Talk:Nashville, Tennessee

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	To-do list for Nashville, Tennessee:	edit  · history  · watch  · refresh
add references to Government section add more pictures (Government, Recent History, Economy, Sports) expand and organize: Opryland USA Opry Mills Nashville sit-ins write articles for red links: Belmont Mansion Nashville's skyline

Contents 1 Great train wreck of Nashville 2 Pruning 3 Skyline images 4 Bridges 5 Economy 6 Notable residents 7 Mike Curb 8 Gaylord Opryland Resort & Convention Center 9 Comcast 10 pictures? 11 companies in nashville 12 Nashville-Davidson (balance) 13 Thoughts on recent deletions - Mike Curb & Nashville Superspeedway 14 History of Nashville 15 Nicknames 16 RSS feed of Nashville headlines? 17 Full disclosure, and the anti-spam conundrum 18 Celsius? 19 Nashville's Kurdish population 20 Food 21 Highest point in Nashville 22 Survey on proposal to make U.S. city naming guidelines consistent with others countries 23 Nashville's suburbs 24 MTA

[edit] Great train wreck of Nashville

Why would you call it the "so-called" great train wreck in Nashville, Tn on July 9,1918. 101 people died . Many were soldiers returning from WWI and over have of the victims were African Americans going to work in the Dupont plant.This was very gruesome and tragic event. The newspaper says that wagon loads of body parts were taken to the morge. One witness said that the young mother sitting next to him was decapitaited and her arm was shoved "into her baby." I don't know what Wikipedia ment by the "so-called" great train wreck, but it sounds like a terrible wreck to me. The 1998 article reads "worst train wreck in US history." I am obviously offended by your statement . You should change that before a survivor or relative of someone who was killed reads it.i understand that ignorance was probaly the reason for this offensive blunder. So you are forgiven, but you need to change the statement.

You may want to edit the reference in the Nashville, Tennessee article and write a short article about the event. -- User:Docu

It sounds like you are right and the article needs to be improved. Sometimes people go overboard when striving hard to write from a neutral point of view. Pete/Pcb21 (talk) 22:26, 29 Apr 2004 (UTC)

"Sometimes people go overboard when striving hard to write from a neutral point of view."

I agree with this, but i'd like to get some feedback about a specific instance. A memorial built in 1918 commemorates a massacre of women and children. One year ago the two statues that make up the monument were smashed. I wrote that they had been desecrated, but are being repaired. Someone changed desecrated to "damaged".

This "neutral" language fails to convey that the damage was human-inflicted, and obviously intentional.

My question is, how "neutral" do we want to be? --User:Richard Myers (talk)

I agree that goes a bit overboard, but have to admit that "desecrated" is a very emotive word, and has (for me at least) almost religious connotations (as in "desecrating a grave"). To convey "human-inflicted, and obviously intentional" damage, I'd probably go for "vandalised"; more neutral in the sense that it conveys the facts (assuming it has the same connotations to other readers as it does for me, of course...) - unlike "damaged" - but doesn't go further than the facts - as "desecrated" arguably does. Just an opinion, of course. - IMSoP 18:35, 2 May 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Pruning

This article is getting too long and awkward; it's time to prune. I don't think we need all the stuff from the Chamber of Commerce page--a link to there would suffice. An encyclopedia is not a promotional brochure, after all. And I don't think we really need the list of neighborhoods, either. RivGuySC 20:42, 19 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I agree, the list of neighborhoods is getting unwieldy. I'll scrap it. Kaldari 18:21, 20 Dec 2004 (UTC)

And all that Chamber of Commerce stuff definitely doesn't belong in the intro. I'll remove that as well... Kaldari 19:03, 20 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I'm not sure what was here before, but a brief list of the neighborhoods or areas would be very useful (I know I looked for it). I don't want to undelete something from the distant past before mentioning it, but it'd be good to at least have general geographic definitions for, e.g., 12 South, East Nashville, and the Village (if not a couple of notable commercial establishments for each). I don't think we need a promotional brochure, but it would help give a better sense of what the city is like. Cka3n 08:04, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

I think the main problem with a neighborhoods list is that it quickly becomes unmanagable. Nashville has dozens of neighborhoods and districts. If we were going to have a neighborhoods list, I think it should be a separate article. Kaldari 19:26, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

