Editing Tennessee (section)

==History==
{{main|History of Tennessee}}

===Pre-European era===
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-gatherer]]s, and Middle Tennessee is believed to have been rich with [[Game (hunting)|game animal]]s such as [[mastodon]]s.{{sfn|Satz|1979|pp=3–4}} The names of the cultural groups who inhabited the area before European contact are unknown, but archaeologists have named several distinct cultural phases, including the [[Archaic period in the Americas|Archaic]] (8000–1000 BC), [[Woodland period|Woodland]] (1000 BC–1000 AD), and [[Mississippian culture|Mississippian]] (1000–1600 AD) periods.<ref>{{cite web |title=Archaeology & the Native Peoples of Tennessee |url=http://mcclungmuseum.utk.edu/permanent/native/index.shtml |publisher=[[McClung Museum of Natural History and Culture]] |access-date=June 20, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120702205050/http://mcclungmuseum.utk.edu/permanent/native/index.shtml |archive-date=July 2, 2012 |location=Knoxville, TN}}</ref> The Archaic peoples first domesticated dogs, and plants such as [[Cucurbita|squash]], [[Maize|corn]], [[gourd]]s, and [[sunflower]]s were first grown in Tennessee during the Woodland period.{{sfn|Satz|1979|pp=4–8}} Later generations of Woodland peoples constructed the first mounds. Rapid civilizational development occurred during the Mississippian period, when Indigenous peoples developed organized [[chiefdom]]s and constructed numerous ceremonial structures throughout the state.{{sfn|Satz|1979|pp=6–11}}

Spanish conquistadors who explored the region in the 16th century encountered some of the Mississippian peoples, including the [[Muscogee|Muscogee Creek]], [[Yuchi]], and [[Shawnee]].{{sfn|Satz|1979|pp=8–11}}{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=16–17}} By the early 18th century, most Natives in Tennessee had disappeared, most likely wiped out by diseases introduced by the Spaniards.{{sfn|Satz|1979|pp=8–11}} 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.{{sfn|Satz|1979|pp=34–35}} They forced the Creek, Yuchi, and Shawnee out of the state in the early 18th century.{{sfn|Satz|1979|pp=34–35}}{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|p=18}} 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.{{sfn|Satz|1979|p=14}} Cherokee peoples in Tennessee were known by European settlers as the [[Overhill Cherokee]] because they lived west of the Blue Ridge Mountains.{{sfn|Finger|2001|p=26}} Overhill settlements grew along the rivers in East Tennessee in the early 18th century.{{sfn|Satz|1979|pp=44–45}}

===Exploration and colonization===
{{Further|Province of North Carolina|Watauga Association|Washington District, North Carolina|State of Franklin|Southwest Territory}}
The first recorded European expeditions into what is now Tennessee were led by Spanish explorers [[Hernando de Soto]] in 1540–1541, [[Tristán de Luna y Arellano|Tristan de Luna]] in 1559, and [[Juan Pardo (explorer)|Juan Pardo]] in 1566–1567.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=25–26}}{{sfn|Langsdon|2000|pp=4–5}}<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Hudson |first1=Charles M. |last2=Smith |first2=Marvin T. |last3=DePratter |first3=Chester B. |last4=Kelley |first4=Emilia |author1-link=Charles M. Hudson|title=The Tristán de Luna Expedition, 1559-1561 |journal=Southeastern Archaeology |date=1989 |volume=8 |issue=1 |pages=31–45 |jstor=40712896 |publisher=[[Taylor & Francis]]}}</ref> In 1673, English fur trader [[Abraham Wood]] sent an expedition from the [[Colony of Virginia]] into [[Overhill Cherokee|Overhill Cherokee territory]] in modern-day northeastern Tennessee.{{sfn|Finger|2001|pp=20–21}}{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=27–28}} That same year, 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.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=27–28}}{{sfn|Finger|2001|pp=20–21}} In 1682, an expedition led by [[René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle]] constructed [[Fort Prudhomme]] on the [[Chickasaw Bluffs]] in West Tennessee.<ref>{{cite book|last=Keating|first=John M.|author-link=|date=1888|title=History of the City of Memphis Tennessee|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nGVAAAAAYAAJ|location=Syracuse, New York|publisher=D. Mason & Company|pages=24–31|id=1104767129|via=Google Books}}</ref> 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, a fur trading settlement at the present location of Nashville near the [[Cumberland River]].{{sfn|Langsdon|2000|p=6}}{{sfn|Albright|1909|pp=18–19}} 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 [[Chickasaw Campaign of 1739|1739 Campaign]] of the [[Chickasaw Wars]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Young|first1=John Preston|last2=James|first2=A.R.|author1-link=John Preston Young|date=1912|title=Standard History of Memphis, Tennessee: From a Study of the Original Sources |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5PkpAAAAYAAJ|location=Knoxville, TN|publisher=H. W. Crew & Company|pages=36–41|isbn=9780332019826|via=Google Books}}</ref>

[[File:Ftloudouninterior.jpg|thumb|left|alt=refer to caption|Reconstruction of [[Fort Loudoun (Tennessee)|Fort Loudoun]], the first British settlement in Tennessee]]
In the 1750s and 1760s, [[longhunter]]s from Virginia explored much of East and Middle Tennessee.{{sfn|Finger|2001|pp=40–42}} Settlers from the [[Colony of South Carolina]] built [[Fort Loudoun (Tennessee)|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.{{sfn|Finger|2001|p=35}}{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=32–33}} Hostilities erupted between the British and the Cherokees into [[Anglo-Cherokee War|an armed conflict]], and a [[siege of Fort Loudoun|siege of the fort]] ended with its surrender in 1760.{{sfn|Finger|2001|pp=36–37}} After the [[French and Indian War]], Britain issued the [[Royal Proclamation of 1763]], which forbade settlements west of the [[Appalachian Mountains]] in an effort to mitigate conflicts with the Natives.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Middlekauff |first1=Robert |title=The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763–1789 |date=2007 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=New York |isbn=978-0-1951-6247-9 |pages=58–60 |edition=Revised Expanded |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nya0ODz-B-cC&pg=PA58 |via=Google Books}}</ref> But migration across the mountains continued, and the first permanent European settlers began arriving in northeastern Tennessee in the late 1760s.{{sfn|Langsdon|2000|p=8}}{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=43–44}} Most of them were [[English Americans|English]], but nearly 20% were [[Scotch-Irish Americans|Scotch-Irish]].{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|p=106}} They formed the [[Watauga Association]] in 1772, a semi-autonomous representative government,{{sfn|Finger|2001|pp=45–47}} and three years later reorganized themselves into the [[Washington District, North Carolina|Washington District]] to support the cause of the [[Southern theater of the American Revolutionary War|American Revolutionary War]].{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=60–61}} The next year, after an unsuccessful petition to Virginia, North Carolina agreed to annex the Washington District to provide protection from Native American attacks.{{sfn|Finger|2001|pp=64–68}}

