Sections

Ishmael S. Reed, contemporary African American satirist, poet, playwright, and essayist, was born in Chattanooga, on February 22, 1938, and lives in Oakland, California. Having left Chattanooga as a child and grown up in Buffalo, New York, he attended public…

This three-hundred-acre state park on an eighteen-thousand-acre lake is located in the northwest corner of Tennessee. The New Madrid earthquakes of 1811-12 probably enlarged a series of oxbow lakes that had existed here long before. Permanent settlement was slow to…

Lee Roy Reeves, designer of the Tennessee State Flag, was born in Johnson City in June 1876, the son of Elbert Clay and Alice D. Robeson Reeves. After graduating from the local high school and normal school, Reeves taught in…

Regions Financial Corporation of Birmingham, Alabama, and Union Planters Corporation of Memphis merged in June 2004 to form a new company with over eighty billion dollars in assets and over five million customers. By consolidating, the new Regions Financial Corporation…

Religion is a word that almost defies any consensual definition. Most people reflect some of their own religious beliefs, or at least those of their own culture, in defining religion. Thus, those from the Semitic traditions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) tend…

Tennessee’s roadside religion is widespread, varied, and includes much more than church architecture. It reflects a range of religious beliefs and experiences, as well as Tennessee’s cultural diversity. Religious roadside architecture encompasses everything from large-scale works of art commissioned by…

Formed by the general assembly on December 3, 1807, Rhea County came out of a portion of Roane County. The new county was situated in a valley between the Tennessee River and the Cumberland Plateau. Though enlarged in 1817, parts…

John Rhea, pioneer, statesman, and early advocate of higher education, was born in northwest Ireland in 1753. He was the son of Joseph Rhea, a Scottish Presbyterian minister transplanted to Ireland, and Elizabeth McIllwaine, also Scots-Irish. As a child, he…

Cartographer, geologist, and educator Matthew Rhea was born near Blountville in 1795. He attended Washington College and earned his living by surveying, teaching, and farming. In 1820 he moved to Maury County, where surveying and cartography became his major interests.…

Rhodes College in Memphis has been aptly characterized as "the garden in the city," a reference to the college's lush, richly wooded, and landscaped campus in the heart of the state's largest city. Princeton Review's 1995 college guide cited Rhodes…

Ted Rhodes, recognized as the first African American professional golfer, grew up in Nashville. Immediately after becoming the first person of color to win the prestigious Masters Tournament in 1997, Tiger Woods told a national television audience: "I am the…

Grantland Rice, the most widely read and respected American sports writer of the first half of the twentieth century, was born in Murfreesboro and named for his maternal grandfather, Henry Grantland. He was later called "Grant" and "Granny" by personal…

Located in Marion County, Richard City is significant for its associations with the development of industrial company towns in Tennessee in the early twentieth century. In the early 1900s, representatives of the Dixie Portland Company, including engineer Ellis Soper, cement…

James D. Richardson, prominent turn-of-the-century Democratic leader, U.S. congressman, and nationally recognized historian and editor, was born in Rutherford County on March 10, 1843. His grandparents, James and Mary Watkins Richardson, had moved to Jefferson in 1814, and his father,…

Bob Riley was one of the earliest and most successful raft pilots in the Upper Cumberland logging industry of the late 1800s, becoming a popular tall-tale figure in Tennessee folklore. Born in 1855 in the Clay County community of Fox…

Before the steamboat, Tennesseans navigated the Mississippi, Cumberland, and Tennessee Rivers and their tributaries in canoes, keelboats, flatboats, and rafts. The original Tennessee rivermen were Cherokees, Shawnees, and other Indians paddling their sleek wooden dugout canoes and cruder "bullboats" (made…

Located near the Tennessee-North Carolina border in Carter County, Roan Mountain State Park is a 2,006-acre park that preserves Roan Mountain, a 6,285-foot peak renowned for its annual blooming of wildflowers, especially its lush 600-acre carpet of crimson catawba rhododendrons.…

Roane County is situated at the juncture of the Tennessee, Clinch, and Emory Rivers, a location of vital importance to both white settlers and Native Americans in the early years of Tennessee state history. Settlers gained control of the area…

Archibald Roane, second governor of Tennessee, was born in 1760 in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. He became a lawyer and served with distinction in the Continental Army during the Revolution. Roane arrived in Tennessee in 1788 in the aftermath of the…

Governor Albert H. Roberts was instrumental in obtaining state ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment for woman suffrage. His highly unpopular tax reform, his use of state troops against labor, and his support for women's rights combined to make him one…