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James G. Sterchi
James Gilbert Sterchi (June 23, 1867 – December 9, 1932) was an American businessman, best known as the cofounder and head of the furniture wholesaler, Sterchi Brothers Furniture Company. At its height, Sterchi Brothers was the world's largest furniture store chain, with sixty-five stores across the southeastern United States and a worldwide customer base. In 1946, the company became the first Knoxville, Tennessee, Knoxville-based firm to be listed on the New York Stock Exchange. The company's ten-story headquarters, now called Sterchi Lofts, stands prominently along Knoxville's skyline, and Sterchi's home in northern Knoxville, Stratford Mansion, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Biography Early life James Gilbert Sterchi (pronounced STUR-kee) was born on the farm of his grandfather, Swiss people, Swiss immigrant Francois Sterchi, in 1867 to Jean Louis Auguste (1838-1914) and Parthena (Tunnell) (1845-1919) Sterchi on his grandparents' farm. Sterchi's g ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joseph Knaffl
Joseph Knaffl (October 9, 1861 – March 23, 1938) was an American art and portrait photographer, active in Knoxville, Tennessee, during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He is best known for his 1899 portrait, "Knaffl Madonna," which has been reprinted thousands of times, and is still used for Hallmark Christmas cards.Jack Neely,A Vision of the Madonna" ''Metro Pulse'', c. 1999. Retrieved: 13 April 2011. Knaffl was a partner in two Knoxville studios: Knaffl and Brother, formed in 1884, and Knaffl and Brakebill, formed in 1909.East Tennessee Historical Society, Lucile Deaderick (ed.), ''Heart of the Valley: A History of Knoxville, Tennessee'' (Knoxville, Tenn.: East Tennessee Historical Society, 1976), pp. 427, 548-550. Biography Knaffl was born in Wartburg, Tennessee, in 1861, the son of Austrian-born physician, Rudolph Knaffl, and his wife, Rosalie. Rudolph Knaffl had been a court physician at the emperor's court in Vienna before moving to the United States in the af ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Country Music
Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, old-time, and American folk music forms including Appalachian, Cajun, Creole, and the cowboy Western music styles of Hawaiian, New Mexico, Red Dirt, Tejano, and Texas country. Country music often consists of ballads and honky-tonk dance tunes with generally simple form, folk lyrics, and harmonies often accompanied by string instruments such as electric and acoustic guitars, steel guitars (such as pedal steels and dobros), banjos, and fiddles as well as harmonicas. Blues modes have been used extensively throughout its recorded history. The term ''country music'' gained popularity in the 1940s in preference to ''hillbilly music'', with "country music" being used today to describe many styles and subgenres. It came to encompas ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Businesspeople From Knoxville, Tennessee
A businessperson, businessman, or businesswoman is an individual who has founded, owns, or holds shares in (including as an angel investor) a private-sector company. A businessperson undertakes activities (commercial or industrial) for the purpose of generating cash flow, sales, and revenue by using a combination of human, financial, intellectual, and physical capital with a view to fueling economic development and growth. History Prehistoric period: Traders Since a "businessman" can mean anyone in industry or commerce, businesspeople have existed as long as industry and commerce have existed. "Commerce" can simply mean "trade", and trade has existed through all of recorded history. The first businesspeople in human history were traders or merchants. Medieval period: Rise of the merchant class Merchants emerged as a "class" in medieval Italy (compare, for example, the Vaishya, the traditional merchant caste in Indian society). Between 1300 and 1500, modern accounti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peter Staub
