cohen , and Ralph Rinzler traveled to remote parts of the region in search of musicians who they thought were unaffected by modern music. Today, dozens of annual music festivals held throughout the region preserve the Appalachian music tradition. Early Appalachian literature typically centered on
3927-418: A second referendum on secession by a 69–31% margin, becoming the last state to secede. In response, East Tennessee Unionists organized a convention in Knoxville with the goal of splitting the region to form a new state loyal to the Union. In the fall of 1861, Unionist guerrillas in East Tennessee burned bridges and attacked Confederate sympathizers, leading the Confederacy to invoke martial law in parts of
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#17327873455994114-496: A significant role in developing the instrumental aspects of Appalachian music, most notably with the introduction of the five-stringed banjo —one of the region's iconic symbols—in the late 18th century. Another instrument known in Appalachian culture was the Appalachian dulcimer which, practically, is a guitar-shaped instrument laid on its side with a flat bottom and the strings plucked in a manner to make alternating notes. In
4301-593: A small percentage of the region's present population, their most notable concentration being the reservation of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians in North Carolina. The Melungeons , a group of mixed African, European, and Native American ancestry, are scattered across northeastern Tennessee, eastern Kentucky, and southwestern Virginia. According to the American Factfinder 's 2013 data,
4488-746: A term meaning rapid results in poorer-performing schools. The Achievement School District is modeled after the Louisiana Recovery School District and takes elements from Michigan's state-run district for failing schools as well. Tennessee received funding from the federal government to create the Achievement School District when it won Race to the Top , a United States Department of Education contest created to spur innovation and reforms in state and local district K–12 education. The Achievement School District
4675-466: A village of indigenous peoples near present-day Tallahassee, Florida , whose name they transcribed as Apalchen or Apalachen ( IPA: [aˈpal(a)tʃen] ). The name was altered by the Spanish to Apalache ( Apalachee ) and used as a name for the tribe and region spreading well inland to the north. Pánfilo de Narváez 's expedition first entered Apalachee territory on June 15, 1528, and applied
4862-569: Is a dialect of Midland American English known as the Southern Midland dialect and is spoken primarily in central and southern Appalachia. The Northern Midland dialect is spoken in the northern parts of the region, while Pittsburgh English (more commonly known as "Pittsburghese") is strongly influenced by the Appalachian dialect. The Southern Appalachian dialect is considered part of the Southern American dialect , although
5049-561: Is captured in works such as Olive Tilford Dargan 's Call Home to the Heart (1932), Agnes Sligh Turnbull 's The Rolling Years (1936), James Still 's The River of Earth (1940), Harriette Simpson Arnow 's The Dollmaker (1954), and Harry Caudill 's Night Comes to the Cumberlands (1962). In the 1970s and 1980s, the rise of authors like Breece D'J Pancake , Dorothy Allison , and Lisa Alther brought greater literary diversity to
5236-632: Is characterized by relatively level plains dotted by rolling hills, and the Western Highland Rim and western Nashville Basin are covered with uneven rounded knobs with steep ravines separated by meandering streams. The Nashville Basin has rich, fertile farmland, and porous limestone bedrock very close to the surface underlies both the Nashville Basin and Eastern Highland Rim. This results in karst that forms numerous caves, sinkholes, depressions, and underground streams. West of
5423-420: Is dominated by the health care , music , finance , automotive , chemical , electronics , and tourism sectors, and cattle , soybeans , poultry , corn , and cotton are its primary agricultural products. Tennessee has played a major role in the development of many forms of popular music , including country , blues , rock and roll , soul , and gospel . Tennessee derives its name most directly from
5610-400: Is far enough from the coast to avoid any direct impact from a hurricane, its location makes it susceptible to the remnants of tropical cyclones , which weaken over land and can cause significant rainfall. The state annually averages about 50 days of thunderstorms, which can be severe with large hail and damaging winds. Tornadoes are possible throughout the state, with West and Middle Tennessee
5797-786: Is in the Green River watershed. All three of these basins are tributaries of the Ohio River watershed. Most of West Tennessee is in the Lower Mississippi River watershed. The entirety of the state is in the Mississippi River watershed , except for a small sliver near the southeastern corner traversed by the Conasauga River , which is part of the Mobile Bay watershed. Tennessee is within
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5984-650: Is known as the Trail of Tears , and an estimated 4,000 died along the way. As settlers pushed west of the Cumberland Plateau, a slavery-based agrarian economy took hold in these regions. Cotton planters used extensive slave labor on large plantation complexes in West Tennessee's fertile and flat terrain after the Jackson Purchase. Cotton also took hold in the Nashville Basin during this time. Entrepreneurs such as Montgomery Bell used slaves in
6171-669: Is now Appalachia over 16,000 years ago. The earliest discovered site is the Meadowcroft Rockshelter in Washington County, Pennsylvania , which some scientists claim is pre- Clovis culture . Several other Archaic period (8000–1000 BC) archaeological sites have been identified in the region, such as the St. Albans site in West Virginia and the Icehouse Bottom site in Tennessee. The presence of Africans in
6358-628: Is now Kentucky took part in George Rogers Clark 's Illinois campaign . Two years later, a group of Appalachian frontiersmen known as the Overmountain Men routed British forces at the Battle of Kings Mountain after rejecting a call by the British to disarm. After the war, residents throughout the Appalachian backcountry—especially the Monongahela region in western Pennsylvania and antebellum northwestern Virginia (now
6545-490: Is pronounced /æpəˈleɪtʃ(i)ə/ , also /æpəˈleɪʃ(i)ə/ , all with a third syllable like "lay". The use of northern pronunciations is controversial to some in the southern region. Despite not being in Appalachia, Appalachian Trail organizations in New England popularized the occasional use of the "sh" sound for the "ch" in northern dialects in the early 20th century. Native American hunter-gatherers first arrived in what
6732-576: Is relatively distinct, but the western escarpment is irregular, containing several long, crooked stream valleys separated by rocky cliffs with numerous waterfalls . The Cumberland Mountains , with peaks above 3,500 feet (1,100 m), comprise the northeastern part of the Appalachian Plateau in Tennessee, and the southeastern part of the Cumberland Plateau is divided by the Sequatchie Valley . The Cumberland Trail traverses
6919-622: Is the largest city by population to be sometimes considered within the Appalachian region. As defined by the 2020 census , the following metropolitan statistical areas and micropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) are sometimes included as part of Appalachia: An estimated 90% of Appalachia's earliest European settlers originated from the Anglo-Scottish border country—namely the English counties of Cumberland , Westmorland , Northumberland, County Durham , Lancashire and Yorkshire , and
7106-587: Is the most biodiverse national park, and the Duck River is the most biologically diverse waterway in North America. The Nashville Basin is renowned for its diversity of flora and fauna. Tennessee is home to 340 species of birds, 325 freshwater fish species, 89 mammals, 77 amphibians, and 61 reptiles. Forests cover about 52% of Tennessee's land area, with oak–hickory the dominant type. Appalachian oak–pine and cove hardwood forests are found in
7293-506: Is the most dominant denomination in Appalachia, although there is a significant Roman Catholic presence in the northern half of the region and urban areas, such as Pittsburgh and Scranton. The region's early Lowland and Ulster Scot immigrants brought Presbyterianism to Appalachia, eventually organizing into bodies such as the Cumberland Presbyterian Church . English Baptists —most of whom had been influenced by
7480-401: Is water. It is the 16th smallest state in land area. The state is about 440 miles (710 km) long from east to west and 112 miles (180 km) wide from north to south. Tennessee is geographically, culturally, economically, and legally divided into three Grand Divisions : East Tennessee , Middle Tennessee , and West Tennessee . It borders eight other states: Kentucky and Virginia to
7667-450: The / æ p ə ˈ l æ tʃ ən z / , and the cultural region of Appalachia is pronounced /ˈæpəˈlætʃ(i)ə/ , both with a third syllable like the "la" in "latch". This pronunciation is favored in the "core" region in the central and southern parts of the Appalachian range. In northern U.S. dialects, the mountains are pronounced / æ p ə ˈ l eɪ tʃ ən z / or / æ p ə ˈ l eɪ ʃ ən z / . The cultural region of Appalachia
