[Edit]
Tennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southern United States. In 1796, it became the sixteenth state to join the union. Tennessee is known as the "Volunteer State", a nickname it earned during the War of 1812, in which volunteer soldiers from Tennessee played a prominent role, especially during the Battle of New Orlean.
Tennessee lies adjacent to 8 other states: Kentucky and Virginia to the north; North Carolina on the east; on the south by Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi; and on the west by Arkansas and Missouri — which makes Tennessee tied with Missouri as the states with the most states touching them in the U.S. The state is trisected by the Tennessee River. The highest point in the state is the peak of Clingmans Dome at 6,643 feet (2,025 m), which lies on Tennessee's eastern border. The geographical center of the state is located several miles east of Murfreesboro on Old Lascassas Pike and is marked by a roadside monument.
The state of Tennessee is geographically and constitutionally divided into three Grand Divisions: East Tennessee, Middle Tennessee, and West Tennessee.
Tennessee features six principal physiographic regions: the Blue Ridge, the Appalachian Ridge and Valley Region, the Cumberland Plateau, the Highland Rim, the Nashville Basin, and the Gulf Coastal Plain.
East Tennessee
The Blue Ridge area lies on the eastern edge of Tennessee, on the border of North Carolina. This region of Tennessee is characterized by high mountains, including the Great Smoky Mountains, the Chilhowee Mountains, the Unicoi Range, and the Snowbird Mountains. The average elevation of the Blue Ridge area is 5,000 feet (1,500 m) above sea level. Clingman's Dome is located in this region.
Stretching west from the Blue Ridge for approximately 55 miles (88 km) is the Ridge and Valley region, in which numerous tributaries join to form the Tennessee River in the Tennessee Valley. This area of Tennessee is covered by fertile valleys separated by wooded ridges, such as Bays Mountain and Clinch Mountain. The western section of the Tennessee valley, where the depressions become broader and the ridges become lower, is called the Great Valley.
Middle Tennessee
To the west of East Tennessee lies the Cumberland Plateau. This area is covered with flat-topped mountains separated by sharp valleys. The elevation of the Cumberland Plateau ranges from 1,500 to 1,800 feet (450 to 550 m) above sea level.
The northern section (in Kentucky) of the Highland Rim is sometimes called the Pennyroyal Plateau. To the west of the Cumberland Plateau is the Highland Rim, an elevated plain that surrounds the Nashville Basin. The Nashville Basin is characterized by rich, fertile farm country.This region is also known for its high tobacco production, and rich natural wildlife diversity. Its people are traditionally Scotch-Irish and still adhear to very traditional ways of life, thus giving this region a distinct "Old World" or pre-Civil War feel.
Many biologists study the area's salamander species because the diversity is greater there than anywhere else in the U.S. This is thought to be because of the clean Appalachian foothill springs that abound in the area. Some of the last remaining large American Chestnut trees still grow in this region and are being used to help breed blight resistant trees. Middle Tennessee was a common destination of settlers crossing the Appalachians in the late 1700s and early 1800s. An important trading route called the Natchez Trace connected Middle Tennessee to the lower Mississippi River.
West Tennessee
West of the Highland Rim and Nashville Basin is the Gulf Coastal Plain, which includes the Mississippi embayment. The Gulf Coastal Plain is, in terms of area, the predominant land region in Tennessee. It is part of the large geographic land area that begins at the Gulf of Mexico and extends north into southern Illinois. In Tennessee, the Gulf Coastal Plain is divided into three sections that extend from the Tennessee River in the east to the Mississippi River in the west. The easternmost section consists of hilly land that runs along the western bank of the Tennessee River. This section of the Gulf Coastal Plain is about 10 miles (16 km) wide. To the west of this narrow strip of land is a wide area of rolling hills and streams that stretches all the way to Memphis. This area is called the Tennessee Bottoms or bottom land. In Memphis, the Tennessee Bottoms end in steep bluffs overlooking the Mississippi River. To the west of the Tennessee Bottoms is the Mississippi Alluvial Plain, less than 300 feet (90 m) above sea level. This area of lowlands, flood plains, and swamp land is sometimes referred to as The Delta region.