Peter Staub (February 22, 1827 – May 19, 1904) was a Swiss-born American businessman, politician, and diplomat. He immigrated to the United States in 1854, and moved to Knoxville, Tennessee, in 1856, where he lived for most of the remainder of his life. Staub served as mayor of Knoxville in the early 1870s and early 1880s, and built the city's first opera house, Staub's Theatre, in 1872. Staub also aided Swiss immigration to the Southern Appalachian region, helping establish what is now the town of Gruetli-Laager, Tennessee, in 1869. In 1885, President Grover Cleveland appointed Staub U.S. Consul to Switzerland.East Tennessee Historical Society, Mary Rothrock (ed.), ''The French Broad-Holston Country: A History of Knox County, Tennessee'' (Knoxville, Tenn.: The Society, 1972), pp. 489-490, 499. Biography Early life Born in Switzerland, Staub was orphaned when he was eight years old. At age 13, he was apprenticed to a tailor, and worked in this trade in France and Swit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peter Kern (American Businessman)
Peter Kern (October 31, 1835 – October 28, 1907) was a German-born American businessman and politician active in Knoxville, Tennessee, USA, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.East Tennessee Historical Society, Mary Rothrock (ed.), ''The French Broad-Holston Country: A History of Knox County, Tennessee'' (Knoxville, Tenn.: East Tennessee Historical Society, 1972), pp. 436-437. He is best known as the founder of the confections company that eventually evolved into Kern's Bakery, a brand still marketed in the Knoxville area. The company's former confectionery and ice cream parlor, now called the Mall Building (or Oliver Hotel), still dominates the southwest corner of Market Square.Jack Neely, ''Market Square: A History of the Most Democratic Place on Earth'' (Knoxville, Tenn.: Market Square District Association, 2009), pp. 31-34, 46-49. Kern served as Knoxville's mayor from 1890 until 1892. Biography Kern was born in Zwingenberg (near Heidelberg) in Germany in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cal Johnson (businessman)
Caldonia (or Calvin) Fackler Johnson (October 14, 1844 – April 7, 1925) was an American businessman and philanthropist, active primarily in Knoxville, Tennessee, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Born into slavery, he rose to become a prominent Knoxville racetrack and saloon owner, and by the time of his death, was one of the wealthiest African-American businessmen in the state.Becky French Brewer and Douglas Stuart McDaniel, Park City (Arcadia Publishing, 2005), p. 38. He also owned several thoroughbred racehorses, one of which captured a world speed record in 1893.Jack Neely, ''Knoxville's Secret History'' (Scruffy Books, 1995), pp. 73-76. Biography Johnson was born in 1844 in a house at the corner of Gay Street and Church Avenue in downtown Knoxville.Robert BookerCaldonia Fackler Johnson ''Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture'', 2009. Retrieved: 1 April 2011. His parents were Harriett Johnson (1813–1894), a slave of Charles McClung, and Cupid Joh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chattanooga, Tennessee
Chattanooga ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Hamilton County, Tennessee, United States. Located along the Tennessee River bordering Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia, it also extends into Marion County, Tennessee, Marion County on its western end. With a population of 181,099 in 2020, it is Tennessee's fourth-largest city and one of the two principal cities of East Tennessee, along with Knoxville, Tennessee, Knoxville. It anchors the Chattanooga metropolitan area, Tennessee's fourth-largest metropolitan statistical area, as well as a larger three-state area that includes Southeast Tennessee, Northwest Georgia, and Northeast Alabama. Chattanooga was a crucial city during the American Civil War, due to the multiple railroads that converge there. After the war, the railroads allowed for the city to grow into one of the Southeastern United States' largest heavy industrial hubs. Today, major industry that drives the economy includes automotive, advanced manufacturing, food and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chilhowee Park
Chilhowee Park is a public park, fairgrounds and exhibition venue in Knoxville, Tennessee, United States, located off Magnolia Avenue in East Knoxville. Developed in the late 19th century, the park is home to the Tennessee Valley Fair and hosts several dozen expositions annually. The park covers , and includes a exposition center, a 1910-era bandstand, a 4,500-seat amphitheater, and a lake, Lake Ottosee. The park is also home to The Muse Knoxville, a children's science museum formerly known as the East Tennessee Discovery Center. Background The land that became Chilhowee Park was initially part of a dairy farm purchased by Professor Fernando Cortes Beaman (1836–1911) in 1875. In the late 1880s, Beaman converted part of the farm into a park with the construction of dance pavilions and mineral springs. In 1890, William Gibbs McAdoo extended trolley tracks along Magnolia Avenue all the way to the park, connecting it with Downtown Knoxville. Later that year, the Lake Par ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Neoclassical Architecture
