History of Nashville

Native Americans of the Mississippian culture, who lived in the area about 1000 AD to 1400 AD, were the first inhabitants of what is today called Nashville. They grew corn, made great earthen mounds, painted beautiful pottery and then inexplicably disappeared. Other Indians, the Cherokee, Chickasaw and Shawnee, followed and used the area as a hunting ground.

Founding the city

The first Europeans settled the area in 1779, and called it Fort Nashborough (the Anglo centric name was Americanised five years later). The legendary Daniel Boone had a stake in the deal, and emigrants from Virginia, the Carolinas and the northeastern states came over the Appalachians along the Wilderness Road. Nashville quickly grew as a trade and manufacturing hub; it was chartered in 1806 and named state capital in 1843.

The city’s key location on the Cumberland River (connecting to the Mississippi navigation system) and at the junction of important rail lines made it a strategic point during the Civil War. As federal troops approached upriver, the administration packed up and moved to Memphis, and Nashville capitulated within a week.

Another celebrated Tennessean, Andrew Johnson (then a US senator) was made military governor and gathered Union loyalists to occupy and enforce martial law in Nashville from 1862 to 1865, which left the city unharmed.

Confederate troops put their sights on Nashville and blew up the railway tracks supplying Union General William Tecumseh Sherman’s battle against Atlanta, and the two armies fought the Battle of Nashville south of the city, in 1864, where Confederate General Thomas Hood’s troops were defeated.

Two major cholera epidemics, which cost the lives of about 1,000 people and caused thousands more to run away, held back the city’s economic revival after the Civil War. The Centennial Exposition in 1897, for which the still-standing replica of the Greek Parthenon was built, heralded the city’s eventual revitalisation.

Country music

Eventually, Nashville became best-known around the world for the soaring popularity of its live aired Barn Dance, which began in 1925. The city was promptly declared the country music capital of the world, and recording studios and production companies sprung up along Music Row, just west of downtown.

In the 1960s, students from the all-black Fisk University fronted sit-in protests at lunch counters downtown, promoted an economic boycott and rallied at City Hall to demand desegregate services. Their successful and peaceful protests became a model and catalyst for civil rights protests all over the South.

In the 1970s, Nashville’s benefactor Gaylord Enterprises founded the Oprylandia Empire and created the city’s country music tourist business by moving the Grand Ole Opry, modernising the Ryman Auditorium, sending boats up and down the river, and adding to the economic renewal of the downtown riverfront.

Modern times

Today, Nashville attracts a broad blend of friendly locals and talented passers-by, who dream of multimillion dollar recording contracts. The resulting flood of first-rate musicians has created an electrifying, ever-changing music scene. In addition to the entertainment business and the city’s multimillion dollar tourist industry, Nashville also depends on its healthcare business and a Nissan factory as economic foundations to keep this optimistic town afloat.