Most of West Tennessee remained Indian land until the Chickasaw Cession of 1818, when the Chickasaw ceded their land between the Tennessee River and the Mississippi River. In Kentucky, this region is known today as Jackson Purchase.
Culture
Music
The story of Tennessee's contribution to American music is essentially the story of two cities: Nashville and Memphis. Nashville is most famous for its status as the long-time capital of country music. Memphis musicians had huge influence on blues, early rock and roll, and soul music.
Festivals
Boomsday is an annual fireworks celebration presented by the Knoxville Tourism and Sports Corporation in conjunction with the radio stations of Journal Broadcast Group (HOT 104.5, STAR 102.1 and 93 POINT 1). Boomsday takes place on Labor Day weekend in Knoxville, TN.
Boomsday boasts over 325,000 spectators during its magnificent firework show. Fireworks are set off from the Henley St. bridge and spectators view the show from the riverfront, hillsides, or on boats from the Tennessee River.
Boomsday is the nation's largest Labor Day firework event. The fireworks display is considered the most elaborate firework show for the holiday, and in 2006, Knoxville will expand Boomsday into a three day event beginning September 1st and ending September 3rd.
Boomsday is held on Volunteer Landing, accompanied with live music and festivities.
Museum
Museum of Appalachia
The Museum of Appalachia is a working museum of frontier and mountain pioneer life in the Appalachia region of the United States. It is located in Norris, Tennessee, 20 miles north of Knoxville. The museum was founded in the late 1960s and currently occupies over 60 acres.
Creative Discovery Museum
The Creative Discovery Museum is a children's museum located in downtown Chattanooga, Tennessee. The museum contains art, music, and field science areas, along with a water-themed zone called RiverPlay, a rooftop exhibit, an inventor's workshop, and a temporary exhibit space. The museum was founded in 1995.
Customs House Museum and Cultural Center
Located on North Second Street in downtown Clarksville, Tennessee is the restored Customs House Museum and Cultural Center. Originally a customs house and later a post office, it was reopen in the 1980s as a local history museum. It contains one of the best collections of local history in the state. It is open to the public and currently offers free admission each Sunday of the month.
Dixon Gallery and Gardens
The Dixon Gallery and Gardens (17 acres) is an art museum with gardens located at 4339 Park Avenue, Memphis, Tennessee. It is open daily except Monday; an admission fee is charged.
The museum focuses on French and American impressionism and features works by Monet, Degas, and Renoir, as well as pieces by Pierre Bonnard, Mary Cassatt, Marc Chagall, Honoré Daumier, Henri Fantin-Latour, Paul Gauguin, Henri Matisse, Berthe Morisot, Edvard Munch, Auguste Rodin, and Alfred Sisley. The museum also houses the Stout Collection of 18th century German porcelain. With nearly 600 pieces of tableware and figures, it is one of the finest such collections in the United States.
The museum sits within four outdoor gardens with Greco-Roman sculpture. Its site was acquired by the Dixons in 1939, and landscaped in the English style with open vistas adjacent to smaller, intimate formal spaces. The major areas within the gardens are the Cutting Garden, Formal Garden, South Lawn, and Woodland Gardens.
Hunter Museum of American Art
The Hunter Museum of American Art is an art museum in Chattanooga, Tennessee. The museum's collections include works representing the Hudson River School, 19th century genre painting, American Impressionism, the Ashcan School, early modernism, regionalism, and post World War II modern and contemporary art.
The museum is situated on an 80-foot bluff overlooking the Tennessee River and downtown Chattanooga. The building itself represents three distinct architectural stages: the original 1904 classical revival mansion which has housed the museum since its opening in 1952, a brutalist addition built in 1975, and a 2005 addition which now serves as the entrance to the museum. With the 2005 expansion the Hunter extended toward downtown, and the recently completed walking bridge over Riverside Drive provides a pedestrian-friendly connection to the nearby Walnut Street Bridge and riverfront attractions.