In 1775, [[Richard Henderson (jurist)|Richard Henderson]] negotiated a series of treaties with the Cherokee to sell the lands of the Watauga settlements at [[Sycamore Shoals]] on 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.<ref>{{cite book|last=Henderson|first=Archibald|author-link=Archibald Henderson (professor) |date=1920|title=The Conquest of the Old Southwest: The Romantic Story of the Early Pioneers Into Virginia, the Carolinas, Tennessee, and Kentucky, 1740–1790 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=no5BAAAAYAAJ|location=New York |publisher=[[The Century Company]] |pages=212–236|via=Google Books}}</ref> 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.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|p=197}} The Chickamauga, 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.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=65–67}}{{sfn|Satz|1979|p=66}} The warnings of Dragging Canoe's cousin [[Nancy Ward]] spared many settlers' lives from the initial attacks.<ref name="king07">{{cite book|editor-last=King|editor-first=Duane H.|title=The Memoirs of Lt. Henry Timberlake: The Story of a Soldier, Adventurer, and Emissary to the Cherokees, 1756-1765|date=2007|publisher=Museum of the Cherokee Indian Press|location=Cherokee, NC|isbn=9780807831267|page=122|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vHr-cf5j0AEC&pg=PA122|access-date=March 28, 2015|via=Google Books}}</ref> In 1779, [[James Robertson (explorer)|James Robertson]] and [[John Donelson]] led two groups of settlers from the Washington District to the French Lick.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|p=53}} These settlers constructed [[Fort Nashborough]], which they named for [[Francis Nash]], a [[Brigadier general (United States)|brigadier general]] of the [[Continental Army]].{{sfn|Albright|1909|pp=49-50}} The next year, the settlers signed the [[Cumberland Compact]], which established a representative government for the colony called the [[Cumberland Association]].{{sfn|Albright|1909|pp=68-72}} This settlement later grew into the city of Nashville.<ref>{{cite web |title=Founding of Nashville |url=http://www.nashvillearchives.org/nashville-founding.html |website=Nashville Metropolitan Government Archives |publisher=Nashville Public Library |access-date=May 2, 2021}}</ref> That same year [[John Sevier]] led a group of [[Overmountain Men]] from Fort Watauga to the [[Battle of Kings Mountain]] in South Carolina, where they defeated the British.{{sfn|Finger|2001|pp=84–88}}

[[File:Southwest Territory Counties (1790).svg|thumb|left|upright=1.8|alt=Map of the Southwest Territory in 1790|The Southwest Territory in 1790]]
Three counties of the [[Washington District]] broke off from [[North Carolina]] in 1784 and formed the [[State of Franklin]].{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=73–74}} Efforts to obtain admission to the [[Perpetual Union|Union]] failed, and the counties, now numbering eight, rejoined North Carolina by 1788.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=81–83}} North Carolina ceded the area to the federal government in 1790, after which it was organized into the [[Southwest Territory]] on May 26 of that year.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=86–87}} The act allowed the territory to petition for statehood once the population reached 60,000.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=86–87}} 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]].{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=56–57, 90}} President [[George Washington]] appointed [[William Blount]] as territorial governor.{{sfn|Langsdon|2000|pp=16–17}} The Southwest Territory recorded a population of 35,691 in the [[1790 United States census|first United States census]] that year, including 3,417 slaves.{{sfn|Lamon|1980|p=4}}

===Statehood and antebellum era===
[[File:Map-of-tennassee-government-1796.jpg|thumb|left|upright=1.35|alt=1796 map of Tennessee by surveyor Daniel Smith|Surveyor [[Daniel Smith (surveyor)|Daniel Smith]]'s "Map of the Tennassee State" (1796)]]

As support for statehood grew among the settlers, Governor Blount called for elections, which were held in December 1793.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=93–94}} 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.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=93–94}} The full legislature convened on August 25, 1794.{{sfn|Langsdon|2000|pp=20–21}} In June 1795, 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.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|p=95}}{{sfn|Langsdon|2000|p=22}} 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.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|p=97}} During this convention, the name Tennessee was chosen for the new state.{{sfn|Langsdon|2000|p=23}} The constitution was completed on February 6, which authorized elections for the state's new legislature, the [[Tennessee General Assembly]].{{sfn|Langsdon|2000|p=24}}{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|p=99}} The legislature convened on March 28, 1796, and the next day, John Sevier was announced as the state's first governor.{{sfn|Langsdon|2000|p=24}}{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|p=99}} Tennessee was admitted to the Union on June 1, 1796, as the 16th state and the first created from federal territory.{{sfn|Langsdon|2000|pp=25–26}}<ref>{{cite book |last=Hubbard |first=Bill Jr. |title=American Boundaries: the Nation, the States, the Rectangular Survey |url=https://archive.org/details/americanboundari00jrbi |url-access=limited |year=2009 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |isbn=978-0-226-35591-7 |page=55 |via=Internet Archive}}</ref>

Tennessee reportedly earned 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.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=139–140}} 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.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=139–140}} Several Tennesseans took part in the [[Texas Revolution]] of 1835–36, including Governor [[Sam Houston]] and Congressman and frontiersman [[Davy Crockett]], who was killed at the [[Battle of the Alamo]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Karsch |first1=Robert F. |title=Tennessee's Interest in the Texan Revolution, 1835-1836 |journal=Tennessee Historical Magazine |year=1937 |volume=3 |issue=4 |pages=206–239 |jstor=42638126 |publisher=Tennessee Historical Society |location=Nashville}}</ref> 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.<ref name=tohm>{{cite web |url=http://www.tennesseehistory.com/archive/volpg.html |title=Why the Volunteer State |publisher=Tennessee Online History Magazine |access-date=April 3, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160413134345/http://tennesseehistory.com/archive/volpg.html |archive-date=April 13, 2016 |url-status=dead}}</ref>