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7854-525: The Manumission Intelligencier (later The Emancipator ), the nation's first exclusively anti-slavery newspaper. At the onset of the American Civil War , most Middle and West Tennesseans favored efforts to preserve their slavery-based economies, but many Middle Tennesseans were initially skeptical of secession. In East Tennessee, most people favored remaining in the Union. In 1860, slaves composed about 25% of Tennessee's population,
8041-429: The 2020 United States census is approximately 6.9 million. Tennessee is geographically, culturally, and legally divided into three Grand Divisions of East , Middle , and West Tennessee . Nashville is the state's capital and largest city, and anchors its largest metropolitan area. Tennessee has diverse terrain and landforms, and from east to west, contains a mix of cultural features characteristic of Appalachia ,
8228-637: The Appalachian Mountains in an effort to mitigate conflicts with the Natives. But migration across the mountains continued, and the first permanent European settlers began arriving in northeastern Tennessee in the late 1760s. Most of them were English , but nearly 20% were Scotch-Irish . They formed the Watauga Association in 1772, a semi-autonomous representative government, and three years later reorganized themselves into
8415-477: The Appalachian Mountains of the eastern United States. In the north, its boundaries stretch from the western Catskill Mountains of New York, continuing south through the Blue Ridge Mountains and Great Smoky Mountains into northern Georgia , Alabama , and Mississippi , with West Virginia near the center, being the only state entirely within the boundaries of Appalachia. In 2021, the region
8602-587: The Appalachian Regional Commission was created to further alleviate poverty in the region, mainly by diversifying the region's economy and helping to provide better health care and educational opportunities to the region's inhabitants. By 1990, Appalachia had largely joined the economic mainstream but still lagged behind the rest of the nation in most economic indicators. Since Appalachia lacks definite physiographical or topographical boundaries, there has been some disagreement over what
8789-883: The Blue Ridge Mountains , Ridge-and-Valley Appalachians , and Cumberland Plateau , part of the Appalachian Mountains ; the Highland Rim and Nashville Basin , part of the Interior Low Plateaus of the Interior Plains ; and the East Gulf Coastal Plain , part of the Atlantic Plains . Other regions include the southern tip of the Cumberland Mountains , the Western Tennessee Valley , and
8976-431: The Chattanooga campaign , Confederates attempted to besiege the Army of the Cumberland into surrendering, but reinforcements from the Army of the Tennessee under the command of Grant, William Tecumseh Sherman , and Joseph Hooker arrived. The Confederates were driven from the city at the battles of Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge in November 1863. Despite Unionist sentiment in East Tennessee, Confederates held
9163-511: The Cherokee town of Tanasi (or "Tanase", in syllabary : ᏔᎾᏏ) in present-day Monroe County, Tennessee , on the Tanasi River, now known as the Little Tennessee River . In 1567, Spanish explorer Captain Juan Pardo and his party encountered a Native American village named "Tanasqui" in the area while traveling inland from modern-day South Carolina ; however, it is unknown if this was the same settlement as Tanasi. The town appeared on British maps as early as 1725. Recent research suggests that
9350-534: The Cherokee National Forest , the Great Smoky Mountains National Park , and several federal wilderness areas and state parks. The Appalachian Trail roughly follows the North Carolina state line before shifting westward into Tennessee. Stretching west from the Blue Ridge Mountains for about 55 miles (89 km) are the Ridge-and-Valley Appalachians , also known as the Tennessee Valley or Great Valley of East Tennessee. This area consists of linear parallel ridges separated by valleys that trend northeast to southwest,
9537-423: The Civil War . While there were two major theaters of operation in the region—namely the Shenandoah Valley and the Chattanooga area—much of the violence was caused by bushwhackers and guerrilla warfare . The northernmost battles of the war were fought in Appalachia with the Battle of Buffington Island and the Battle of Salineville resulting from Morgan's Raid . Large numbers of livestock were killed (grazing
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#17327873455999724-461: The Colony of South Carolina built Fort Loudoun on the Little Tennessee River in 1756, the first British settlement in what is now Tennessee and the westernmost British outpost to that date. Hostilities erupted between the British and the Cherokees into an armed conflict , and a siege of the fort ended with its surrender in 1760. After the French and Indian War , Britain issued the Royal Proclamation of 1763 , which forbade settlements west of
9911-406: The Confederacy , and most of the eastern region harboring pro - Union sentiment. As a result, Tennessee was the last state to officially secede from the Union and join the Confederacy , and the first former Confederate state readmitted to the Union after the war had ended during the Reconstruction era . During the 20th century, Tennessee transitioned from a predominantly agrarian society to
10098-430: The Emancipation Proclamation was announced, Tennessee was largely held by Union forces and thus not among the states enumerated, so it freed no slaves there. Andrew Johnson declared all slaves in Tennessee free on October 24, 1864. On February 22, 1865, the legislature approved an amendment to the state constitution prohibiting slavery, which was approved by voters the following month, and would go into effect later on in
10285-440: The French and Indian War in 1763 lured settlers deeper into the mountains, namely to upper east Tennessee , northwestern North Carolina, upstate South Carolina , and central Kentucky. During the 18th century, enslaved Africans were brought to Appalachia by European settlers of trans-Appalachia Kentucky and the upper Blue Ridge Valley. According to the first census of 1790, more than 3,000 enslaved Africans were transported across
10472-409: The Great Smoky Mountains , Bald Mountains , Unicoi Mountains , Unaka Mountains , and Iron Mountains . These mountains, which average 5,000 feet (1,500 m) above sea level in Tennessee, contain some of the highest elevations in eastern North America. The state's border with North Carolina roughly follows the highest peaks of this range, including Kuwohi. Most of the Blue Ridge area is protected by
10659-425: The Manhattan Project and advancements in supercomputing and nuclear power . By the 1950s, poor farming techniques and the loss of jobs to mechanization in the mining industry had left much of central and southern Appalachia poverty-stricken. The lack of jobs also led to widespread difficulties with outmigration. Beginning in the 1930s, federal agencies such as the Tennessee Valley Authority began investing in
10846-441: The Mississippi Alluvial Plain . The state's highest point, which is also the third-highest peak in eastern North America, is Kuwohi , at 6,643 feet (2,025 m) above sea level. Its lowest point, 178 feet (54 m), is on the Mississippi River at the Mississippi state line in Memphis. Tennessee has the most caves in the United States, with more than 10,000 documented. Geological formations in Tennessee largely correspond with
11033-425: The Muscogee Creek , Yuchi , and Shawnee . By the early 18th century, most Natives in Tennessee had disappeared, most likely wiped out by diseases introduced by the Spaniards. The Cherokee began migrating into what is now eastern Tennessee from what is now Virginia in the latter 17th century, possibly to escape expanding European settlement and diseases in the north. They forced the Creek, Yuchi, and Shawnee out of
11220-422: The Royal Colonial Boundary of 1665 , but due to faulty surveys, begins north of this line in the east, and to the west, gradually veers north before shifting south onto the actual 36°30′ parallel at the Tennessee River in West Tennessee. Uncertainties in the latter 19th century over the location of the state's border with Virginia culminated in the U.S. Supreme Court settling the matter in 1893 , which resulted in
11407-438: The Separate Baptist and Regular Baptist movements—were also common on the Appalachian frontier, and today are represented in the region by groups such as the Free Will Baptists , the Southern Baptists , Missionary Baptists , and "old-time" groups such as the United Baptists and Primitive Baptists . Circuit riders such as Francis Asbury helped spread Methodism to Appalachia in the early 19th century, and today 9.2% of
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#173278734559911594-429: The State of Tennessee , is a landlocked state in the Southeastern region of the United States . It borders Kentucky to the north, Virginia to the northeast, North Carolina to the east, Georgia , Alabama , and Mississippi to the south, Arkansas to the southwest, and Missouri to the northwest. Tennessee is the 36th-largest by area and the 15th-most populous of the 50 states. Tennessee's population as of
11781-433: The Tennessee Centennial and International Exposition in Nashville. A full-scale replica of the Parthenon in Athens was designed by architect William Crawford Smith and constructed for the celebration, owing to the city's reputation as the "Athens of the South". Due to increasing racial segregation and poor standards of living, many black Tennesseans fled to industrial cities in the Northeast and Midwest as part of
