The Athens Post (Athens, Tenn.)
Historic newspapers carry the language, views and graphic reporting of their time, including racist content. They are shown to teen and adult profiles.
756 issues from 1849 to 1874, published in Athens, Tennessee, digitised for Chronicling America.
In 1841, Captain James Williams established the Knoxville Post, a weekly Whig newspaper in Knoxville, Tennessee. The paper was published by New Jersey native, Samuel P. Ivins, with Williams serving as editor. At thirty years old, Ivins was already an experienced newspaperman. His career began at the True American printing room in Trenton, New Jersey, in 1824 when he was just fourteen years old. Ivins spent four years there before leaving to become a journeyman printer, traveling to most of the larger towns in Pennsylvania over the following five years. He then spent several years in New York City before heading south, where he traveled for some time, eventually settling in Knoxville in the early 1840s.
In 1844, Williams retired from the editorial department of the Knoxville Post, leaving Ivins in charge. Ivins ran the paper in Knoxville for the next four years, then in 1848, foreseeing the potential of the region to the south of Knoxville, he moved the paper to Athens, Tennessee, renaming it the Athens Post.
Construction of a railroad linking Knoxville and Dalton, Georgia, had commenced in 1837 but halted in 1839 due to financial and legal problems with the Hiwassee Railroad Company. Ivins determined that the success of the area hinged on that railroad. Writing editorials in the Athens Post, he campaigned for the completion of the railroad, and for Athens to be a depot on the line. Interest in the area’s undeveloped resources was reawakened and construction resumed in…
- Genres
- News
- Published in
- Athens, Tennessee, United States
- Language
- English
- Collection
- Chronicling America
- Licence or status
- None stated by the archive
- Rights
- The Library of Congress believes that the newspapers in Chronicling America are in the public domain or have no known copyright restrictions. Newspapers published in the United States more than 95 years ago are in the public domain in their entirety.
- Credit
- Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers, Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities
- Who can read it
- Teens profiles and older (placed by Invisible Network from what the archive says; archives give no ratings)
- Archive
- Library of Congress