Neoclassical architecture is an architectural style produced by the Neoclassical movement that began in the mid-18th century in Italy and France. It became one of the most prominent architectural styles in the Western world. The prevailing styles of architecture in most of Europe for the previous two centuries, Renaissance architecture and Baroque architecture, already represented partial revivals of the Classical architecture of ancient Rome and (much less) ancient Greek architecture, but the Neoclassical movement aimed to strip away the excesses of Late Baroque and return to a purer and more authentic classical style, adapted to modern purposes. The development of archaeology and published accurate records of surviving classical buildings was crucial in the emergence of Neoclassical architecture. In many countries, there was an initial wave essentially drawing on Roman architecture, followed, from about the start of the 19th century, by a second wave of Greek Revival archi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
McGee Brothers
The McGee Brothers were an American old-time performing duo of brothers Sam McGee (Samuel Fleming McGee, May 1, 1894 – August 28, 1975) and Kirk McGee (David Kirkland McGee, November 4, 1899 – October 24, 1983). Sam typically played guitar and Kirk usually played banjo or fiddle, although they were both proficient in multiple string instruments. The McGee Brothers were one of the most enduring acts on the Grand Ole Opry during the show's first fifty years. They made their initial appearance on the Opry in 1926 and the following year joined Uncle Dave Macon's band, the Fruit Jar Drinkers. In the 1930s, the McGees teamed up with early Opry fiddler Arthur Smith to form a string band known as the "Dixieliners," and in the 1940s they played and toured with Bill Monroe and His Bluegrass Boys and several other notable acts. The McGee Brothers saw a brief resurgence during the folk revival of the 1950s and 1960s, when folk artist Mike Seeger managed to reunite them with Arthur S ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sid Harkreader
Sidney Johnson "Fiddlin' Sid" Harkreader (February 26, 1898 — March 19, 1988) was an American Old-time fiddle player and string band leader. He was an early member of the Grand Ole Opry, at first accompanying banjoist Uncle Dave Macon and later performing on the program with his own band. In the 1940s, Harkreader formed and briefly toured with the Western band "The Round-Up Gang" before returning again to the Opry. Harkreader was born in Gladeville, Tennessee, a small town in the cedar glades region east of Nashville. His father encouraged him to develop musical abilities, and Harkreader learned to play fiddle at local square dances. Determined to become a professional entertainer, Harkreader first toured as a fiddler for the Loew vaudeville circuit. Around 1923, he paired with Uncle Dave Macon to play old-time music in Nashville, and the following year, the two recorded several sides for Vocalion Records.Wolfe, ''Encyclopedia of Country Music'', 228. On November 6, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Uncle Dave Macon
David Harrison Macon (October 7, 1870 – March 22, 1952), known professionally as Uncle Dave Macon, was an American old-time banjo player, singer, songwriter, and comedian. Known as "The Dixie Dewdrop", Macon was known for his chin whiskers, plug hat, gold teeth, and gates-ajar collar, he gained regional fame as a vaudeville performer in the early 1920s before becoming the first star of the Grand Ole Opry in the latter half of the decade. Macon's music is considered the ultimate bridge between 19th-century American folk and vaudeville music and the phonograph and radio-based music of the early 20th-century. Music historian Charles Wolfe wrote, "If people call yodelling Jimmie Rodgers 'the father of country music,' then Uncle Dave must certainly be 'the grandfather of country music'." Macon's polished stage presence and lively personality have made him one of the most enduring figures of early country music.Wolfe, pp. 320–321. Early life and family Macon was born in Smart ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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