Timeline of Tennessee History and Literature

HISTORY

YEAR

LITERATURE

The Watauga Association formed by settlers in present-day East Tennessee.

1772

Oct. 7 — Settlers from present-day Tennessee take part in the Battle of King's Mountain.

1780

Dec. 14 — State of Franklin established (but collapses in 1788).

1784

1791

Nov. 5 — Knoxville Gazette established in Rogersville.

June 1 — TN becomes a state.

1796

1797

Tennessee Gazette established in Nashville.

Population:
World: 800 million
US: 5,308,483
TN: 105,602

1800

Feb. 7 — Most severe earthquake in American history creates Reelfoot Lake.

1812

Nashville Whig (earliest newspaper in the Tennessean genealogy) founded.

1814

Mar. 20 — George Washington Harris born in Allegheny City, PA.

Andrew Jackson inaugurated as 7th US President. Serves 1829-1837.

1829

1832

Charles W. Todd publishes Woodville (first novel published in TN).

1834

Narrative of the Life of David Crockett published.

Davy Crockett dies at the siege of the Alamo in TX.

1836

Nashville becomes the state capital.

James K. Polk becomes 11th US President. Serves 1845-1849.

1845

Population:
World: 1.1 billion
US: 23,191,876
TN: 1,002,717

1850

Jan. 24 — Mary Noailles Murfree born in Murfreesboro.

1854

Nat "Deadwood Dick" Love born.

George Washington Harris character "Sut Lovingood" first appears in the journal Spirit of the Times.

1860

Oct. 25 — Will Allen Dromgoole born in Murfreesboro.

Abraham Lincoln becomes 16th US President.

Apr. 12 — Civil War begins in Charleston, SC

June 8 — TN secedes from the Union.

1861

Feb. 23 — Nashville captured by Union forces.

1862

Jan. 1 — Emancipation Proclamation signed.

1863

Marcus J. Wright publishes diaries on his Civil War experiences.

Apr. 8 — Civil War ends.

Apr. 15 — President Lincoln dies from an assassin's bullet. Andrew Johnson sworn in as President.

1865

TN readmitted to the Union.

1866

1869

Dec. 11 — George Washington Harris dies

1889

Ida B. Wells-Barnett becomes co-editor of Free Speech and Headlight.

1893

Jan. 17 — Evelyn Scott (Elsie Dunn) born in Clarksville.

1899

Nov. 19 — Allen Tate born in Winchester, KY.

1900

Einstein publishes the first of his papers dealing with the theory of relativity.

1905

Apr. 24 — Robert Penn Warren born in Guthrie, KY.

1907

May 12 - Nashville Tennessean founded.

Henry Ford creates the Model T.

1908

Sept. 4 — Richard Wright born near Natchez, MS.

W.E.B. DuBois and others found the NAACP.

1909

Nov. 27 — James Agee born in Knoxville.

WWI Begins

1914

The Fugitives begin meeting at Vanderbilt.

1916

Nov. 17 — Shelby Foote born in Greenville, MS.

U.S. enters WWI.

Russian "October" Revolution.

1917

Jan. 8 — Peter Taylor born in Trenton

19^th Amendment ratified, granting women the right to vote.

1920

May 20 — Wilma Dykeman born in Asheville, NC.

1921

July 19 — Elizabeth Spencer born in Carrollton, MS.

Aug. 11 — Alex Haley born in Ithaca, NY.

1922

First issue of The Fugitive published.

T.S. Stribling publishes Birthright.

Scopes "Monkey" Trial held in Dayton, TN.

Jan. 31 — Benjamin L. Hooks born in Memphis.

1925

The Great Depression begins.

Herbert Hoover becomes 31^st US President.

1929

May 10 — John Trotwood Moore dies (in Columbia?)

Evelyn Scott publishes The Wave.

1930

I'll Take My Stand, manifesto of the Vanderbilt Agrarians, published.

Will Allen Dromgoole elected Poet Laureate of the Poetry Society of the South.

Prohibition ends.

1933

July 20 — Cormac McCarthy born in Providence, RI.

