A book that details aspects of slavery in Tennessee and its relationship with the economy, newspapers and the government. Based largely on newspaper advertisements and first-person accounts, this book is full of revelations that prove that slavery was a much bigger part of Tennessee's culture than people realize today.

The Beginnings of the The Volunteer State Tennessee was a remote place in 1810. By 1850, some of the most influential people in America had come from Tennessee, such as Sequoyah, David Crockett, the filibuster William Walker and the slave trader Isaac Franklin. Learn about the state's first steamboats and its initial telegraph message. Read newly discovered accounts from the Trail of Tears. Hop along the Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad and relive the glory and tragedy. Author and columnist Bill Carey details these stories and more on early history in The Volunteer State.

Through correspondence with people involved in the slave trade and interviews with former slaves, Bancroft exposed the commercial aspects of the American slave trade, including the breeding of slaves for future sale, the separation of slave families, the profitability of the trade, and the integration of slave traders into the highest ranks of southern society.

"Focuses on networks of people, information, conveyances, and other resources and technologies that moved slave-based products from suppliers to buyers and users." (page 3) The book examines the credit and financial systems that grew up around trade in slaves and products made by slaves.

Traces the author's thirty-year research into his slave ancestry, describing the history of the massive tobacco plantation where his ancestors worked and his family's extensive genealogical legacy.

A business history that is both accurate and interesting is a rare find. In this comprehensive volume, Bill Carey tells the inside stories of the most important businesses in Nashville history, mixing fascinating anecdotes with bottom-line analyses to give a perspective of Nashville that has never been captured before. It's a complete history of Genesco, an apparel giant led by Maxey Jarman that fell on hard times in the 1970s. Carey chronicles the National Life & Accident Insurance Co., a business so important that it helped Nashville become the home of country music and a major tourist destination. He also tells the bizarre saga of Minnie Pearl's Fried Chicken, a company founded by brothers John Jay and Henry Hooker that went from stock market darling to legendary failure in only a few months.