In my opinion (and, hence, I am discussing this here rather than changing anything in the article), the neighborhoods of the city tell more about the city than the corporations here or the bridges here, and I can't imagine a neighborhoods paragraph that would be longer than those passages. Would a decent middle position be something like: "Nashville has many distinct neighborhoods and districts, including x, y, and z" where each name linked to its own page? Of course, more style is called for, but that might be a middle ground. Cka3n 19:51, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

That sounds like a good idea to me. I think the trick is to avoid making lists. The list of businesses is problematic as well. People are constantly adding non-notable businesses or businesses not actually based in Nashville. We should probably change that to a paragraph as well one of these days. Kaldari 21:04, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Skyline images

Since there is no copyright or licensing information provided for any of the skyline images, I'm going to have to remove them from the article for now. Anyone know of any good public domain images of the Nashville skyline? Kaldari 19:53, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Since I couldn't find one, I just went ahead and shot one myself. Kaldari 02:35, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Bridges

I've added a table of notable bridges to the Transportation section. I don't think it's necessary to list every bridge in Nashville (since there are dozens), but I thought it might be useful to include the better known ones. Hunting down the lengths and opening dates has been something of a scavenger hunt. If anyone wants to help fill in the blanks, it would be much appreciated. Kaldari 02:38, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Economy

There seems to be some disagreement on what exactly Nashville's biggest industry is. Although this article originally stated that finance and insurance were the biggest, I haven't been able to find any sources to back this up. Most sources seem to suggest health care is currently the biggest:

• "...it's the Music City's vital and growing health care industry that is steadily leading Nashville's economy... Health care's outlook as a growth industry and a financial investment continues to strengthen. This is obviously good news for our city's largest industry." - Nashville Business Journal, June 29, 2001
• "While music is one of Nashville’s largest industries, it is generally considered the second or third most important in the area behind health care and perhaps book publishing." - EconSouth, Second Quarter 2004

I found one source (from 7 years ago) suggesting publishing was the largest industry:

• "Even Bibles (Nashville's biggest industry) were jumping off shelves." - Slate, June 17, 1998

I also found a source suggesting that finance and insurance may not be as important to Nashville's economy as they once were:

• "The nicknames 'Wall Street of the South' and 'Financial Center of the Southeast,' while no longer as accurate as they once were, are reflections of the influence that banking has had in contributing to the area's growth." - Insiders' Guide to Nashville, 3rd Edition

Kaldari 22:42, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)

In the 1990s, Nashville went from being a "headquarters" town in finance and insurance to being a "branch office" town because of the rampant mergers and acquisitions in those industries. Examples: J.C. Bradford, First American, Commerce Union Bank, American General. Iamvered 20:38, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Notable residents

My grandmother, who lived in Nashville for many years, told me that Earl Scruggs lived down the street from her. Can anyone confirm about either Flatt or Scruggs? Shoaler 11:24, 17 May 2005 (UTC)

Looks like that's probably accurate. Scruggs apparently has a recording studio here. Kaldari 2 July 2005 01:48 (UTC)

[edit] Mike Curb

I got rid of Bjtitus's addition of record executive Mike Curb as a notable resident. If we add Mike Curb, we'll have to add every single other record executive that lives here...unless there's something extraordinarily special about him.

Zpb52 04:34, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Gaylord Opryland Resort & Convention Center

It's up! Man, took me 2 hours to research and write this. I hope you all enjoy it. Feel free to expand and change anything, preferably if you have uncopyrighted pictures. Zpb52 02:01, Jun 25, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Comcast

"Comcast Cable is the dominant cable service provider in Nashville. Its advertising sales arm, Comcast Spotlight, serves as the local interconnect, representing Charter Communications' approximately 150,000 subscribers in the DMA (Designated Market Area), along with two small systems in the market... In total, the interconnect has 539,000 subscribers, representing 98 percent of all cable homes in the market." [1] Kaldari 2 July 2005 01:28 (UTC)

In NASHVILLE proper, Comcast IS a monopoly, dating back to 19-whenever when Metro gave Viacom the monopoly. The Nashville article is not about Middle Tennessee...it's about Nashville. Comcast has a monopoly in Nashville. Zpb52 July 2, 2005 01:34 (UTC)

Well perhaps you're right. I was just going on the source above since I don't know much about it. Why did metro give Viacom a monopoly? Do you know what the terms of the agreement are? Kaldari 2 July 2005 01:44 (UTC)

I don't know the terms, and at the moment I'm too lazy to do any research concerning it. But I found this document from Metro Council when Intermedia sold to AT&T in 1999 [2] Maybe you can find what you need in there. Zpb52 July 2, 2005 01:49 (UTC)

[edit] pictures?