11968-401: The Tennessee River , and the Mississippi River forms its western border. The Great Smoky Mountains National Park , the nation's most visited national park, is in eastern Tennessee. Tennessee is rooted in the Watauga Association , a 1772 frontier pact generally regarded as the first constitutional government west of the Appalachian Mountains . Its name derives from Tanasi ( ᏔᎾᏏ ),
12155-446: The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) was created in 1933 to provide electricity, jobs, flood control, improved waterway navigation, agricultural development, and economic modernization to the Tennessee River Valley . The TVA built several hydroelectric dams in the state in the 1930s and 1940s, which inundated communities and thousands of farmland acreage, and forcibly displaced families via eminent domain . The agency quickly grew into
12342-435: The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers operate many hydroelectric dams on the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers and their tributaries, which form large reservoirs throughout the state. About half the state's land area is in the Tennessee Valley drainage basin of the Tennessee River. The Cumberland River basin covers the northern half of Middle Tennessee and a small portion of East Tennessee. A small part of north-central Tennessee
12529-417: The U.S. Navy captured the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers in February 1862 at the battles of Fort Henry and Fort Donelson . Grant then proceeded south to Pittsburg Landing and held off a Confederate counterattack at Shiloh in April in what was at the time the bloodiest battle of the war. Memphis fell to the Union in June after a naval battle on the Mississippi River. Union strength in Middle Tennessee
12716-402: The Upland South , and the Deep South . The Blue Ridge Mountains along the eastern border reach some of the highest elevations in eastern North America, and the Cumberland Plateau contains many scenic valleys and waterfalls . The central part of the state is marked by cavernous bedrock and irregular rolling hills, and level, fertile plains define West Tennessee. The state is twice bisected by
12903-456: The Upland South , following Protestant Scotch-Irish migrations to the southern and Midwestern United States in the 18th and 19th centuries. The Upland South region includes the Ozark Plateau in Missouri , Arkansas , and Oklahoma , an area which is not included in the ARC definition. While exploring inland along the northern coast of Florida in 1528, the members of the Narváez expedition , including Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca , found
13090-401: The Washington District to support the cause of the American Revolutionary War . The next year, after an unsuccessful petition to Virginia, North Carolina agreed to annex the Washington District to provide protection from Native American attacks. In 1775, Richard Henderson negotiated a series of treaties with the Cherokee to sell the lands of the Watauga settlements at Sycamore Shoals on
13277-544: The whitewater slalom events at the Atlanta Summer Olympic Games were held on the Ocoee River in Polk County . In 2002, Tennessee amended its constitution to establish a lottery . In 2006, the state constitution was amended to outlaw same-sex marriage . This amendment was invalidated by the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court case Obergefell v. Hodges . On December 23, 2008, the largest industrial waste spill in United States history occurred at TVA's Kingston Fossil Plant when more than 1.1 billion gallons of coal ash slurry
13464-437: The yeoman farmers of Appalachia and their wealthier lowland counterparts continued to grow, especially as the latter dominated most state legislatures. People in Appalachia began to feel slighted over what they considered unfair taxation methods and lack of state funding for improvements (especially for roads). In the northern half of the region, the lowland elites consisted largely of industrial and business interests, whereas in
13651-531: The "Cotton Capital of the World" during the late 19th century, and Nashville, Knoxville, and several smaller cities saw modest industrialization. Northerners also began exploiting the coalfields and mineral resources in the Appalachian Mountains. To pay off debts and alleviate overcrowded prisons, the state turned to convict leasing , providing prisoners to mining companies as strikebreakers , which
13838-571: The 1860s and native novelists such as Mary Noailles Murfree . Works such as Rebecca Harding Davis 's Life in the Iron Mills (1861), Emma Bell Miles ' The Spirit of the Mountains (1905), Catherine Marshall's Christy (1912), Horace Kephart 's Our Southern Highlanders (1913) marked a shift in the region's literature from local color to realism. The transition from an agrarian society to an industrial society and its effects on Appalachia
14025-579: The 18th century, Appalachia (then known simply as the "backcountry") began to distinguish itself from its wealthier lowland and coastal neighbors to the east. Frontiersmen often argued with lowland and tidewater elites over taxes, sometimes to the point of armed revolts such as the Regulator Movement (1767–1771) in North Carolina. In 1778, at the height of the American Revolution , backwoodsmen from Pennsylvania, Virginia, and what
14212-515: The 1960s the region had failed to capitalize on any long-term benefits from these two industries. Beginning in the 1930s, the federal government sought to alleviate poverty in the Appalachian region with a series of New Deal initiatives, specifically the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). The TVA was responsible for the construction of hydroelectric dams that provide a vast amount of electricity and that support programs for better farming practices, regional planning, and economic development. In 1965,
14399-507: The 21st century. Since 2001, a number of the region's public schools were threatened with loss of funding due to difficulties fulfilling the demands of No Child Left Behind . Appalachian music is one of the best-known manifestations of Appalachian culture. Traditional Appalachian music (called old-time music ) is derived primarily from the English, Irish, and Scottish ballad and fiddle traditions. African-American blues musicians played
14586-678: The 36th and final state necessary to ratify the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution , which gave women the right to vote . In 1925, John T. Scopes , a high school teacher in Dayton , was tried and convicted for teaching evolution in violation of the state's recently passed Butler Act . Scopes was prosecuted by former Secretary of State and presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan and defended by attorney Clarence Darrow . The case
14773-553: The ARC's pragmatic definition. The term " Greater Appalachia " was introduced by American journalist Colin Woodard in his 2011 book, American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America . Sean Trende , senior elections analyst at RealClearPolitics , defines "Greater Appalachia" in his 2012 book The Lost Majority as including both the Appalachian Mountains region and
14960-520: The Appalachian Mountains dates back to the 16th century with the arrival of European colonists. Enslaved Africans were first brought to America during the 16th-century Spanish expeditions to the mountainous regions of the South. In 1526 enslaved Africans were brought to the Pee Dee River region of western North Carolina by Spanish explorer Lucas Vazquez de Ayllõn . Enslaved Africans also accompanied
15147-509: The Appalachian region. Sociologists such as James Brown and Cratis Williams and authors such as Harry Caudill and Michael Harrington brought attention to the region's plight in the 1960s, prompting Congress to create the Appalachian Regional Commission in 1965. The commission's efforts helped to stem the tide of outmigration and diversify the region's economies. Although there have been drastic improvements in
15334-576: The Blue Mountains in North Carolina and Tennessee. Although Swedes and Finns formed only a tiny portion of the Appalachian settlers, it was Swedish and Finnish settlers of New Sweden who brought the northern European woodsman skills such as log cabin construction which formed the basis of backwoods Appalachian material culture. Germans were a major pioneer group to migrate to Appalachia, settling mainly in western Pennsylvania and southwest Virginia . Smaller numbers of Germans were also among
15521-557: The Blue Ridge Mountains and Cumberland Plateau, and bottomland hardwood forests are common throughout the Gulf Coastal Plain. Pine forests are also found throughout the state. The Southern Appalachian spruce–fir forest in the highest elevations of the Blue Ridge Mountains is considered the second-most endangered ecosystem in the country. Some of the last remaining large American chestnut trees grow in
15708-574: The Blue Ridge Mountains and on the Cumberland Plateau. Tennessee has the third-highest number of amphibian species, with the Great Smoky Mountains home to the most salamander species in the world. The state ranks second in the nation for the diversity of its freshwater fish species. Most of Tennessee has a humid subtropical climate , with the exception of some of the higher elevations in the Appalachians, which are classified as
