Teresa Biddle-Douglass

Decatur County borders the Tennessee River in West Tennessee and was established in 1845. Its name honors Commodore Stephen Decatur, naval hero of the War of 1812. Carved from land originally claimed by the Chickasaws, the area was part of…

Congressman and industrial entrepreneur George G. Dibrell was born and raised in Sparta and returned to White County after attending East Tennessee University (now University of Tennessee) in Knoxville. In 1842 he married Mary E. Leftwich, and they had eight…

At the turn of the century, Chattanooga emerged as a textile manufacturing center, particularly for cotton hosiery. The 1913 introduction of the process of mercerizing, which gives yarn a fine silk finish, enhanced local industry and generated a new corporation,…

The 1927 merger of two black-owned and -operated Memphis banks which had been instrumental in launching and supporting African American businesses in the 1910s and 1920s created the Fraternal and Solvent Savings Bank and Trust Company. The bank's eventual failure,…

A financial institution chartered by Congress in 1865 for the newly freed black population of former slave states, the Freedmen's Savings Bank was a key component of the African American struggle for equality and independence during Reconstruction. A total of…

Gilbert Gaul, late nineteenth-century artist, is best known for his depictions of military topics, particularly scenes of the Civil War. Born in Jersey City, New Jersey, he entered the National Academy of Design in New York City at age seventeen…

This Nashville-based company, which grew from a small local shoe manufacturer to one of the nation's largest apparel companies, has been an important Tennessee enterprise for over seventy years. With sales exceeding one million dollars its first year in business,…

Millie E. Hale contributed significantly to the health and welfare of Nashville's African American population in the early twentieth century by establishing a small hospital for those turned away by white institutions. A graduate of Fisk University and the Graduate…

W. C. Handy, African American composer, bandleader, publisher, and "Father of the Blues," combined the contemporary ragtime and Latin rhythms he had encountered in vaudeville, minstrel shows, and extensive travels with the black folk music of his heritage into the…

A family business that grew from a backyard foundry to a major commercial enterprise, Hardwick Stove Company shaped Bradley County's industrial history for over one hundred years. Its founder, Christopher Hardwick, began building cast iron stoves in his Cleveland, Tennessee,…

Tennessee's natural limestone springs, ample timber, and fertile soil for growing grain have made the state an ideal location for whiskey production. Whiskey was an important part of frontier life as both an easily portable diet staple and a medicinal…

Hiwassee College is a two-year coeducational liberal arts institution located near Madisonville in Monroe County. Originally a Methodist campground school known as Bat Creek, the college was established in 1850 as one of Tennessee's oldest educational facilities. A typical school…

Educator and president of the University of Tennessee Andrew D. Holt was born in Milan, Tennessee, on December 4, 1904. In 1927 Holt earned his bachelor's degree from Emory University in Atlanta and went on to receive his master's and…

Louis Hughes, author and businessman, was born a slave in Virginia in 1832. Hughes remained in bondage over thirty years and spent most of that time in Tennessee. While still in slavery, Hughes secretly learned to read and write and…

The National Association of Free Will Baptists, an organization of evangelical churches, has maintained its headquarters in Nashville since its formation in 1935. A derivative of Arminian or "general" Baptists, the denomination arose in the United States in the early…

Previously established in Houston, Texas, as the Houston Oilers, the Tennessee Titans, the first National Football League (NFL) team to be based in Tennessee, secured a move to Nashville in 1996 after reaching an agreement with the city that included,…