[[File:TheHermitage.jpg|thumb|right|alt=President Andrew Jackson's home ''The Hermitage'' in Nashville|''[[The Hermitage (Nashville, Tennessee)|The Hermitage]]'', plantation home of President [[Andrew Jackson]] in Nashville]]
Between the 1790s and 1820s, additional land cessions were negotiated with the Cherokee, who had established [[Cherokee Nation (1794–1907)|a national government]] modeled on the [[Constitution of the United States|U.S. Constitution]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Ehle |first=John |author-link=John Ehle |date=1988 |title=Trail of Tears: The Rise and Fall of the Cherokee Nation |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MC2lR-lpmfwC |pages=155–188 |location=New York |publisher=Anchor Books |isbn=0-385-23954-8 |via=Google Books}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.vanderbilt.edu/olli/class-materials/Spring2016CITWeek3.pdf |title=Treaties and Land Cessions Involving the Cherokee Nation |author=<!--Not stated--> |date=April 12, 2016 |publisher=Vanderbilt University |access-date=May 20, 2021 |archive-date=March 27, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230327161021/https://www.vanderbilt.edu/olli/class-materials/Spring2016CITWeek3.pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref> In 1818, Jackson and Kentucky governor [[Isaac Shelby]] reached an agreement with 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 (U.S. historical region)|Jackson Purchase]]".{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=149–150}} The Cherokee moved their capital from Georgia to the [[Red Clay State Park|Red Clay Council Grounds]] in southeastern Tennessee in 1832, due to new laws forcing them from their previous capital at [[New Echota]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Corn|first=James F.|date=1959|title=Red Clay and Rattlesnake Springs: A History of the Cherokee Indians of Bradley County, Tennessee|location=Marceline, Missouri|publisher=[[Walsworth Publishing Company]]|pages=67–70}}</ref> In 1838 and 1839, U.S. troops [[Cherokee removal|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 is known as the [[Trail of Tears]], and an estimated 4,000 died along the way.{{sfn|Satz|1979|p=103}}<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.mtsuhistpres.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Hiwassee-River-Heritage-Center-Phase-II-Exhibit-Final-Panels-merged-compressed.pdf|title=Fort Cass|author=<!--Not stated-->|date=2013|website=mtsuhistpress.org|publisher=[[Middle Tennessee State University]]|location=Murfreesboro, Tennessee|access-date=November 7, 2020|archive-date=November 8, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201108035059/https://www.mtsuhistpres.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Hiwassee-River-Heritage-Center-Phase-II-Exhibit-Final-Panels-merged-compressed.pdf|url-status=dead}}</ref>

[[File:Tennessee Statehood Sesquicentennial, 3c, 1946 issue.jpg|thumb|left|upright=1.1|in 1946 the U.S. Post Office issued a [[commemorative stamp]] celebrating the 150th anniversary of Tennessee statehood.]]
As settlers pushed west of the Cumberland Plateau, a slavery-based [[agrarian economy]] took hold in these regions.{{sfn|Lamon|1980|pp=9–12}} Cotton planters used extensive slave labor on large [[Plantation complexes in the Southern United States|plantation complexes]] in West Tennessee's fertile and flat terrain after the Jackson Purchase.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=209–212}} Cotton also took hold in the Nashville Basin during this time.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=209–212}} Entrepreneurs such as [[Montgomery Bell]] used slaves in the production of iron in the Western Highland Rim, and slaves also cultivated such crops as tobacco and corn throughout the Highland Rim.{{sfn|Lamon|1980|pp=9–12}} 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.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|p=210}} A strong [[Abolitionism in the United States|abolition movement]] developed in East Tennessee, beginning as early as 1797, and in 1819, [[Elihu Embree]] of [[Jonesborough, Tennessee|Jonesborough]] began publishing the ''[[Manumission Intelligencier]]'' (later ''The Emancipator''), the nation's first exclusively anti-slavery newspaper.{{sfn|Lamon|1980|pp=7–9}}<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Goodheart |first1=Lawrence B. |title=Tennessee's Antislavery Movement Reconsidered: The Example of Elihu Embree |journal=Tennessee Historical Quarterly |date=Fall 1982 |volume=41 |issue=3 |pages=224–238 |jstor=42626297 |publisher=Tennessee Historical Society |location=Nashville}}</ref>
{{clear}}

===Civil War===
{{main|Tennessee in the American Civil War|Confederate States of America|Ordinance of Secession}}

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.{{sfn|Connelly|1979|pp=3-8}} In 1860, slaves composed about 25% of Tennessee's population, the lowest share among the states that joined the [[Confederate States of America|Confederacy]].{{sfn|Lamon|1980|p=116}} Tennessee provided more Union troops than any other Confederate state, and the second-highest number of Confederate troops, behind Virginia.<ref name="guide"/><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Bates |first1=Walter Lynn |date=Winter 1991 |title=Southern Unionists: A Socio-Economic Examination of the Third East Tennessee Volunteer Infantry Regiment, U.S.A., 1862–1865 |jstor=42626970 |journal=Tennessee Historical Quarterly |publisher=Tennessee Historical Society |location=Nashville |volume=50 |issue=4 |pages=226–239 |doi=}}</ref> Due to its central location, Tennessee was a crucial state during the war and saw more military engagements than any state except Virginia.<ref>{{cite web |title=CWSAC Report |url=http://www.nps.gov/hps/abpp/cwsac/cws0-1.html |website=Civil War Sites Advisory Commission |publisher=National Park Service |access-date=February 17, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181219001021/https://www.nps.gov/abpp/cwsac/cws0-1.html |archive-date=December 19, 2018 |date=December 8, 1997 |url-status=dead}}</ref>

After [[Abraham Lincoln]] was elected president in [[1860 United States presidential election|1860]], secessionists in the state government led by Governor [[Isham Harris]] [[Ordinance of Secession|sought voter approval]] to sever ties with the United States, which was rejected in a referendum by a 54–46% margin in February 1861.{{sfn|Connelly|1979|pp=3–4, 291}} After the Confederate [[Battle of Fort Sumter|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.{{sfn|Connelly|1979|pp=3–4}} On June 8, with Middle Tennesseans having significantly changed their position, voters approved a second referendum on secession by a 69–31% margin, becoming the last state to secede.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|p=294}} In response, East Tennessee Unionists organized [[East Tennessee Convention|a convention in Knoxville]] with the goal of splitting the region to form a new state loyal to the Union.<ref>{{cite book|last=Temple|first=Oliver Perry|date=1899|title=East Tennessee and the Civil War |url=https://archive.org/details/easttennesseean00tempgoog|location=Cincinnati|publisher=[[Robert Clarke & Company]]|pages=340–365|isbn=1166069060|author-link=Oliver Perry Temple|via=Internet Archive}}</ref> In the fall of 1861, Unionist guerrillas in East Tennessee [[East Tennessee bridge burnings|burned bridges]] and attacked Confederate sympathizers, leading the Confederacy to invoke [[martial law]] in parts of the region. Because of this, many southern unionists were sent fleeing to nearby Union states, particularly the [[Border states (American Civil War)|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.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Madden |first1=David |title=Unionist Resistance to Confederate Occupation: The Bridge Burners of East Tennessee |journal=East Tennessee Historical Society Publications |date=1980 |volume=52 |pages=42–53}}</ref> In March 1862, Lincoln appointed native Tennessean and [[War Democrat]] [[Andrew Johnson]] as military governor of the state.{{sfn|Langsdon|2000|p=131}}