15895-562: The Carolinas filled up, immigrants began pushing further and further westward into the Appalachian Mountains. A relatively large proportion of the early backcountry immigrants were Ulster Scots —later known as " Scotch-Irish ", a group mostly originating from southern Scotland and northern England, many of whom had settled in Ulster Ireland prior to migrating to America —who were seeking cheaper land and freedom from prejudice as
16082-513: The Cherokees adapted the name from the Yuchi word Tana-tsee-dgee , meaning "brother-waters-place" or "where-the-waters-meet". The modern spelling, Tennessee , is attributed to Governor James Glen of South Carolina, who used this spelling in his official correspondence during the 1750s. In 1788, North Carolina created " Tennessee County ", and in 1796, a constitutional convention , organizing
16269-792: The Chickasaw to sell the land between the Mississippi and Tennessee Rivers to the United States, which included all of West Tennessee and became known as the " Jackson Purchase ". The Cherokee moved their capital from Georgia to the Red Clay Council Grounds in southeastern Tennessee in 1832, due to new laws forcing them from their previous capital at New Echota . In 1838 and 1839, U.S. troops forcibly removed thousands of Cherokees and their black slaves from their homes in southeastern Tennessee and forced them to march to Indian Territory in modern-day Oklahoma . This event
16456-488: The Civil War, mandatory education laws and state assistance helped larger communities begin to establish grade schools and high schools. During the same period, many of the region's institutions of higher education were established or greatly expanded. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, service organizations such as Pi Beta Phi and various religious organizations established settlement schools and mission schools in
16643-1166: The Company of Women , Hazard Zones , Gloria , Running , Morgantown , Lyndon Johnson and the Majorettes , Looking Good ) Maurice Manning ( Bucolics , A Companion for Owls ), Anne Shelby ( Appalachian Studies , We Keep a Store ), George Ella Lyon ( Borrowed Children , Don't You Remember? ), Pamela Duncan ( Moon Women , The Big Beautiful ), David Joy ( Where All Light Tends to Go , The Weight of This World ), Chris Offutt ( No Heroes , The Good Brother ), Charles Frazier ( Cold Mountain , Thirteen Moons ), Sharyn McCrumb ( The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter ), Robert Morgan ( Gap Creek ), Jim Wayne Miller ( The Brier Poems ), Gurney Norman ( Divine Right's Trip , Kinfolks ), Ron Rash ( Serena ), Elizabeth Madox Roberts ( The Great Meadow , The Time of Man ), Thomas Wolfe ( Look Homeward Angel , You Can't Go Home Again ), Rachel Carson ( The Sea Around Us , Silent Spring ; Presidential Medal of Freedom ), and Jeannette Walls ( The Glass Castle ). Appalachian literature crosses with
16830-668: The French Lick. These settlers constructed Fort Nashborough , which they named for Francis Nash , a brigadier general of the Continental Army . The next year, the settlers signed the Cumberland Compact , which established a representative government for the colony called the Cumberland Association . This settlement later grew into the city of Nashville. That same year John Sevier led
17017-769: The Highland Rim is the Western Tennessee Valley , which consists of about 10 miles (16 km) in width of hilly land along the banks of the Tennessee River. West of this is the Gulf Coastal Plain , a broad feature that begins at the Gulf of Mexico and extends northward into southern Illinois . The plain begins in the east with low rolling hills and wide stream valleys, known as the West Tennessee Highlands, and gradually levels out to
17204-573: The Lowland Scottish counties of Ayrshire , Dumfriesshire, Roxburghshire , Berwickshire and Wigtownshire . Most of these were from families who had been resettled in the Ulster Plantation in northern Ireland in the 17th century, but some came directly from the Anglo-Scottish border region. In America, these people are often grouped under the single name " Scotch-Irish " or "Scots-Irish". Many of these Scots-Irish emigrated to
17391-502: The Nashville Basin and are being used to help breed blight -resistant trees. Middle Tennessee is home to many unusual and rare ecosystems known as cedar glades , which occur in areas with shallow limestone bedrock that is largely barren of overlying soil and contain many endemic plant species. Common mammals found throughout Tennessee include white-tailed deer , red and gray foxes , coyotes , raccoons , opossums , wild turkeys , rabbits , and squirrels . Black bears are found in
17578-721: The Scotch-Irish were looked down upon by other more powerful elements in society. Others included Germans from the Palatinate region and English settlers from the Anglo-Scottish border country. Between 1730 and 1763, immigrants trickled into western Pennsylvania , the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, and western Maryland . Thomas Walker's discovery of the Cumberland Gap in 1750 and the end of
17765-484: The Southern Appalachia has a white majority, comprising 84% of the population. African Americans are 7% and Hispanics or Latinos are 6% of the population. Asians and Pacific Islanders are 1.5% of the population. The counties have great differences among themselves, in terms of racial and ethnic diversity. Christianity is the main religion in Appalachia, which is characterized by a sense of independence and
17952-456: The U.S. Supreme Court ruled racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, Oak Ridge High School in 1955 became the first school in Tennessee to be integrated . The next year, nearby Clinton High School was integrated, and Tennessee National Guard troops were sent in after pro-segregationists threatened violence. Between February and May 1960,
18139-522: The United States "Alleghania" or "Appalachia" in place of "America", since the latter name belonged to Latin America too. Edgar Allan Poe later took up the idea and considered Appalachia a much better name than America or Alleghania; he thought it better defined the United States as a distinct geographical entity, separate from the rest of the Americas, and he also thought it did honor to both Irving and
18326-683: The United States government into areas of science and technology were established in the mid-20th century, notably with NASA 's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, crucial with the design of Apollo program launch vehicles and propulsion of the Space Shuttle program , and at adjacent facilities Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tennessee with
18513-490: The Whig Party had disintegrated. Sentiments in northern Appalachia had shifted to the pro- abolitionist Republican Party . In southern Appalachia, abolitionists still constituted a radical minority, although several smaller opposition parties (most of which were both pro- Union and pro-slavery) were formed to oppose the planter-dominated Southern Democrats . As states in the southern United States moved toward secession ,
18700-534: The Woodland period. Later generations of Woodland peoples constructed the first mounds. Rapid civilizational development occurred during the Mississippian period, when Indigenous peoples developed organized chiefdoms and constructed numerous ceremonial structures throughout the state. Spanish conquistadors who explored the region in the 16th century encountered some of the Mississippian peoples, including
18887-566: The area for most of the war. A few days after the fall of Chattanooga, Confederates led by James Longstreet unsuccessfully campaigned to take control of Knoxville by attacking Union General Ambrose Burnside 's Fort Sanders . The capture of Chattanooga allowed Sherman to launch the Atlanta campaign from the city in May 1864. The last major battles in the state came when Army of Tennessee regiments under John Bell Hood invaded Middle Tennessee in
19074-708: The area to the federal government in 1790, after which it was organized into the Southwest Territory on May 26 of that year. The act allowed the territory to petition for statehood once the population reached 60,000. Administration of the territory was divided between the Washington District and the Mero District, the latter of which consisted of the Cumberland Association and was named for Spanish territorial governor Esteban Rodríguez Miró . President George Washington appointed William Blount as territorial governor. The Southwest Territory recorded
19261-686: The banks of the Watauga River . An agreement to sell land for the Transylvania Colony , which included the territory in Tennessee north of the Cumberland River, was also signed. Later that year, Daniel Boone , under Henderson's employment, blazed a trail from Fort Chiswell in Virginia through the Cumberland Gap , which became part of the Wilderness Road , a major thoroughfare into Tennessee and Kentucky. The Chickamauga,
19448-523: The commission was established, counties were added based on economic need, however, rather than any cultural parameters. The first major attempt to map Appalachia as a distinctive cultural region came in the 1890s with the efforts of Berea College president William Goodell Frost , whose "Appalachian America" included 194 counties in 8 states. In 1921, John C. Campbell published The Southern Highlander and His Homeland in which he modified Frost's map to include 254 counties in 9 states. A landmark survey of
19635-406: The country's largest electric utility and initiated a period of dramatic economic growth and transformation that brought many new industries and employment opportunities to the state. During World War II , East Tennessee was chosen for the production of weapons-grade fissile enriched uranium as part of the Manhattan Project , a research and development undertaking led by the U.S. to produce