WWII Begins.

1939

Dec. 7 — Japan attacks Pearl Harbor, U.S. enters the war.

Over 300,000 Tennesseans serve.

1941

John Crowe Ransom publishes The New Criticism.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory established to work on the Manhattan Project.

1942

1943

June 7 — Nikki Giovanni born in Knoxville.

1944

July 23 — Lisa (Reed) Alther born in Kingsport.

WWII ends.

5,731 Tennesseans killed in action.

1945

1946

Robert Penn Warren publishes All the King's Men, Pulitzer Prize for fiction (1947).

Population:
World: 2.4 billion
US: 150,697,361
TN: 3,291,718

Korean War begins.

1950

Regular color television broadcasts begin.

Brown v. Board of Education declares that segregated schooling is illegal.

1954

July 13 — Grantland Rice dies.

Joseph Wood Krutch publishes The Measure of Man, National Book Award for nonfiction (1955).

1955

May 16 — James Agee dies in New York.

1957

James Agee's A Death in the Family, is published posthumously, Pulitzer Prize for fiction (1958).

Robert Penn Warren publishes Promises: Poems, 1954-1956, Pulitzer Prize and the National Book award for poetry (1958).

Aug. 1 — Madison Smartt Bell born in Nashville.

Oct. 1 — NASA founded.

1958

1960

Randall Jarrell publishes The Woman at the Washington Zoo: Poems and Translations, National Book Award for poetry (1961).

John F. Kennedy becomes the 35^th President.

23^rd Amendment ratified.

1961

Nov. 22 — JFK assassinated in Dallas.

Patricia Neal wins Best Actress Oscar for Hud.

1963

Dec. 2 — Ann Patchett born in Los Angeles.

1963

John Crowe Ransom publishes Selected Poems (revised ed.), National Book Award for poetry (1964).

Civil Rights Act of 1964 ratified.

Martin Luther King, Jr. awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

Sept. 2 — Sgt. Alvin York dies in Pall Mall.

1964

Feb. 21 — Malcolm X assassinated.

U.S. involvement in Vietnam escalates.

1965

James Dickey publishes Buckdancer's Choice, National Book Award for poetry (1966).

Apr. 4 — Martin Luther King, Jr. assassinated in Memphis.

June 6 — Robert F. Kennedy dies after attack by Sirhan Sirhan in Los Angeles on June 4.

1968

Apr. 25 — Donald Davidson dies in Nashville.

Nikki Giovanni publishes Black Feeling, Black Talk.

Aug. 9 — Richard Nixon resigns the Presidency.

1974

With the publication of The Civil War, a Narrative: Red River to Appomattox, Shelby Foote completes his epic trilogy.

Aug. 16 — Elvis Presley dies in Memphis.

1977

Alex Haley given a Pulitzer Prize Special Award for Roots.

1979

Cormac McCarthy publishes Suttree.

World's Fair takes place in Knoxville, attracting 11 million visitors.

1982

Ishmael Reed publishes The Terrible Twos.

1986

Robert Penn Warren appointed Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress — the first such appointee to be designated the "Poet Laureate."

Persian Gulf War begins.

1991

John Grisham Publishes The Firm.

April 29 — L.A. riots

1992

Cormac McCarthy publishes All the Pretty Horses, National Book Award for fiction (1992).

1994

May 10 — Cleanth Brooks dies in New Haven, CT.

Peter Taylor publishes In the Tennessee Country.

1997

Charles Wright publishes Black Zodiac, Pulitzer Prize and National Book Critics Circle Award for poetry (1998).

House of Representatives votes to impeach President Clinton; the Senate acquits him.

1998

Population:
World: 6 billion
US: 281,421,906
TN: 5,689,283

Al Gore loses a controversial Presidential election to George W. Bush.

2000

Sep. 23 - Carl Thomas Rowan dies.

Sept. 11 — World Trade Center attacked by terrorists.

2001

Ann Patchett publishes Bel Canto, PEN/Faulkner Award and Orange Prize (2002).