[[File:Kurz and Allison - Battle of Franklin, November 30, 1864.jpg|thumb|left|alt=Chromolithograph of the Battle of Franklin, which occurred on November 30, 1864|The [[Battle of Franklin (1864)|Battle of Franklin]], November 30, 1864]]
General [[Ulysses S. Grant]] and the [[U.S. Navy]] captured the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers in February 1862 at the battles of [[Battle of Fort Henry|Fort Henry]] and [[Battle of Fort Donelson|Fort Donelson]].{{sfn|Connelly|1979|pp=24–30}} Grant then proceeded south to Pittsburg Landing and held off a Confederate counterattack at [[Battle of Shiloh|Shiloh]] in April in what was at the time the bloodiest battle of the war.{{sfn|Connelly|1979|pp=45–51}} Memphis fell to the Union in June after a [[First Battle of Memphis|naval battle]] on the Mississippi River.{{sfn|Connelly|1979|pp=51–53}} Union strength in Middle Tennessee 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 [[Battle of Stones River|Stones River]], another one of the war's costliest engagements.{{sfn|Connelly|1979|pp=54–65}} The next summer, Rosecrans's [[Tullahoma campaign]] forced Bragg's remaining troops in Middle Tennessee to retreat to Chattanooga with little fighting.{{sfn|Connelly|1979|pp=65–68}}

During 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.{{sfn|Connelly|1979|pp=77–79}} The Confederates were driven from the city at the battles of [[Battle of Lookout Mountain|Lookout Mountain]] and [[Battle of Missionary Ridge|Missionary Ridge]] in November 1863.{{sfn|Connelly|1979|pp=80–82}} Despite Unionist sentiment in East Tennessee, Confederates held the area for most of the war. A few days after the fall of Chattanooga, Confederates led by [[James Longstreet]] unsuccessfully [[Knoxville campaign|campaigned to take control of Knoxville]] by attacking Union General [[Ambrose Burnside]]'s [[Battle of Fort Sanders|Fort Sanders]].{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|p=314}} The capture of Chattanooga allowed Sherman to launch the [[Atlanta campaign]] from the city in May 1864.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://civilwaronthewesternborder.org/timeline/atlanta-campaign |title=Atlanta Campaign |author=<!--Not stated--> |website=Civil War On the Western Border |date=May 7, 1864 |publisher=Missouri State Library |location=Jefferson City, Missouri |access-date=July 27, 2021 |quote=}}</ref> The last major battles in the state came when Army of Tennessee regiments under [[John Bell Hood]] [[Franklin–Nashville campaign|invaded Middle Tennessee]] in the fall of 1864 in an effort to draw Sherman back. They were checked by [[John Schofield]] at [[Battle of Franklin (1864)|Franklin]] in November and completely dispersed by [[George Henry Thomas|George Thomas]] at [[Battle of Nashville|Nashville]] in December.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=314–315}} On April 27, 1865, the [[list of maritime disasters|worst maritime disaster in American history]] occurred when the ''[[Sultana (steamboat)|Sultana]]'' steamboat, which was transporting freed Union prisoners, [[Sultana (steamboat)#Disaster|exploded]] in the Mississippi River north of Memphis, killing 1,168 people.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Salecker|first1=Gene Eric|title=Disaster on the Mississippi : the Sultana explosion, April 27, 1865|date=1996|publisher=Naval Inst. Press|location=Annapolis, Md.|isbn=1-55750-739-2|url=https://archive.org/details/disasteronmissis00sale|pages=79–80|via=Internet Archive}}</ref>

When 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.<ref name="npsjohnson">{{cite web |title=Andrew Johnson and Emancipation in Tennessee |url=https://www.nps.gov/anjo/learn/historyculture/johnson-and-tn-emancipation.htm |website=National Park Service |publisher=Andrew Johnson National Historic Site |access-date=May 11, 2021 |date=February 5, 2020}}</ref> Andrew Johnson declared all slaves in Tennessee free on October 24, 1864.<ref name="npsjohnson"/> 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 the year. This made Tennessee the only Southern state to abolish slavery at the time.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.history.umd.edu/Freedmen/chronol.htm |title=Chronology of Emancipation during the Civil War |location=College Park, Maryland |publisher=University of Maryland: Department of History |access-date=November 2, 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071011224131/http://www.history.umd.edu/Freedmen/chronol.htm |archive-date=October 11, 2007 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="blackhistory">{{cite web |url=http://www.state.tn.us/tsla/exhibits/blackhistory/timelines/timeline_1861-1865.htm |title=This Honorable Body: African American Legislators in 19th Century Tennessee |location=Nashville |publisher=Tennessee State Library and Archives |access-date=November 2, 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071119190405/http://www.state.tn.us/tsla/exhibits/blackhistory/timelines/timeline_1861-1865.htm |archive-date=November 19, 2007 |url-status=dead}}</ref> Tennessee ratified the [[Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution|Thirteenth Amendment]], which outlawed slavery in every state, on April 7, 1865,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/GPO-CONAN-2013/pdf/GPO-CONAN-2013.pdf|title=The Constitution of the United States Of America Analysis And Interpretation Centennial Edition Interim Edition: Analysis Of Cases Decided By The Supreme Court Of The United States To June 26, 2013s|access-date=February 17, 2014|last=U.S. Government Printing Office |first=112th Congress, 2nd Session, Senate Document No. 112–9|page=30|date=2013}}</ref> and the [[Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution|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 the fact that other states had not yet ratified it.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=333–334}} Johnson became vice president when Lincoln was [[1864 United States presidential election|reelected]], and president after Lincoln's [[Assassination of Abraham Lincoln|assassination]] in May 1865.{{sfn|Langsdon|2000|p=131}} On July 24, 1866, Tennessee became the first Confederate state to have its elected members readmitted to Congress.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Glass |first1=Andrew |title=Tenn. is readmitted to the Union July 24, 1866 |url=https://www.politico.com/story/2008/07/tenn-is-readmitted-to-the-union-july-24-1866-011990 |access-date=May 11, 2021 |work=Politico |date=July 24, 2008}}</ref>