Anyone have a picture of the capitol building to put in the article?

[edit] companies in nashville

for the list of companies in nashville, I'm informed that we want to keep the list to companies having revenues of $1B or more. Question on that though -- do we want to limit this to companies based in nashville, or are companies who are influential in nashville also good for the list? If 'influential in nashville', Deloitte would have to be on the list (I'm not affiliated; in fact I dislike Deloitte as a company). Wright industries may also fit that bill, as well as Compuware -- although compuware's share around here isn't what it once was. So, base question - based here only, or are companies with a presence here ok?

My opinion is that we only list companies based in Nashville, as determining which companies are "influential" in Nashville seems too subjective. Plus I think we should try to keep the list relatively short if possible. I am, however, open to the idea of creating a new Economy of Nashville article that could deal with these things more thoroughly. What are other people's opinions? Kaldari 05:07, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

A simple listing of companies in a city is not particularly good for a city article. A separate listing of companies might be good as a separate article/page, linked to from an economy section, or under 'see also'. Every city article should have an Economy section, however. This would describe not only the companies and types of companies based there, but also a general description of what types of workers are in the city, why there are certain types of businesses, a brief history of the economic situation, etc. Dr. Cash 21:57, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Nashville-Davidson (balance)

The information you are adding to the summary of the Nashville article is not correct. Nashville-Davidson (balance) does not correspond to the old City of Nashville. Nashville-Davidson (balance) is Nashville minus seperately incorporated satellite cities. It is a designation used only by the U.S. census (so that they don't count the same people twice for two cities) and has virtually no use or value of public interest. Nashville-Davidson (balance) includes many suburbs and rural areas that were not part of the old City of Nashville. The old City of Nashville hasn't existed since the 60s and no one in Nashville (besides historians and old folks) have any idea what it corresponded to as everyone these days considers Nashville synonymous with Davidson County. Putting esoteric information about a peculiar census designation in the summary of the Nashville article isn't appropriate in my opinion, especially since it isn't accurate to begin with. Kaldari 19:54, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Nashville-Davidson (balance) would have to correspond to the former City of Nashville since it says in the article of the balance "This portion generally corresponds to the area of the City of Nashville before the formation of the consolidated Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County." Heegoop, 13 January 2006 (UTC).

It says that it "generally corresponds" because most of areas unincorporated prior to consolidation were sparsely populated and thus didn't make much difference census-wise. I have corrected the article to say "roughly" rather than "generally" so that it is less misleading. I wish I could draw you a picture to explain things better, but I'm afraid the wiki-software isn't that advanced yet :) Kaldari 20:18, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Hopefully this will help it make sense:

Kaldari 20:39, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Thoughts on recent deletions - Mike Curb & Nashville Superspeedway

I think a case could be made for listing Mike Curb as a notable resident, as his career has been more than just being a Music Row suit. The Mike Curb Congregation has a genuine place in the history of gospel music, and he was very successful as a composer of movie soundtracks, eventually becoming president of MGM Records. Then he served as Lieutenant Governor of California (as a Republican, under Jerry Brown!). Since moving to Nashville, he has been very active in local civic and philanthropic activities, particularly with Belmont and Fisk Universities. According to the news, he played a part in helping lure Nissan from California to Tennessee--made a promotional video speaking as an ex-Californian. I think all this makes him as good a notable local as Bettie Page, for instance. (BTW, I'm not a friend or even acquaintance of his--just interested in local history.)

With regard to Nashville Superspeedway, I think a case for a mention can be made there too. Clearly the management means to emphasize its ties to the city, or they would have chosen another name. Also, according to news reports, the property extends across the county line and lies partly in Wilson and partly in Nashville/Davidson. I believe it should be mentioned.

