NASHVILLE, the capital city of Tennessee, U.S.A., a port of entry, and the county seat of Davidson county; on the Cum berland river in the north-central part of the State. It is on Fed eral highways 31, 41 and 7o, has a municipal airport; and is served by the Louisville and Nashville, the Nashville, Chattanooga and St. Louis and the Tennessee Central railways, motor-bus lines and river packets. Pop. 118,342 in 1920 (3o% negroes and 98% native-born) ; in 1930 it was by the Federal census 153,866, a gain in that decade of 35,524 or 3o%. The city covers 211 sq.m., on hills and bluffs averaging 500 ft. above sea-level, in a vast undulating elliptical valley of 5,450 square miles. The sur rounding country is a blue-grass region of great fertility. Within 25 m. of the city practically everything is raised that is needed for food and clothing, and most of the necessities of life are manu factured. Seven bridges cross the river. On the highest hill stands the State House, a fine example of pure Greek architecture, with a cupola 205 ft. high. The tomb of President Polk is in the capitol grounds, and II m. east of the city is "The Hermitage," the beau tiful plantation home of President Jackson. In Centennial park, where the Tennessee Centennial Exposition was held in 1897, is a copy of the Parthenon. Mt. Olivet cemetery contains a beau tiful monument to the Confederate soldiers, surrounded by 2,000 of their graves, and north of the city is a National cemetery where 16,862 Federal soldiers are buried. A memorial to the sol diers and sailors of the World War (covering two blocks and con taining a large auditorium) was erected by the city, the county and the State, at a cost of $2,600,000. The Tennessee State fair is held at Nashville annually, and many of the State institutions are situated here, including the Confederate Soldiers' Home, the In dustrial school, the school for the blind, the Middle Tennessee hospital for the insane, the penitentiary, and the Training and Agricultural school for boys. The public parks cover 2,100 ac. ; the hotels have 1,50o guest-rooms; there are 257 churches, includ ing a Roman Catholic cathedral, 36 public schools and 4o under private auspices. The city's assessed valuation for 1928 was $169, 623,822. Since 1913 it has operated under a commission form of government.
Nashville is one of the foremost educational centres in the South. Vanderbilt university (founded in 1873 by Commodore Vanderbilt, who contributed $1,000,000 towards its funds, and whose son and grandsons have given over $2,000,000) has grounds and buildings valued at $5,652,724, productive funds of $10, 000,000 and an enrolment (1927-28) of 1,401. Its medical school has been housed since 1925 in a well equipped and comprehensive plant, built with grants from the General Education Board and the Carnegie Corporation and earlier gifts from Andrew Carnegie.
The George Peabody college for Teachers (opened as a normal school in 1875) has an endowment of $4,133,000 and an enrol ment (1928) of 3,858. Fisk university (for negroes), founded in 1865 by the American Missionary Association and the Western Freedmen's Aid Commission, has buildings and grounds valued at $500.000, endowment funds of nearly $300,000, and an annual enrolment of about 700. The Fisk Jubilee Singers, sent out first in 1871 to raise money for a dormitory for women, have sung in most of the large cities of America and Europe. Nashville is the seat also of the Agricultural and Industrial State college and the Meharry Medical college (both for negroes).
Among the most important manufacturing industries are print ing and publishing (especially of religious periodicals and books), coffee-roasting, and the manufacture of stoves and furnaces, hardwood flooring, fertilizers, cloth and paper bags, boots and shoes, self-raising flour, furniture, knit goods, building materials, wooden and paper boxes, work garments, shirts, soft collars, women's dresses and underwear, brick, mattresses, tobacco and snuff, steel barges, feather pillows, chewing gum and clinical thermometers. Two of the railroads have shops here, employing together over 3,00o persons. The factory output in 1927 was valued at $94,435,056. Nashville is the seat of a branch of the Federal Reserve Bank. Bank debits in 1927 aggregated $1,090, 140,000.
Nov. 1779, James Robertson and eight compan ions, who had set out in February from the Watauga settlements in eastern Tennessee to establish an "advance guard of civiliza tion" in the rich central basin, arrived at the spot where Nash ville now stands, and decided to make it the site of the new set tlement. They were joined a few months later by their wives and children and other pioneers, under Col. John Donelson. The town (called Nashborough until its incorporation in 1784) was named after either Abner Nash, then governor of North Carolina, or his brother Francis, a Revolutionary general, killed at Germantown. In 1806 it was chartered as a city. From 1812 (except from 1815 to 1826) the legislature met at Nashville, and in 1843 it was made the State capital. On June 3, 185o, it was the scene of the South ern, or Nashville, Convention, attended by 1 oo delegates from nine States, which denounced the Wilmot Proviso and (at an ad journed meeting in November) expressed disapproval of the Compromise Measures and asserted the right of the South to secede. For the battle of Nashville (1864) see below. During the World War the Government established the Old Hickory Powder plant across the river, constructing large factory buildings and a village to accommodate 30,00o persons. (X.)