19822-458: The cultural groups who inhabited the area before European contact are unknown, but archaeologists have named several distinct cultural phases, including the Archaic (8000–1000 BC), Woodland (1000 BC–1000 AD), and Mississippian (1000–1600 AD) periods. The Archaic peoples first domesticated dogs, and plants such as squash , corn , gourds , and sunflowers were first grown in Tennessee during
20009-408: The division between Middle and West Tennessee. Tennessee's eastern boundary roughly follows the highest crests of the Blue Ridge Mountains , and the Mississippi River forms its western boundary. Due to flooding of the Mississippi that has changed its path, the state's western boundary deviates from the river in some places. The northern border was originally defined as 36°30′ north latitude and
20196-455: The division of Bristol between the two states. An 1818 survey erroneously placed Tennessee's southern border 1 mile (1.6 km) south of the 35th parallel ; Georgia legislators continue to dispute this placement , as it prevents Georgia from accessing the Tennessee River. Marked by a diversity of landforms and topographies, Tennessee features six principal physiographic provinces , from east to west, which are part of three larger regions:
20383-521: The eastern escarpment of the Cumberland Plateau and Cumberland Mountains. West of the Cumberland Plateau is the Highland Rim , an elevated plain that surrounds the Nashville Basin , a geological dome . Both of these physiographic provinces are part of the Interior Low Plateaus of the larger Interior Plains . The Highland Rim is Tennessee's largest geographic region, and is often split into eastern and western halves. The Eastern Highland Rim
20570-554: The end of Reconstruction . Pittsburgh as well as Knoxville grew into major industrial centers, especially regarding iron and steel production. By 1900, the Chattanooga area of north Georgia and northern Alabama had experienced similar changes with manufacturing booms in Atlanta and Birmingham at the edge of the Appalachian region. Railroad construction gave the greater nation access to the vast coalfields in central Appalachia, making its economy greatly dependent on coal mining. As
20757-623: The entirety of East Tennessee from northwestern Alabama to southwestern Virginia, and is considered one of the most active zones in the Southeastern United States, frequently producing low-magnitude earthquakes. The New Madrid seismic zone in the northwestern part of the state produced a series of devastating earthquakes between December 1811 and February 1812 that formed Reelfoot Lake near Tiptonville . The southwestern Blue Ridge Mountains lie within Tennessee's eastern edge, and are divided into several subranges, namely
20944-419: The expeditions of Fernando de Soto in 1540 and Juan Pardo in 1566, who both traveled through Appalachia. The de Soto and Pardo expeditions explored the mountains of South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Georgia, and encountered complex agrarian societies consisting of Muskogean-speaking inhabitants. De Soto indicated that much of the region west of the mountains was part of the domain of Coosa ,
21131-401: The fact that other states had not yet ratified it. Johnson became vice president when Lincoln was reelected , and president after Lincoln's assassination in May 1865. On July 24, 1866, Tennessee became the first Confederate state to have its elected members readmitted to Congress. The years after the Civil War were characterized by tension and unrest between blacks and former Confederates,
21318-593: The fall of 1864 in an effort to draw Sherman back. They were checked by John Schofield at Franklin in November and completely dispersed by George Thomas at Nashville in December. On April 27, 1865, the worst maritime disaster in American history occurred when the Sultana steamboat, which was transporting freed Union prisoners, exploded in the Mississippi River north of Memphis, killing 1,168 people. When
21505-463: The feuds as the natural products of profound ignorance, poverty, and isolation, and perhaps even inbreeding . In reality, the leading participants were typically well-to-do local elites with networks of clients who, like the Northeast and Chicago political machines , fought for their power over local and regional politics. Logging firms' rapid devastation of the forests of the Appalachians sparked
21692-640: The first wave of the Great Migration between 1915 and 1930. Many residents of rural parts of Tennessee relocated to larger cities during this time for more lucrative employment opportunities. As part of the Temperance movement , Tennessee became the first state in the nation to effectively ban the sale, transportation, and production of alcohol in a series of laws passed between 1907 and 1917. During Prohibition , illicit production of moonshine became extremely common in East Tennessee, particularly in
21879-611: The general direction of the entire Appalachian range. Most of these ridges are low, but some of the higher ones are commonly called mountains. Numerous tributaries join to form the Tennessee River in the Ridge and Valley region. The Cumberland Plateau rises to the west of the Tennessee Valley, with an average elevation of 2,000 feet (610 m). This landform is part of the larger Appalachian Plateau and consists mostly of flat-topped tablelands . The plateau's eastern edge
22066-621: The goal to be eventually released back into city and state school systems. They acquire staff from programs such as the Memphis Teacher Residency and Teach for America . Malika Anderson was named the superintendent of the Achievement School District in November 2015 by the Tennessee Department of Education . She was preceded by Chris Barbic, who served in the role from 2011 to 2015. The district depends on charter management organizations (CMOs) in order to run and fund these charter schools. CMOs come from various sources such as
22253-655: The habitats of native species and contributed significantly to the decline in agricultural land use in larger Appalachia. There are growing IT sectors in many parts of the region. Frontier , the fastest supercomputer in the world, is housed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. In the 21st century, Appalachia has swung heavily towards the Republican Party . Due to topographic considerations, several major cities are located near but not included in Appalachia. These include Cincinnati , Ohio, Cleveland , Ohio, Nashville, Tennessee , and Atlanta , Georgia. Pittsburgh
22440-509: The initial wave of migrants to the southern mountains. The initial wave of Appalachian ethnography and anthropology in the first half of the 20th century disregarded this German culture, instead choosing to focus almost solely on the Scots-Irish component of Appalachian culture. This was likely due to Germanophobia caused by the two World Wars, and has since begun to be corrected. In the 19th century, Welsh immigrants were brought into
22627-530: The initiative failed after Tennessee's governor ordered the Confederate Army to occupy the region, forcing East Tennessee's Unionists to flee to the north or go into hiding. The one exception was the so-called Free and Independent State of Scott , though it was never recognized by either the Union or the Confederacy and thus would later be invaded by Confederates. Both central and southern Appalachia suffered tremendous violence and turmoil during
22814-526: The juncture of the Holston and French Broad rivers in Knoxville, flows southwest to Chattanooga, and exits into Alabama before reemerging in the western part of the state and flowing north into Kentucky. Its major tributaries include the Clinch , Little Tennessee , Hiwassee , Sequatchie , Elk , Beech , Buffalo , Duck , and Big Sandy rivers. The Cumberland River flows through the north-central part of
23001-582: The larger genre of Southern literature . Internationally renowned writers such as William Faulkner and Cormac McCarthy have made notable contributions to the American canon with tales set within Appalachia. McCarthy's Suttree (1979) is an intense vision of the squalidness and brutality of life along the Tennessee River , in the heart of Appalachia. Other McCarthy novels set in Appalachia include The Orchard Keeper (1965), Outer Dark (1968), and Child of God (1973). Appalachia also serves as
23188-678: The legislature allowed African American men to vote, disenfranchised former Confederates, and with martial law, took action against the Ku Klux Klan , which was founded in December 1865 in Pulaski as a vigilante group to advance former Confederates' interests. In 1870, Southern Democrats regained control of the state legislature, and over the next two decades, passed Jim Crow laws to enforce racial segregation . A total of 251 lynchings , predominately of Black people, took place in Tennessee. A number of epidemics swept through Tennessee in
23375-403: The legislature conducted a census of the territory, which recorded a population of 77,263, including 10,613 slaves, and a poll that showed 6,504 in favor of statehood and 2,562 opposed. Elections for a constitutional convention were held in December 1795, and the delegates convened in Knoxville on January 17, 1796, to begin drafting a state constitution. During this convention, the name Tennessee