===Reconstruction and late 19th century===
The years after the Civil War were characterized by tension and unrest between blacks and former Confederates, the worst of which occurred in [[Memphis riots of 1866|Memphis in 1866]].<ref>{{cite journal |last=Ryan |first=James Gilbert |title=The Memphis Riots of 1866: Terror in a Black Community During Reconstruction |journal=The Journal of Negro History |date=July 1977 |volume=62 |issue=3 |pages=243–257 |doi=10.2307/2716953 |jstor=2716953 |publisher=The University of Chicago Press|s2cid=149765241 |issn = 0022-2992}}</ref> 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 Era|Reconstruction]].{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=333–334}} The [[Radical Republicans]] seized control of the state government toward the end of the war, and appointed [[William G. Brownlow|William G. "Parson" Brownlow]] governor. Under Brownlow's administration from 1865 to 1869, 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, Tennessee|Pulaski]] as a vigilante group to advance former Confederates' interests.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Coulter |first1=E. Merton |author1-link=E. Merton Coulter |title=William G. Brownlow: Fighting Parson of the Southern Highlands |date=1999 |publisher=University of Tennessee Press |location=Knoxville, TN |isbn=978-1-57233-050-4 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=egskEhcF5gkC |access-date=May 12, 2021 |via=Google Books}}</ref> In 1870, [[Southern Democrats]] regained control of the state legislature,{{sfn|Lamon|1980|pp=46-48}} and over the next two decades, passed [[Jim Crow laws]] to enforce [[racial segregation]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Folmsbee |first1=Stanley J. |title=The Origin of the First "Jim Crow" Law |journal=The Journal of Southern History |date=May 1949 |volume=15 |issue=2 |pages=235–247 |doi=10.2307/2197999 |jstor=2197999 |publisher=Southern Historical Association |location=Atlanta}}</ref> A total of 251 [[Lynching in the United States|lynching]]s, predominately of Black people, took place in Tennessee.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://archive.tuskegee.edu/repository/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Lynchings-Stats-Year-Dates-Causes.pdf |title=Lynchings: By State and Race, 1882-1968 |author=<!--Not stated--> |date=<!--Not given--> |website= |publisher=Tuskegee University |access-date=September 11, 2023 |quote=}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/entries/lynching/ |title=Lynching |last=Bennett |first=Kathy |date=October 8, 2017 |publisher=Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture |access-date=September 11, 2023}}</ref>

[[File:AmCyc Memphis (Tennessee).jpg|thumb|right|alt=1879 illustration of Memphis, showing the city's cotton industry|Memphis became known as the "Cotton Capital of the World" in the years following the Civil War]]
A number of epidemics swept through Tennessee in the years after the Civil War, including [[cholera]] in 1873, which devastated the Nashville area,<ref>{{cite book|last=Barnes|first=Joseph K.|date=1875|title=The Cholera Epidemic of 1873 in the United States|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HwwPAAAAYAAJ|location=Washington, D.C.|publisher=U.S. Government Printing Office|page=478|author-link=Joseph Barnes (American physician)|access-date=May 23, 2021 |via=Google Books}}</ref> and [[yellow fever]] in 1878, which killed more than one-tenth of Memphis's residents.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Baker |first1=Thomas H. |title=Yellowjack: The Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1878 in Memphis, Tennessee |journal=Bulletin of the History of Medicine |date=May–June 1968 |volume=42 |issue=3 |pages=241–264 |jstor=44450733 |publisher=[[The Johns Hopkins University Press]] |location=Baltimore|pmid=4874077}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Webb |first1=Gina |title=Yellow fever epidemic changes course of Memphis history in 'Fever Season' |url=https://www.ajc.com/entertainment/yellow-fever-epidemic-changes-course-memphis-history-fever-season/IRFeaGgIt83vD2I8kgJ6WN/ |access-date=May 23, 2021 |work=The Atlanta Journal-Constitution |date=October 20, 2012}}</ref> 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.<ref name=jsh/> Memphis became known as the "Cotton Capital of the World" during the late 19th century, and Nashville, Knoxville, and several smaller cities saw modest industrialization.<ref name=jsh>{{cite journal|last=Belissary |first=Constantine G.|date=May 1953|title=The Rise of Industry and the Industrial Spirit in Tennessee, 1865-1885|jstor=2955013 |journal=The Journal of Southern History|volume=19|issue=2|pages=193–215|doi=10.2307/2955013}}</ref> 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 was protested by miners forced to compete with the system.{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=387–389}} An armed uprising in the Cumberland Mountains known as the [[Coal Creek War]] in 1891 and 1892 resulted in the state ending convict leasing.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Cotham |first1=Perry C. |title=Toil, Turmoil & Triumph: A Portrait of the Tennessee Labor Movement |date=1995 |publisher=Hillsboro Press |location=Franklin, Tennessee |isbn=9781881576648 |pages=56–80 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HWiN4VbNBLQC |access-date=May 23, 2021 |via=Google Books}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Shapiro |first1=Karin |title=A New South Rebellion: The Battle Against Convict Labor in the Tennessee Coalfields, 1871-1896 |date=1998 |publisher=[[University of North Carolina Press]] |location=Chapel Hill, North Carolina |isbn=9780807867051 |pages=75–102, 184–205 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nSE6DwAAQBAJ |access-date=May 23, 2021 |via=Google Books}}</ref>

Despite New South promoters' efforts, agriculture continued to dominate Tennessee's economy.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=McKenzie |first1=Robert Tracy |title=Freedmen and the Soil in the Upper South: The Reorganization of Tennessee Agriculture, 1865-1880 |journal=The Journal of Southern History |date=February 1993 |volume=59 |issue=1 |pages=63–84 |doi=10.2307/2210348 |jstor=2210348 |publisher=Southern Historical Association |location=Atlanta}}</ref> The majority of freed slaves were forced into [[sharecropping]] during the latter 19th century, and many others worked as agricultural wage laborers.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Winters |first1=Donald L. |title=Postbellum Reorganization of Southern Agriculture: The Economics of Sharecropping in Tennessee |journal=Agricultural History |date=Autumn 1988 |volume=62 |issue=4 |pages=1–19 |jstor=3743372 |publisher=Agricultural History Society}}</ref> In 1897, Tennessee celebrated its statehood centennial one year late with the [[Tennessee Centennial and International Exposition]] in Nashville.<ref>{{cite book |title=Official Guide To The Tennessee Centennial and International Exposition and City of Nashville |date=1897 |publisher=Marshall & Bruce |location=Nashville |url=https://library.si.edu/digital-library/book/officialguidete00tenn |doi=10.5479/sil.999616.39088016962151 |access-date=May 23, 2021 |via=[[Smithsonian Libraries]]}}</ref> A [[Parthenon (Nashville)|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".{{sfn|Corlew|Folmsbee|Mitchell|1981|pp=411–414}}<ref>{{cite journal |last=Coleman |first=Christopher K. |title=From Monument to Museum: The Role of the Parthenon in the Culture of the New South |journal=Tennessee Historical Quarterly |volume=49 |issue=3 |page=140 |jstor=42626877 |date=Fall 1990}}</ref>

