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People who grew up knowing Central Avenue are just now getting used to calling it Central Street, as their great-grandparents did. It makes sense, by the pattern we’ve set up. But we’ve complicated things, and, as is often the case, […]

We’d been wondering when this shoe might fall. Last week we learned that someone associated with the Journal Media Group, the News Sentinel’s corporate owner, disconnected or allowed to lapse several years’ worth of the archives of Metro Pulse, removing […]

Over this hot summer, I noticed the UT bookstore, known perhaps more accurately as the VolShop, on Henley Street had closed. I was walking over from UT one searing day in July, and thought I’d pop in there for a […]

The ancient name Palmyra is unexpectedly in the news. Two months ago, the roving street gang that likes to call itself the Islamic State seized the old Syrian ghost town and destroyed some of its pagan statues. They staged some […]

Everybody has an opinion about whether the Confederate flag is good or bad. They’re all dug in. Some are certain it’s racist and the very signature of evil. Others say it’s purely an expression of Southern pride and reverence for […]

Old newspapers, legal documents, letters, and directories of various sorts are full of mundane detail. More interesting stuff about life in Knoxville more than a century ago is often elusive. Like what people ate. Archaeologists can tell us that people […]

It was springtime, and musicians from around the world, from the big cities of the North and from the capitals of Europe, were converging on Gay Street. It exalted the old town in surprising ways. When it was underway, fans […]

Every year, millions will crowd around televisions to watch the most famous New Year’s Eve celebration in the world.  The ball drop at Times Square in New York has become a universally recognized symbol of an annual new beginning.  It […]

A key part of the Mercury launch is the formation of a new 501(c)(3) nonprofit, an educational organization known as the Knoxville History Project. It’s surprising, when you think about it, that Knoxville, almost 225 years old, has never had its […]