23562-425: The lowest share among the states that joined the Confederacy . Tennessee provided more Union troops than any other Confederate state, and the second-highest number of Confederate troops, behind Virginia. Due to its central location, Tennessee was a crucial state during the war and saw more military engagements than any state except Virginia. After Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 , secessionists in
23749-400: The most recent world's fair to be held in the U.S. In 1986, Tennessee held a yearlong celebration of the state's heritage and culture called "Homecoming '86". Tennessee celebrated its bicentennial in 1996 with a yearlong celebration called "Tennessee 200". A new state park that traces the state's history, Bicentennial Mall , was opened at the foot of Capitol Hill in Nashville. The same year,
23936-408: The most vulnerable. The state averages 15 tornadoes annually. They can be severe, and the state leads the nation in the percentage of total tornadoes that have fatalities. Winter storms such as in 1993 and 2021 occur occasionally, and ice storms are fairly common. Fog is a persistent problem in some areas, especially in East Tennessee. Tennessee is divided into 95 counties , each of which has
24123-524: The mountain areas of North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama—were "conditional" Unionists in that they opposed secession but also opposed violence to prevent secession, and thus when their respective state legislatures voted to secede, some would either shift their support to the Confederacy, or flee the state. Kentucky sought to remain neutral at the outset of the conflict, opting not to supply troops to either side. After Virginia voted to secede, several mountain counties in northwestern Virginia rejected
24310-779: The mountains into East Tennessee and more than 12,000 into the Kentucky mountains. Between 1790 and 1840, a series of treaties with the Cherokee and other Native American tribes opened up lands in north Georgia , north Alabama , the Tennessee Valley , the Cumberland Plateau , and the Great Smoky Mountains . The last of these treaties culminated in the removal of the bulk of the Cherokee population (as well as Choctaw , Chickasaw and others) from
24497-664: The mountains, and continued for many decades afterward. Sgt. Alvin C. York of Fentress County became one of the most famous and honored American soldiers of World War I . He received the Congressional Medal of Honor for single-handedly capturing an entire German machine gun regiment during the Meuse–Argonne offensive . On July 9, 1918, Tennessee suffered the worst rail accident in U.S. history when two passenger trains collided head on in Nashville, killing 101 and injuring 171. On August 18, 1920, Tennessee became
24684-490: The name. Now spelled "Appalachian", it is the fourth oldest surviving European place-name in the U.S. After the de Soto expedition in 1540, Spanish cartographers began to apply the name of the tribe to the Appalachian Mountain range. The first cartographic appearance of Apalchen is on Diego Gutiérrez 's 1562 map; the first use for the mountain range is the 1565 map by Jacques le Moyne de Morgues . Le Moyne
24871-547: The nationwide demand for lumber skyrocketed, lumber firms turned to the virgin forests of southern Appalachia, using sawmill and logging railroad innovations to reach remote timber stands. The Tri-Cities area of Tennessee and Virginia and the Kanawha Valley of West Virginia became major petrochemical production centers. The late 19th and early 20th centuries also saw the development of various regional stereotypes. Attempts by President Rutherford B. Hayes to enforce
25058-430: The natives after whom the Appalachian Mountains had been named. At the time, however, the United States had already reached far beyond the greater Appalachian region, but the "magnificence" of Appalachia Poe considered enough to rechristen the nation with a name that would be unique to its character. However, Poe's popular influence only grew decades after his death, and so the name was never seriously considered. By 1860,
25245-520: The new state out of the Southwest Territory , adopted "Tennessee" as the state's name. The first inhabitants of Tennessee were Paleo-Indians who arrived about 12,000 years ago at the end of the Last Glacial Period . Archaeological excavations indicate that the lower Tennessee Valley was heavily populated by Ice Age hunter-gatherers , and Middle Tennessee is believed to have been rich with game animals such as mastodons . The names of
25432-661: The nickname "The Volunteer State" during the War of 1812 , when 3,500 Tennesseans answered a recruitment call by the General Assembly for the war effort. These soldiers, under Andrew Jackson 's command, played a major role in the American victory at the Battle of New Orleans in 1815, the last major battle of the war. Several Tennesseans took part in the Texas Revolution of 1835–36, including Governor Sam Houston and Congressman and frontiersman Davy Crockett , who
25619-582: The north, North Carolina to the east, Georgia , Alabama , and Mississippi on the south, and Arkansas and Missouri on the west. It is tied with Missouri as the state bordering the most other states. Tennessee is trisected by the Tennessee River , and its geographical center is in Murfreesboro . Nearly three–fourths of the state is in the Central Time Zone , with most of East Tennessee on Eastern Time . The Tennessee River forms most of
25806-411: The north-central part of West Virginia)—refused to pay a tax placed on whiskey by the new American government, leading to what became known as the Whiskey Rebellion . The resulting tighter federal controls in the Monongahela valley resulted in many whiskey/bourbon makers migrating via the Ohio River to Kentucky and Tennessee where the industry could flourish. In the early 19th century, the rift between
25993-466: The observations of people from outside the region, such as Henry Timberlake 's Memoirs (1765) and Thomas Jefferson 's Notes on the State of Virginia (1784), although there are notable exceptions, including Davy Crockett 's A Narrative of the Life of Davy Crockett (1834). Travellers' accounts published in 19th-century magazines gave rise to Appalachian local color , which reached its height with George Washington Harris 's Sut Lovingood character of
26180-429: The ordinance and with the help of the Union Army established a separate state, admitted to the Union as West Virginia in 1863. However, half the counties included in the new state, comprising two-thirds of its territory, were secessionist and pro-Confederate. This caused great difficulty for the Unionist state government in Wheeling , both during and after the war. A similar effort occurred in East Tennessee. Still,
26367-453: The parts of the region south of the Mason–Dixon line , the lowland elites consisted of large-scale land-owning planters . The Whig Party , formed in the 1830s, drew widespread support from disaffected Appalachians. Tensions between the mountain counties and state governments sometimes reached the point of mountain counties threatening to break off and form separate states. In 1832, bickering between western Virginia and eastern Virginia over
26554-457: The production arm of the Manhattan Project in Oak Ridge, which enriched uranium at three major facilities for use in atomic bombs. The first of the bombs was detonated in Alamogordo, New Mexico , in a test code-named Trinity , and the second, nicknamed " Little Boy ", was dropped on Imperial Japan at the end of World War II. After the war, the Oak Ridge National Laboratory became an institution for scientific and technological research. After
26741-467: The production of iron in the Western Highland Rim, and slaves also cultivated such crops as tobacco and corn throughout the Highland Rim. East Tennessee's geography did not allow for large plantations as in the middle and western parts of the state, and as a result, slavery became increasingly rare in the region. A strong abolition movement developed in East Tennessee, beginning as early as 1797, and in 1819, Elihu Embree of Jonesborough began publishing
26928-404: The project, and in 1971, the U.S. Supreme Court sided with the group and established the framework for judicial review of government agencies in the landmark case of Citizens to Preserve Overton Park v. Volpe . TVA's construction of the Tellico Dam in Loudon County became the subject of national controversy in the 1970s when the endangered snail darter fish was reported to be affected by
27115-419: The project. After lawsuits by environmental groups, the debate was decided by the U.S. Supreme Court case Tennessee Valley Authority v. Hill in 1978, leading to amendments of the Endangered Species Act . The 1982 World's Fair was held in Knoxville. Also known as the Knoxville International Energy Exposition, the fair's theme was "Energy Turns the World". The exposition was one of the most successful, and
27302-631: The region encompasses. The most commonly used modern definition of Appalachia is the one initially defined by the Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC) in 1965 and expanded over subsequent decades. The region defined by the commission currently includes 420 counties and eight independent cities in 13 states, including all 55 counties in West Virginia , 14 counties in New York, 52 in Pennsylvania , 32 in Ohio , 3 in Maryland , 54 in Kentucky , 25 counties and 8 cities in Virginia , 29 in North Carolina , 52 in Tennessee , 6 in South Carolina , 37 in Georgia , 37 in Alabama , and 24 in Mississippi . When