===Early 20th century===
[[File:"A group of several hundred workers at Norris Dam construction camp site during noon hour." - NARA - 532734.jpg|thumb|left|alt=Photograph of workers at Norris Dam in 1933|Workers at the [[Norris Dam]] construction camp site in 1933]]

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 the first wave of the [[Great Migration (African American)|Great Migration]] between 1915 and 1930.{{sfn|Lamon|1980|pp=75–80}} Many residents of rural parts of Tennessee relocated to larger cities during this time for more lucrative employment opportunities.<ref name=jsh/> 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.<ref name="dickinson">{{cite web |last1=Dickinson |first1=W. Calvin |title=Temperance |url=https://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/entries/temperance/ |website=[[Tennessee Encyclopedia]] |access-date=May 29, 2021 |date=October 8, 2017}}</ref> During [[Prohibition in the United States|Prohibition]], illicit production of [[moonshine]] became extremely common in East Tennessee, particularly in the mountains, and continued for many decades afterward.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Durand |first=Loyal |date=April 1956 |title="Mountain Moonshining" in East Tennessee |jstor=211641 |journal=Geographical Review |volume=46 |issue=2 |pages=168–181 |publisher=Taylor & Francis |doi=10.2307/211641|bibcode=1956GeoRv..46..168D}}</ref>

Sgt. [[Alvin York|Alvin C. York]] of [[Fentress County, Tennessee|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]].<ref>{{cite news |title=Sergeant York, War Hero, Dies; Killed 25 Germans and Captured 132 in Argonne Battle |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1964/09/03/archives/sergeant-york-war-hero-dies-killed-25-germans-and-captured-132-in.html |url-access=limited |access-date=May 23, 2021 |work=[[The New York Times]] |date=September 3, 1964}}</ref> On July 9, 1918, Tennessee suffered the [[Great Train Wreck of 1918|worst rail accident in U.S. history]] when two passenger trains [[head-on collision|collided head on]] in Nashville, killing 101 and injuring 171.<ref name="Coggins2012">{{cite book |first=Allen R. |last=Coggins |title=Tennessee Tragedies: Natural, Technological, and Societal Disasters in the Volunteer State |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SfK6aBuqohQC&pg=PA158 |access-date=November 23, 2012 |date=January 15, 2012 |publisher=Univ. of Tennessee Press |isbn=978-1-57233-829-6 |page=158 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140101183229/http://books.google.com/books?id=SfK6aBuqohQC&pg=PA158 |archive-date=January 1, 2014 |url-status=live |via=Google Books}}</ref> On August 18, 1920, Tennessee became the 36th and final state necessary to ratify the [[Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution]], which gave women the [[Women's suffrage|right to vote]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Tennessee and the 19th Amendment |url=https://www.nps.gov/articles/tennessee-women-s-history.htm |website=nps.gov |publisher=National Park Service |access-date=July 15, 2021 |date=July 31, 2020}}</ref> In 1925, [[John T. Scopes]], a high school teacher in [[Dayton, Tennessee|Dayton]], was [[Scopes Trial|tried and convicted]] for teaching [[evolution]] in violation of the state's recently passed [[Butler Act]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Israel|first=Charles Alan|title=Before Scopes: Evangelicalism, Education, and Evolution in Tennessee, 1870–1925|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5l4DBjpvLpgC&pg=PA161 |year=2004|publisher=[[University of Georgia Press]]|location=Athens, Georgia|page=161|isbn=9780820326450|via=Google Books}}</ref> Scopes was prosecuted by former [[United States Secretary of State|Secretary of State]] and presidential candidate [[William Jennings Bryan]] and defended by attorney [[Clarence Darrow]]. The case was intentionally publicized,<ref>{{cite book|last=Larson|first=Edward J.|author-link=Edward J. Larson|date=2004 |title=Evolution: The Remarkable History of a Scientific Theory|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4HPewgEACAAJ|location=New York |publisher=[[Modern Library]]|pages=211–213|isbn=9780679642886|via=Google Books}}</ref> and highlighted the [[Rejection of evolution by religious groups|creationism-evolution controversy]] among religious groups.<ref>{{cite book |last=Cotkin|first=George|date=1992|title=Reluctant Modernism: American Thought and Culture, 1880–1900|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5T0l6BQc2kkC|location=Lanham, Maryland|publisher=[[Rowman & Littlefield]]|pages=7–14|isbn=9780742531475|via=Google Books}}</ref> In 1926, Congress authorized the establishment of [[Great Smoky Mountains National Park|a national park]] in the [[Great Smoky Mountains]], which was officially established in 1934 and dedicated in 1940.<ref>{{cite book|last=Pierce |first=Daniel S.|date=2000|title=The Great Smokies: From Natural Habitat to National Park|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QR-EmSQfPvgC|pages=140–151|location=Knoxville, TN|publisher=University of Tennessee Press|isbn=1572330791|via=Google Books}}</ref>

When the [[Great Depression]] struck in 1929, much of Tennessee was severely impoverished even by national standards.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Glass |first1=Andrew |title=Tennessee Valley Authority created, May 18, 1933 |url=https://www.politico.com/story/2017/05/18/tennessee-valley-authority-created-may-18-1933-238325 |access-date=May 23, 2021 |work=Politico |date=May 18, 2017}}</ref> As part of President [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]]'s [[New Deal]], 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 Valley|Tennessee River Valley]].<ref name=clemnelson/> 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 in the United States|eminent domain]].<ref name="natarchTVA">{{cite web |title=The TVA and the Relocation of Mattie Randolph |url=https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/tva-relocation.html |website=[[National Archives]] |access-date=June 12, 2021 |date=August 15, 2016}}</ref><ref name="stephens">{{cite web |last1=Stephens |first1=Joseph |title=Forced Relocations Presented More of an Ordeal than an Opportunity for Norris Reservoir Families |url=https://www.historicunioncounty.com/article/forced-relocations-presented-more-ordeal-opportunity-norris-reservoir-families |website=Historic Union County |date=May 2018 |access-date=June 15, 2021}}</ref> The agency quickly grew into 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.<ref name=clemnelson>{{cite report|last1=Clem|first1=Clayton L.|last2=Nelson|first2=Jeffrey H.|title=2010 International Conference on High Voltage Engineering and Application |date=October 2010|chapter=The TVA Transmission System: Facts, Figures and Trends|pages=1–11 |chapter-url=https://zenodo.org/record/1270775|publisher=Proceedings of the 2010 IEEE International Conference on High Voltage Engineering and Application|doi=10.1109/ichve.2010.5640878 |isbn=978-1-4244-8283-2 |access-date=April 18, 2021|via=[[Zenodo]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Kitchens |first1=Carl |title=The Role of Publicly Provided Electricity in Economic Development: The Experience of the Tennessee Valley Authority, 1929–1955 |journal=The Journal of Economic History |date=June 2014 |volume=74 |issue=2 |pages=389–419 |jstor=24550877 |publisher=Cambridge University Press|doi=10.1017/S0022050714000308 |s2cid=27463057}}</ref>

