As published by the Murfreesboro Post, Sunday, May 30, 2012 With a smile on his lips and a twinkle in his eye, Marion Bean spoke of downtown Murfreesboro with a fondness that carries years of memories. He noted the history of downtown, like when the city was the state’s capitol…
As published by the Daily News Journal, Wednesday, May 30, 2012 By Doug Davis, Daily News Journal In the 1950s, Murfreesboro obtained federal funding to assist in urban renewal on 52 acres of property known as the Bottoms. “I once lived on Front Street, but I went to the Bottoms…
As published by the Murfreesboro Post, Shirley Ferris Jones, Tuesday, May 29, 2012 WThe month of May was anything but “merry” for the citizens of Murfreesborough in 1862. Our little town was barely 50 years old when it became a focal point of the Civil War in the West. From…
Merry Month of May As published by the Murfreesboro Post, Dan Whittle, Sunday, May 27, 2012 R.D. “Bo” McKneely’s connection to Tennessee began in 1958 when he met prominent Rutherford County resident Sara McQuire Bell, widow of the late Ed Bell, former publisher of the Daily News Journal. “I went…
As published by the Daily News Journal, Sunday, Sunday, May 20, 2012 By Greg Tucker, President of the Rutherford County Historical Society “Those years at Central High were the happiest of my life,” remembers Oma Wilson McNabb. “But after Pearl Harbor, the mood at school was usually quite somber.” The…
As published by the Daily News Journal, Sunday, Sunday, April 21, 2012 By Greg Tucker, President of the Rutherford County Historical Society Personal correspondence preserved through generations can provide an incomparable window to the past. Consider the “common” events reported to an absent spouse in the 1880s; a mother’s love…
As published by the Murfreesboro Post, Ken Beck, Thursday, March 29, 2012 Jim Stone last trod the turf of Coldwater Cemetery as a lad of 10 in 1948. This sunny, 70-degree morning in late February, some 64 years later, he seeks to pinpoint the final resting place of his great-great…
As published by the Murfreesboro Post, Jonathan Fagan, Sunday, March 25, 2012 Just in time for the 35th anniversary of Uncle Dave Macon Days, longtime organizers of the event discovered documents from its humble beginnings. Macon, nicknamed The Dixie Dewdrop, was a banjo-picking, original member of the Grand Ole Opry…
Dan Whittle, The Murfreesboro Post, March 12, 2012 SMYRNA, Tenn. – What historic Sewart Air Base brought to here cannot be measured in the present. Amongst the biggest, longest-felt local impacts was when Sewart landed Maj. James “Jim” Walls as a pilot of C-130s in 1957, and after his distinguished 20-plus…
As published by the Murfreesboro Post, Jonathan Fagan, Sunday, February 19, 2012 A wealthy black Southern planter who owned many slaves? The image challenges many preconceived notions of the Antebellum South and its social structure, but such a shocking image was reality in Rutherford, Davidson and Wilson counties. Along the…