Here are 40 Interesting Facts About Tennessee.
1-5 Interesting Facts About Tennessee
1. Tennessee Aquarium in the United States is home to an electric eel that uses its electrical discharges to post from its own Twitter account when it emits electricity at a high enough threshold. – Source
2. The Jack Daniels distillery in Lynchburg, Tennessee, can’t sell any liquor because it is in a dry county. Instead, they sell commemorative Jack Daniels bottles that happen to have whiskey in them. – Source
3. When Tennessee seceded from the United States during the Civil War, the county of Scott, TN disagreed with the move so strongly that it seceded from Tennessee to form its own “free and independent state.” It only officially rejoined Tennessee in 1986. – Source
4. For over an hour on 7 February 2008, Comcast accidentally broadcast p*rn instead of Cartoon Network in Nashville, Tennessee. – Source
5. Davy Crockett, as a Congressman in the U.S. House of Representatives, opposed President Andrew Jackson’s 1830 Indian Removal Act and was the only member of the Tennessee delegation to vote against it. Six years later he died defending the Alamo. – Source
6-10 Interesting Facts About Tennessee
6. Citizens of Athens, Tennessee in 1946 lead an armed rebellion against the local government who was accused of using law enforcement to intimidate voters and rig elections. – Source
7. Firefighters in Tennessee let a house burn because the homeowners didn’t pay a “$75 fire subscription fee”. – Source
8. Operation Rocky Top was an FBI mission that discovered corruption in the Tennessee State government. With the help of a first-year state representative, the FBI had arrested 50 people including state officials, which led to two state officials committing suicide to avoid trial. – Source
9. In 2005, Tennessee began requiring drug dealers to anonymously pay taxes on any illegal substances they sold. – Source
10. A Tennessee Church kicked out a woman who had been a member for 60 years for refusing to publicly condemn her lesbian daughter. – Source
11-15 Interesting Facts About Tennessee
11. In 2011, in response to a bill prohibiting Tennessee school teachers from alluding to homosexuality, George Takei offered his last name in lieu of the word “gay”, e.g. “Takei Marriage”, “Takei Pride Parade”, and even “That’s so Takei”. – Source
12. A Tennessee magistrate judge once ordered a woman to change her son’s name from “Messiah” because “The word Messiah is a title that has only been earned by one person, and that one person is Jesus Christ.” – Source
13. Courts are increasingly turning to website Urban Dictionary to clarify modern slang language. It has notably been used in a supreme court sexual harassment case in Tennessee in 2013. – Source
14. Pat Summit, former University of Tennessee Women’s Basketball Coach, had a student-athlete graduation rate of 100%. She coached for 38 years. – Source
15. A school in Tennessee enforced a policy to combat sagging pants. Low-riding students would get “Urkeled” by teachers, where teachers pull up their pants for them, sometimes securing the pants with zip ties. – Source
16-20 Interesting Facts About Tennessee
16. A town in Tennessee hanged an elephant for murder in 1916. – Source
17. In a 1978 Tennessee state legislature race, one candidate murdered his opponent. Because he was not convicted before the election, his name had to remain on the ballot while his victim’s was removed, leading the murdered candidate’s widow to run a successful write-in campaign. – Source
18. A man in Tennessee built a 10,000 square foot treehouse with 97 floors by himself over a span of 14 years and it’s open to the public for free. – Source
19. “Old Sparky” the electric chair used for executions in Tennessee, was built out of the gallows used by the state before it abolished hangings in 1913. – Source
20. During the 2010-2011 school year, the University of Tennessee spent a grand total of $2,296,023 on the recruitment of athletes (more than any other university), with an average of more than $7,000 per male athlete. – Source
21-25 Interesting Facts About Tennessee
21. In May 1983, a huge explosion in a rural area of Tennessee caused damage in a miles-wide radius, killing 11. The cause was the largest known secret, unlicensed fireworks factory in US history. – Source
22. Tennessee ratified the 15th amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which granted Black Males the right to vote, in 1997, 127 years late. – Source
23. Tennessee has a state park named after the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, Nathan Bedford Forrest. – Source
24. There is a coin-operated, multi-story structure vending machine in Nashville, Tennessee, where it is possible to buy a car at the touch of a button. – Source
25. There is a full-scale replica of the Parthenon in Nashville, Tennessee. – Source