[[File:Calutron operators.jpg|thumb|right|alt=Photograph of calutron operators at Oak Ridge during the Manhattan Project|[[Calutron]] operators at the [[Y-12 National Security Complex|Y-12]] Plant in Oak Ridge during the [[Manhattan Project]]]]
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 the world's first [[atomic bomb]]s. The [[planned community]] of [[Oak Ridge, Tennessee|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.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Fine |first1=Lenore |last2=Remington |first2=Jesse A. |title=The Corps of Engineers: Construction in the United States |publisher=United States Army Center of Military History |url=http://www.history.army.mil/html/books/010/10-5/CMH_Pub_10-5.pdf |pages=134–135 |access-date=August 25, 2013 |location=Washington, D.C. |year=1972 |oclc=834187 |archive-date=February 1, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170201142645/https://history.army.mil/html/books/010/10-5/CMH_Pub_10-5.pdf |url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Jones |first=Vincent |title=Manhattan: The Army and the Atomic Bomb |publisher=United States Army Center of Military History |location=Washington, D.C. |year=1985 |url=http://www.history.army.mil/html/books/011/11-10/CMH_Pub_11-10.pdf |pages=46–47 |access-date=August 25, 2013 |oclc=10913875 |archive-date=October 7, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141007074359/http://www.history.army.mil/html/books/011/11-10/CMH_Pub_11-10.pdf |url-status=dead}}</ref> The [[Clinton Engineer Works]] was established as 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 (nuclear test)|Trinity]], and the second, nicknamed "[[Little Boy]]", was [[Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki|bropped on Imperial Japan]] at the end of World War II.{{sfn|Jones|1985|p=522}} After the war, the [[Oak Ridge National Laboratory]] became an institution for scientific and technological research.<ref name=bigproblems/>

===Mid-20th century to present===
After the U.S. Supreme Court ruled racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional in ''[[Brown v. Board of Education]]'' in 1954, [[Oak Ridge High School (Tennessee)|Oak Ridge High School]] in 1955 became the first school in Tennessee to be [[School integration in the United States|integrated]].{{sfn|Lamon|1980|pp=100–101}} The next year, nearby [[Clinton High School (Clinton, Tennessee)|Clinton High School]] was integrated, and [[Tennessee National Guard]] troops were sent in after pro-segregationists threatened violence.{{sfn|Lamon|1980|pp=100–101}} Between February and May 1960, a [[Nashville sit-ins|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.{{sfn|Lamon|1980|pp=106–108}} On April 4, 1968, [[James Earl Ray]] [[Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.|assassinated]] civil rights leader [[Martin Luther King Jr.]] in Memphis.<ref>{{Cite web|date=April 24, 2017|title=Assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.|url=https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/assassination-martin-luther-king-jr|access-date=July 15, 2020|website=The Martin Luther King, Jr., Research and Education Institute}}</ref> King had traveled there to support [[Memphis sanitation strike|striking African American sanitation workers]].<ref>{{cite magazine|url=https://swampland.time.com/2013/04/04/time-looks-back-martin-luther-kings-assassination/|title=Time Looks Back: The Assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.|author=Time Magazine Staff|magazine=[[Time (magazine)|Time]]|date=April 4, 2013|access-date=October 19, 2016}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.post-gazette.com/opinion/tony-norman/2008/04/04/The-last-sermon-Memphis-April-3-1968/stories/200804040201|title=The last sermon, Memphis, April 3, 1968|work=[[Pittsburgh Post-Gazette]]|date=April 4, 2008|first=Tony|last=Norman |access-date=October 19, 2016}}</ref>

[[File:Sunsphere 02.jpg|thumb|left|alt=Photograph of the 1982 World's Fair in Knoxville, showing the Sunsphere|The [[1982 World's Fair]] in Knoxville]]
The 1962 [[Supreme Court of the United States|U.S. Supreme Court]] case ''[[Baker v. Carr]]'' arose from a challenge to the longstanding rural bias of apportionment of seats in the Tennessee legislature and established the principle of "[[one man, one vote]]".<ref>{{cite book |title=A Justice for All: William J. Brennan, Jr., and the Decisions that Transformed America |url=https://archive.org/details/justiceforallwil00eisl |url-access=registration |last=Eisler |first=Kim Isaac |year=1993 |publisher=Simon & Schuster |location=New York |isbn=978-0-671-76787-7 |via=Internet Archive}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |chapter=Baker v. Carr |title=The Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States |last=Peltason |first=Jack W. |editor=Hall, Kermit L. |year=1992 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=New York |isbn=978-0-19-505835-2 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/oxfordcompaniont00hall/page/67 67–70] |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/oxfordcompaniont00hall/page/67|via=Internet Archive}}</ref> The construction of [[Interstate 40 in Tennessee|Interstate 40]] through Memphis became a national talking point on the issue of [[Eminent domain in the United States|eminent domain]] and [[grassroots lobbying]] when the [[Tennessee Department of Transportation]] (TDOT) attempted to construct the highway through the city's [[Overton Park]]. A [[Citizens to Preserve Overton Park|local activist group]] spent many years contesting the project, and in 1971, the U.S. Supreme Court sided with the group and established the framework for [[Judicial review in the United States|judicial review]] of government agencies in the [[List of landmark court decisions in the United States|landmark case]] of ''[[Citizens to Preserve Overton Park v. Volpe]]''.<ref name="interstate100">{{cite web |title=100 Years: Tennessee's Interstate System |url=https://www.tn.gov/tdot/100years-home/100years-interstate.html |website=[[Tennessee Department of Transportation]] |access-date=May 25, 2021}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Carey |first1=Bill |title=Overton Park's Citizens and Their Successful Battle Against the Highway |journal=Tennessee Magazine |date=May 1, 2018 |url=https://www.tnmagazine.org/overton-parks-citizens-successful-battle-highway/ |access-date=July 15, 2021}}</ref> 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 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 of 1973|Endangered Species Act]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=Tennessee Valley Authority v. Hill|url=https://www.justice.gov/enrd/tennessee-valley-authority-v-hill|access-date=May 18, 2021|website=[[United States Department of Justice]]|date=April 13, 2015|archive-date=May 19, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210519030038/https://www.justice.gov/enrd/tennessee-valley-authority-v-hill|url-status=dead}}</ref>