Sorry, no tips were foundTennessee lies adjacent to 8 other states: Kentucky and Virginia to the north; North Carolina on the east; on the south by Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi; and on the west by Arkansas and Missouri — which makes Tennessee tied with Missouri as the states with the most states touching them in the U.S. The state is trisected by the Tennessee River. The highest point in the state is the peak of Clingmans Dome at 6,643 feet (2,025 m), which lies on Tennessee's eastern border. The geographical center of the state is located several miles east of Murfreesboro on Old Lascassas Pike and is marked by a roadside monument.
The state of Tennessee is geographically and constitutionally divided into three Grand Divisions: East Tennessee, Middle Tennessee, and West Tennessee.
Tennessee features six principal physiographic regions: the Blue Ridge, the Appalachian Ridge and Valley Region, the Cumberland Plateau, the Highland Rim, the Nashville Basin, and the Gulf Coastal Plain.
East Tennessee
The Blue Ridge area lies on the eastern edge of Tennessee, on the border of North Carolina. This region of Tennessee is characterized by high mountains, including the Great Smoky Mountains, the Chilhowee Mountains, the Unicoi Range, and the Snowbird Mountains. The average elevation of the Blue Ridge area is 5,000 feet (1,500 m) above sea level. Clingman's Dome is located in this region.
Stretching west from the Blue Ridge for approximately 55 miles (88 km) is the Ridge and Valley region, in which numerous tributaries join to form the Tennessee River in the Tennessee Valley. This area of Tennessee is covered by fertile valleys separated by wooded ridges, such as Bays Mountain and Clinch Mountain. The western section of the Tennessee valley, where the depressions become broader and the ridges become lower, is called the Great Valley.
Middle Tennessee
To the west of East Tennessee lies the Cumberland Plateau. This area is covered with flat-topped mountains separated by sharp valleys. The elevation of the Cumberland Plateau ranges from 1,500 to 1,800 feet (450 to 550 m) above sea level.
The northern section (in Kentucky) of the Highland Rim is sometimes called the Pennyroyal Plateau. To the west of the Cumberland Plateau is the Highland Rim, an elevated plain that surrounds the Nashville Basin. The Nashville Basin is characterized by rich, fertile farm country.This region is also known for its high tobacco production, and rich natural wildlife diversity. Its people are traditionally Scotch-Irish and still adhear to very traditional ways of life, thus giving this region a distinct "Old World" or pre-Civil War feel.
Many biologists study the area's salamander species because the diversity is greater there than anywhere else in the U.S. This is thought to be because of the clean Appalachian foothill springs that abound in the area. Some of the last remaining large American Chestnut trees still grow in this region and are being used to help breed blight resistant trees. Middle Tennessee was a common destination of settlers crossing the Appalachians in the late 1700s and early 1800s. An important trading route called the Natchez Trace connected Middle Tennessee to the lower Mississippi River.
West Tennessee
West of the Highland Rim and Nashville Basin is the Gulf Coastal Plain, which includes the Mississippi embayment. The Gulf Coastal Plain is, in terms of area, the predominant land region in Tennessee. It is part of the large geographic land area that begins at the Gulf of Mexico and extends north into southern Illinois. In Tennessee, the Gulf Coastal Plain is divided into three sections that extend from the Tennessee River in the east to the Mississippi River in the west. The easternmost section consists of hilly land that runs along the western bank of the Tennessee River. This section of the Gulf Coastal Plain is about 10 miles (16 km) wide. To the west of this narrow strip of land is a wide area of rolling hills and streams that stretches all the way to Memphis. This area is called the Tennessee Bottoms or bottom land. In Memphis, the Tennessee Bottoms end in steep bluffs overlooking the Mississippi River. To the west of the Tennessee Bottoms is the Mississippi Alluvial Plain, less than 300 feet (90 m) above sea level. This area of lowlands, flood plains, and swamp land is sometimes referred to as The Delta region.