27489-542: The region for their mining and metallurgical expertise, and by 1900 over 100,000 Welsh immigrants were living in western Pennsylvania alone. Thousands of German-speaking Swiss migrated to Appalachia in the second half of the 19th century, and their descendants remain in places such as East Bernstadt, Kentucky , and Gruetli-Laager, Tennessee . The coal mining and manufacturing boom in the late 19th and early 20th centuries brought large numbers of Italians and Eastern Europeans to Appalachia, although most of these families left
27676-416: The region in modern-day New York state and Pennsylvania. By the mid-18th century the French had outposts such as Fort Duquesne and Fort Le Boeuf controlling the access points of the Allegheny River and upper Ohio River valleys after exploration by Celeron de Bienville . European migration into Appalachia began in the 18th century. As lands in eastern Pennsylvania, the Tidewater region of Virginia and
27863-431: The region in the following decade by the United States Department of Agriculture defined the region as consisting of 206 counties in 6 states. In 1984, Karl Raitz and Richard Ulack expanded the ARC's definition to include 445 counties in 13 states, although they removed all counties in Mississippi and added two in New Jersey . Historian John Alexander Williams, in his 2002 book Appalachia: A History , distinguished between
28050-741: The region to believe they were more widespread than in reality. In an 1899 article in The Atlantic , Berea College president William G. Frost attempted to redefine the inhabitants of Appalachia as "noble mountaineers"—relics of the nation's pioneer period whose isolation had left them unaffected by modern times. Entering the 21st century, residents of Appalachia are viewed by many Americans as uneducated and unrefined, resulting in culture-based stereotyping and discrimination in many areas, including employment and housing. Such discrimination has prompted some to seek redress under prevailing federal and state civil rights laws. Appalachia, and especially Kentucky, became nationally known for its violent feuds in
28237-410: The region via the Trail of Tears in the 1830s. Appalachian frontiersmen have long been romanticized for their ruggedness and self-sufficiency. A typical depiction of an Appalachian pioneer involves a hunter wearing a coonskin cap and buckskin clothing , and sporting a long rifle and shoulder-strapped powder horn . Perhaps no single figure symbolizes the Appalachian pioneer more than Daniel Boone ,
28424-431: The region when the Great Depression shattered the economy in the 1930s. African Americans have been present in the region since the 18th century, and currently make up 8% of the ARC-designated region, mostly concentrated in urban areas and former mining and manufacturing towns; The African-American component of Appalachia is sometimes termed Affrilachia . Native Americans, the region's original inhabitants, are now only
28611-412: The region's economic conditions since the commission's founding, the ARC listed 80 counties as "distressed" in 2020, with nearly half of them (38) in Kentucky. Since the 1980s, population growth in southern Appalachia has brought about concerns of farmland loss and hazards to the local environment. Regarding housing development, exurban development , characterized by its low-density housing, has violated
28798-476: The region's history, education in Appalachia has lagged behind the rest of the nation due in part to struggles with funding from respective state governments and an agrarian-oriented population that often did not see a practical need for formal education. Early education in the region evolved from teaching Christian morality and learning to read the Bible in small, one-room schoolhouses that convened in months when children were not needed to help with farm work. After
28985-426: The region's inhabitants as uneducated and unrefined; although these stereotypes still exist to a lesser extent today, sociology studies have since begun to dispel them. While endowed with abundant natural resources, Appalachia has long struggled economically and has been associated with poverty. In the early 20th century, large-scale logging and coal mining firms brought jobs and modern amenities to Appalachia, but by
29172-477: The region's more rural areas. In the 20th century, national trends began to have more of an effect on education in Appalachia, sometimes clashing with the region's traditional values. The Scopes Trial —the nation's most publicized debate over the teaching of the theory of evolution —took place in Dayton, Tennessee , in southern Appalachia in 1925. Despite consolidation and centralization, schools in Appalachia struggled to keep up with federal and state demands into
29359-400: The region's population is Methodist, represented by such bodies as the United Methodist Church , the Free Methodist Church , and the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church . Pentecostal movements within the region include the Church of God (based in Cleveland, Tennessee ) and the Assemblies of God . Scattered Mennonite colonies exist throughout the region. The Appalachian dialect
29546-673: The region. Along with the above-mentioned, some of Appalachia's best known writers include James Agee ( A Death in the Family ), Anne W. Armstrong ( This Day and Time ), Wendell Berry ( Hannah Coulter , The Unforeseen Wilderness: An Essay on Kentucky's Red River Gorge , Selected Poems of Wendell Berry ), Jesse Stuart ( Taps for Private Tussie , The Thread That Runs So True ), Denise Giardina ( The Unquiet Earth , Storming Heaven ), Lee Smith ( Fair and Tender Ladies , On Agate Hill ), Silas House ( Clay's Quilt , A Parchment of Leaves ), Wilma Dykeman ( The Far Family , The Tall Woman ), Keith Maillard ( Alex Driving South , Light in
29733-440: The region. Because of this, many southern unionists were sent fleeing to nearby Union states, particularly the border state of Kentucky . Other southern unionists, who stayed in Tennessee after the state's secession, either resisted the Confederate cause or eventually joined it. In March 1862, Lincoln appointed native Tennessean and War Democrat Andrew Johnson as military governor of the state. General Ulysses S. Grant and
29920-496: The remote mountain districts. They pitted the men in extended clans against each other for decades, often using assassination and arson as weapons, along with ambushes , gunfights , and pre-arranged shootouts . The infamous Hatfield-McCoy Feud was the best-known of these family feuds. Some of the feuds were continuations of violent local Civil War episodes. Journalists often wrote about the violence, using stereotypes that "city folks" had developed about Appalachia; they interpreted
30107-432: The rivers in East Tennessee in the early 18th century. The first recorded European expeditions into what is now Tennessee were led by Spanish explorers Hernando de Soto in 1540–1541, Tristan de Luna in 1559, and Juan Pardo in 1566–1567. In 1673, English fur trader Abraham Wood sent an expedition from the Colony of Virginia into Overhill Cherokee territory in modern-day northeastern Tennessee. That same year,
30294-464: The state averaging a high of around 90 °F (32 °C). Winters tend to be mild to cool, decreasing in temperature at higher elevations. For areas outside the highest mountains, the average overnight lows are generally near freezing. The highest recorded temperature was 113 °F (45 °C) at Perryville on August 9, 1930, while the lowest recorded temperature was −32 °F (−36 °C) at Mountain City on December 30, 1917. While Tennessee
30481-483: The state government led by Governor Isham Harris sought voter approval to sever ties with the United States, which was rejected in a referendum by a 54–46% margin in February 1861. After the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter in April and Lincoln's call for troops in response, the legislature ratified an agreement to enter a military league with the Confederacy on May 7, 1861. On June 8, with Middle Tennesseans having significantly changed their position, voters approved
30668-417: The state in the early 18th century. The Chickasaw remained confined to West Tennessee, and the middle part of the state contained few Native Americans, although both the Cherokee and the Shawnee claimed the region as their hunting ground. Cherokee peoples in Tennessee were known by European settlers as the Overhill Cherokee because they lived west of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Overhill settlements grew along
30855-520: The state's constitution led to calls on both sides for the state's separation into two states. In 1841, Tennessee state senator (and later U.S. president) Andrew Johnson introduced legislation in the Tennessee Senate calling for the creation of a separate state in East Tennessee. The proposed state would have been known as " Frankland " and would have invited like-minded mountain counties in Kentucky, Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama to join it. In 1839 Washington Irving proposed to rename
31042-528: The state's topographic features, and, in general, decrease in age from east to west. The state's oldest rocks are igneous strata more than 1 billion years old found in the Blue Ridge Mountains, and the youngest deposits in Tennessee are sands and silts in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain and river valleys that drain into the Mississippi River. Tennessee is considered seismically active and contains two major seismic zones, although destructive earthquakes rarely occur there. The Eastern Tennessee seismic zone spans