[[File:Ocoee River 1996 Olympics.jpg|thumb|alt=Whitewater slalom contestants on the Ocoee River during the 1996 Olympics|The [[Ocoee River]] was home to the [[1996 Summer Olympics]] whitewater slalom events, the only Olympic sporting event ever held in the state.]]
The [[1982 World's Fair]] was held in Knoxville.<ref>{{cite news|last=Trieu|first=Cat|date=November 16, 2017|title=Remembering the 1982 World's Fair|url=https://www.utdailybeacon.com/arts_and_culture/lifestyle/remembering-the-1982-world-s-fair/article_7f68471c-ca7e-11e7-b14f-17dc38318998.html|work=The Daily Beacon|publisher=University of Tennessee|location=Knoxville, TN|access-date=April 25, 2021}}</ref> 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 the most recent world's fair to be held in the U.S.<ref>{{cite news|last=McCrary|first=Amy|date=May 28, 2016|title=The world came to Knoxville in May 1982|url=https://www.knoxnews.com/story/life/2016/05/28/the-world-came-to-knoxville-in-may-1982/90993100/|work=Knoxville News Sentinel|access-date=April 24, 2021}}</ref> In 1986, Tennessee held a yearlong celebration of the state's heritage and culture called "Homecoming '86".<ref>{{cite news |last1=Hurst |first1=Jack |title=Tennessee Homecoming '86 |url=https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1986-06-22-8602140771-story.html |access-date=June 3, 2021 |work=Chicago Tribune |date=June 22, 1986}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Hillinger |first1=Charles |title=Sweet Lips and Rest of Tennessee Blow a Kiss |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1986-03-23-vw-5928-story.html |access-date=June 3, 2021 |work=Los Angeles Times |date=March 23, 1986}}</ref> 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 State Park|Bicentennial Mall]], was opened at the foot of Capitol Hill in Nashville.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Daughtrey |first1=Larry |title=200 and counting ... |url=https://tennessean.newspapers.com/clip/76852761/200-and-counting/ |access-date=May 1, 2021 |work=The Tennessean |date=June 2, 1996 |location=Nashville |page=1A, [https://tennessean.newspapers.com/clip/76852841/celebrating-200-years-of-statehood/ 9A]|via=Newspapers.com}}</ref> The same year, the [[canoe slalom|whitewater slalom]] events at the Atlanta [[1996 Summer Olympics|Summer Olympic Games]] were held on the [[Ocoee River]] in [[Polk County, Tennessee|Polk County]].<ref name="fontenay">{{cite web |last=Fontenay |first=Blake |title=Shooting the Rapids: How a Small East Tennessee Community Struck Olympic Gold |url=https://sos.tn.gov/tsla/tri-star-chronicles-shooting-rapids |website=[[Tennessee State Library]] |access-date=June 4, 2021 |date=April 22, 2016 |archive-date=June 4, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210604183107/https://sos.tn.gov/tsla/tri-star-chronicles-shooting-rapids |url-status=dead}}</ref>

In 2002, Tennessee amended its constitution to establish a [[Lotteries in the United States|lottery]].<ref>{{cite news |last1=Cass |first1=Michael |title=Lottery proposal easily wins approval |url=https://tennessean.newspapers.com/clip/79906102/lottery-proposal-easily-wins-approval/ |access-date=June 20, 2021 |work=The Tennessean |date=November 6, 2002 |location=Nashville |pages=1A, [https://tennessean.newspapers.com/clip/79906119/lottery-some-worried-legal-jargon/ 2A] |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref> In 2006, the state constitution [[Tennessee Marriage Protection Amendment|was amended]] to outlaw [[same-sex marriage]]. This amendment was invalidated by the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court case ''[[Obergefell v. Hodges]]''.<ref>{{cite news |last=Moreau |first=Julie |title=States across U.S. still cling to outdated gay marriage bans |url=https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/states-across-u-s-still-cling-outdated-gay-marriage-bans-n1137936 |access-date=May 2, 2021 |work=NBC News |date=February 18, 2020}}</ref> On December 23, 2008, the [[Kingston Fossil Plant coal fly ash slurry spill|largest industrial waste spill in United States history]] occurred at TVA's [[Kingston Fossil Plant]] when more than 1.1 billion gallons of [[fly ash|coal ash]] slurry was accidentally released into the [[Emory River|Emory]] and [[Clinch River]]s.<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.mensjournal.com/features/coal-disaster-killing-scores-rural-americans/ |title=A Lawyer, 40 Dead Americans, and a Billion Gallons of Coal Sludge |last=Sullivan |first=J.R .|date=September 2019 |work=Men's Journal |access-date=November 2, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191102150952/https://www.mensjournal.com/features/coal-disaster-killing-scores-rural-americans/ |archive-date=November 2, 2019 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Bourne |first=Joel K. |date=February 19, 2019 |title=Coal's other dark side: Toxic ash that can poison water, destroy life and toxify people |url=https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/02/coal-other-dark-side-toxic-ash |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190219140212/https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/02/coal-other-dark-side-toxic-ash/ |url-status=dead |archive-date=February 19, 2019 |work=National Geographic |access-date=May 22, 2020}}</ref> The cleanup cost more than $1 billion and lasted until 2015.<ref>{{cite news |last=Flessner |first=Dave |date=May 29, 2015 |title=TVA to auction 62 parcels in Kingston after ash spill cleanup completed |url=https://www.timesfreepress.com/news/business/aroundregion/story/2015/may/29/tvaucti62-parcels-kingstafter-ash-spill-clean/306796/ |work=Chattanooga Times Free Press |location=Chattanooga, TN |access-date=June 16, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190616180927/https://www.timesfreepress.com/news/business/aroundregion/story/2015/may/29/tvaucti62-parcels-kingstafter-ash-spill-clean/306796/ |archive-date=June 16, 2019 |url-status=live}}</ref>