Most of West Tennessee remained Indian land until the Chickasaw Cession of 1818, when the Chickasaw ceded their land between the Tennessee River and the Mississippi River. In Kentucky, this region is known today as Jackson Purchase.
Culture
Music
The story of Tennessee's contribution to American music is essentially the story of two cities: Nashville and Memphis. Nashville is most famous for its status as the long-time capital of country music. Memphis musicians had huge influence on blues, early rock and roll, and soul music.
Festivals
Boomsday is an annual fireworks celebration presented by the Knoxville Tourism and Sports Corporation in conjunction with the radio stations of Journal Broadcast Group (HOT 104.5, STAR 102.1 and 93 POINT 1). Boomsday takes place on Labor Day weekend in Knoxville, TN.
Boomsday boasts over 325,000 spectators during its magnificent firework show. Fireworks are set off from the Henley St. bridge and spectators view the show from the riverfront, hillsides, or on boats from the Tennessee River.
Boomsday is the nation's largest Labor Day firework event. The fireworks display is considered the most elaborate firework show for the holiday, and in 2006, Knoxville will expand Boomsday into a three day event beginning September 1st and ending September 3rd.
Boomsday is held on Volunteer Landing, accompanied with live music and festivities.
Museum
Museum of Appalachia
The Museum of Appalachia is a working museum of frontier and mountain pioneer life in the Appalachia region of the United States. It is located in Norris, Tennessee, 20 miles north of Knoxville. The museum was founded in the late 1960s and currently occupies over 60 acres.
Creative Discovery Museum
The Creative Discovery Museum is a children's museum located in downtown Chattanooga, Tennessee. The museum contains art, music, and field science areas, along with a water-themed zone called RiverPlay, a rooftop exhibit, an inventor's workshop, and a temporary exhibit space. The museum was founded in 1995.
Customs House Museum and Cultural Center
Located on North Second Street in downtown Clarksville, Tennessee is the restored Customs House Museum and Cultural Center. Originally a customs house and later a post office, it was reopen in the 1980s as a local history museum. It contains one of the best collections of local history in the state. It is open to the public and currently offers free admission each Sunday of the month.
Dixon Gallery and Gardens
The Dixon Gallery and Gardens (17 acres) is an art museum with gardens located at 4339 Park Avenue, Memphis, Tennessee. It is open daily except Monday; an admission fee is charged.
The museum focuses on French and American impressionism and features works by Monet, Degas, and Renoir, as well as pieces by Pierre Bonnard, Mary Cassatt, Marc Chagall, Honoré Daumier, Henri Fantin-Latour, Paul Gauguin, Henri Matisse, Berthe Morisot, Edvard Munch, Auguste Rodin, and Alfred Sisley. The museum also houses the Stout Collection of 18th century German porcelain. With nearly 600 pieces of tableware and figures, it is one of the finest such collections in the United States.
The museum sits within four outdoor gardens with Greco-Roman sculpture. Its site was acquired by the Dixons in 1939, and landscaped in the English style with open vistas adjacent to smaller, intimate formal spaces. The major areas within the gardens are the Cutting Garden, Formal Garden, South Lawn, and Woodland Gardens.
Hunter Museum of American Art
The Hunter Museum of American Art is an art museum in Chattanooga, Tennessee. The museum's collections include works representing the Hudson River School, 19th century genre painting, American Impressionism, the Ashcan School, early modernism, regionalism, and post World War II modern and contemporary art.
The museum is situated on an 80-foot bluff overlooking the Tennessee River and downtown Chattanooga. The building itself represents three distinct architectural stages: the original 1904 classical revival mansion which has housed the museum since its opening in 1952, a brutalist addition built in 1975, and a 2005 addition which now serves as the entrance to the museum. With the 2005 expansion the Hunter extended toward downtown, and the recently completed walking bridge over Riverside Drive provides a pedestrian-friendly connection to the nearby Walnut Street Bridge and riverfront attractions.
Last edited by Anna (5:55, 29 August 2006)
Add Your Tip