31229-470: The state, emerging in the northeastern Highland Rim, passing through Nashville, turning northwest to Clarksville, and entering Kentucky east of the Tennessee River. Its principal branches in Tennessee are the Obey , Caney Fork , Stones , Harpeth , and Red rivers. The Mississippi River drains nearly all of West Tennessee. Its tributaries are the Obion , Forked Deer , Hatchie , Loosahatchie , and Wolf rivers. The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) and
31416-506: The state, national organizations, and financial donors. The Achievement School District creates autonomy for these schools to launch the programs they need. The bottom 5% of Tennessee schools include 83 schools across Memphis , Jackson , Nashville , Knoxville and Chattanooga . As of August 2016, there are 31 schools serving 12,000 students in the ASD. Tennessee Tennessee ( / ˌ t ɛ n ɪ ˈ s iː / , locally / ˈ t ɛ n ɪ s i / ), officially
31603-424: The two are distinguished by the rhotic nature of the Appalachian dialect. Early 20th-century writers believed the Appalachian dialect to be a surviving relic of Old World Scottish or Elizabethan dialects. Recent research suggests, however, that while the dialect has a stronger Scottish influence than other American dialects, most of its distinguishing characteristics have developed in the United States. For much of
31790-420: The west, culminating in the creation of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park , Shenandoah National Park , Cumberland Gap National Historical Park , and the Blue Ridge Parkway in the 1930s. During the same period, New England forester Benton MacKaye led the movement to build the 2,175-mile (3,500 km) Appalachian Trail, stretching from Georgia to Maine . Several significant moments of investment by
31977-478: The west. It ends at steep loess bluffs overlooking the Mississippi embayment , the westernmost physiographic division of Tennessee, which is part of the larger Mississippi Alluvial Plain . This flat 10 to 14 miles (16 to 23 km) wide strip is commonly known as the Mississippi Bottoms, and contains lowlands, floodplains , and swamps . Tennessee is drained by three major rivers , the Tennessee , Cumberland , and Mississippi . The Tennessee River begins at
32164-696: The whiskey tax in the late 1870s led to an explosion in violence between Appalachian " moonshiners " and federal "revenuers" that lasted through the Prohibition period in the 1920s. The breakdown of authority and law enforcement during the Civil War may have contributed to an increase in clan feuding, which by the 1880s was reported to be a problem across most of Kentucky's Cumberland region as well as Carter County, Tennessee ; Carroll County, Virginia ; and Mingo and Logan counties in West Virginia. Regional writers from this period such as Mary Noailles Murfree and Horace Kephart liked to focus on such sensational aspects of mountain culture, leading readers outside
32351-417: The world's first atomic bombs . The planned community of Oak Ridge was built to provide accommodations for the facilities and workers; the site was chosen due to the abundance of TVA electric power, its low population density, and its inland geography and topography, which allowed for the natural separation of the facilities and a low vulnerability to attack. The Clinton Engineer Works was established as
32538-447: The worst of which occurred in Memphis in 1866 . Because Tennessee had ratified the Fourteenth Amendment before its readmission to the Union, it was the only former secessionist state that did not have a military governor during Reconstruction . The Radical Republicans seized control of the state government toward the end of the war, and appointed William G. "Parson" Brownlow governor. Under Brownlow's administration from 1865 to 1869,
32725-404: The year. This made Tennessee the only Southern state to abolish slavery at the time. Tennessee ratified the Thirteenth Amendment , which outlawed slavery in every state, on April 7, 1865, and the Fourteenth Amendment , which granted citizenship and equal protection under the law to former slaves, on July 18, 1866. Both amendments went into effect after Tennessee's readmission to the union due to
32912-405: The years after the Civil War, including cholera in 1873, which devastated the Nashville area, and yellow fever in 1878, which killed more than one-tenth of Memphis's residents. Reformers worked to modernize Tennessee into a " New South " economy during this time. With the help of Northern investors, Chattanooga became one of the first industrialized cities in the South. Memphis became known as
33099-475: The years following World War I, British folklorist Cecil Sharp brought attention to Southern Appalachia when he noted that its inhabitants still sang hundreds of English and Scottish ballads that had been passed down to them from their ancestors. Commercial recordings of Appalachian musicians in the 1920s (such as the famous 1927 Bristol sessions ) would have a significant impact on the development of country music and bluegrass . Traditional Appalachian music saw
33286-417: Was accidentally released into the Emory and Clinch Rivers . The cleanup cost more than $ 1 billion and lasted until 2015. Tennessee is in the Southeastern United States . Culturally, most of the state is considered part of the Upland South , and the eastern third is part of Appalachia . Tennessee covers roughly 42,143 square miles (109,150 km ), of which 926 square miles (2,400 km ), or 2.2%,
33473-421: Was also the first European to apply "Apalachen" specifically to a mountain range as opposed to a village, native tribe, or a southeastern region of North America. The name was not commonly used for the whole mountain range until the late 19th century. A competing and often more popular name was the " Allegheny Mountains ", "Alleghenies", and even "Alleghania". In southern U.S. dialects, the mountains are called
33660-512: Was an important part of Appalachia's economy), and numerous farms were destroyed, pillaged, or neglected. The actions of both Union and Confederate armies left many inhabitants in the region resentful of government authority and suspicious of outsiders for decades after the war. After the Civil War, northern Appalachia experienced an economic boom. At the same time, economies in the southern region stagnated, especially as Southern Democrats regained control of their respective state legislatures at
33847-442: Was chosen for the new state. The constitution was completed on February 6, which authorized elections for the state's new legislature, the Tennessee General Assembly . The legislature convened on March 28, 1796, and the next day, John Sevier was announced as the state's first governor. Tennessee was admitted to the Union on June 1, 1796, as the 16th state and the first created from federal territory. Tennessee reportedly earned
34034-526: Was created to improve student achievement in Tennessee's Priority Schools—those in the bottom 5% in the state—and in so doing, increasing students' career options and life outcomes. It is modeled from principles of President Bush's No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 and Obama's Race to the Top legislation. Various states submit their budget proposals in order to receive financial support. Schools in desperate need of change are labelled as priority schools. Those priority schools are added into this school district with
34221-440: Was home to an estimated 26.3 million people. Since its recognition as a cultural region in the late 19th century, Appalachia has been a source of enduring myths and distortions regarding the isolation, temperament, and behavior of its inhabitants. Early 20th-century writers often engaged in yellow journalism focused on sensationalistic aspects of the region's culture, such as moonshining and clan feuding , portraying
34408-454: Was intentionally publicized, and highlighted the creationism-evolution controversy among religious groups. In 1926, Congress authorized the establishment of a national park in the Great Smoky Mountains , which was officially established in 1934 and dedicated in 1940. When the Great Depression struck in 1929, much of Tennessee was severely impoverished even by national standards. As part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt 's New Deal ,
34595-492: Was killed at the Battle of the Alamo . The state's nickname was solidified during the Mexican–American War when President James K. Polk of Tennessee issued a call for 2,800 soldiers from the state, and more than 30,000 volunteered. Between the 1790s and 1820s, additional land cessions were negotiated with the Cherokee, who had established a national government modeled on the U.S. Constitution . In 1818, Jackson and Kentucky governor Isaac Shelby reached an agreement with
34782-519: Was protested by miners forced to compete with the system. An armed uprising in the Cumberland Mountains known as the Coal Creek War in 1891 and 1892 resulted in the state ending convict leasing. Despite New South promoters' efforts, agriculture continued to dominate Tennessee's economy. The majority of freed slaves were forced into sharecropping during the latter 19th century, and many others worked as agricultural wage laborers. In 1897, Tennessee celebrated its statehood centennial one year late with
34969-438: Was tested in a series of Confederate offensives beginning in the summer of 1862, which culminated in General William Rosecrans 's Army of the Cumberland routing General Braxton Bragg 's Army of Tennessee at Stones River , another one of the war's costliest engagements. The next summer, Rosecrans's Tullahoma campaign forced Bragg's remaining troops in Middle Tennessee to retreat to Chattanooga with little fighting. During
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