RivGuySC 04:03, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

I believe Mike Curb is already listed as a notable resident of Nashville. Kaldari 06:36, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] History of Nashville

Thanks to Iamvered I think it's time to break out History of Nashville into its own article. Anyone object? Kaldari 00:26, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

• - I have done so... because the article was getting too long. I know it still needs categories, I'm working on it. The History of Nashville is a serious stub that really needs work... I will keep adding but anyone who can enrich this should do so. Iamvered 07:58, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
  • We should probably provide a two or three paragraph summary in this article. I would do it myself, but I'm supposed to be on wikibreak ;) Kaldari 23:25, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

* Done. Iamvered 20:58, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Nicknames

Personally, I'm not a fan of the Nicknames section. It doesn't seem encyclopedic, it's completely unsourced, and there is no precedent for it elsewhere in Wikipedia. I don't mind if long-standing well-sourced nicknames are mentioned in the article (both "Music City" and "Athens of the South" are mentioned in most books about Nashville), but many of these other nicknames might well be ephemeral fads (just like "Powder City", "Rock City", and "The Wall Street of the South", which were all former Nashville nicknames). If we do decide to keep the Nicknames section, it should be moved to the bottom of the article, per the guidelines at WikiProject Cities. Kaldari 22:04, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

I moved the Nicknames section toward the end, just above "Sister Cities". I disagree that it's not encyclopedic-- the sections provides information that gives uninformed readers a better idea of the town's character and makeup. As far as the addition of other nicknames, as long as we can document them (I will work on sourcing the nicknames already in use), I see no reason not to include them. Incidentally, Kaldari, you rock.  :-) Iamvered 20:49, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

As long as you can verify them with reputable sources, I don't see it being a problem. Kaldari 21:01, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

I like the nicknames section, and you can google up some documentation on all of them, although admittedly you get more hits on Music City than Titan Town. ("Metro" is used in so many cities that I doubt it being very worthwhile.) However, I do have a question - shouldn't "NashVegas" be bicapitalized? I've always seen it that way and "Nashvegas" looks to me like it should be a trademark of the gas company. However, the google results show several examples of both. RivGuySC 18:56, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] RSS feed of Nashville headlines?

The wiki-based Nashville entry at [SmallBusiness.com] includes RSS feeds of local news. I don't know what the policy is here on adding such a thing, but I gather that it's not done, as my attempt to use the code from the SB.com page did not appear to work when previewed. Here's what I had tried to put in:

(header) Recent Nashville news
Recent headlines from The Tennessean
<rss>http://tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?category=RSS05&mime=xml|max=4</rss> News of Nashville business and politics from subscription-based NashvillePost.com
<rss>http://www.nashvillepost.com/news/rss|max=4</rss> Local news, weather and sports from WKRN-News2
<rss>http://www.wkrn.com/taxonomy/term/20//feed|max=4</rss>

I imagine there's an ongoing discussion somewhere about the role RSS ought to play in Wikipedia, but I have not found it yet. Is there any move afoot to incorporate feeds into articles? Tom Wood 17:49, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Full disclosure, and the anti-spam conundrum

After posting various updates to this entry today (and having made contributions to a variety of entries in the past, as you can see by my history), I started to write something that would fill in the stub for NashvillePost.com, which I had added to the list of local media. Only then did I learn that I have committed spam, in the eyes of the present Wikipedia consensus. I work for NashvillePost.com. As I read the rules, that means I am absolutely forbidden to mention it or link to it on Wikipedia. Now, we are a six-year-old news service with more than 1,000 subscribers and thousands of other daily visitors, currently averaging 75,000 pageviews a month. We regularly break major stories about business and politics in Nashville -- for recent examples, do a Google News search for the word "FractionAir" or the name "Roscoe Dixon." We also have a freely available collection of past articles related to Nashville history, the majority written by one or the other of two authors whose books other Wikipedians have added to the suggested readings on the Nashville article: Bill Carey and myself, E. Thomas Wood. I added a link to that "Old Nashville" collection as well.

It can't possibly be in the best interest of readers who want to know about Nashville for me to go back in and excise the links that I have feloniously created. But if someone else out there thinks the readers would be better served without this information, I know it will disappear. In that event, I think the readers who are deprived of it might appreciate an explanation here.

Either way, I'm now sufficiently cowed to avoid writing an article that would cure the current red link for NashvillePost.com. Knowing some basic history of this media outlet and the people behind it would allow readers to make more informed decisions about what they think of its content, but nobody unaffiliated with it is in a position to tell that story. Given that any puffery I might try to include in that article would be swiftly excised, I think it would be a more satisfactory policy to allow an affiliated person to post an article on his or her own company, with full disclosure in the talk box, and then invite the world to take issue with anything in the article and to add any negative facts that may be deemed relevant. Tom Wood 18:45, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

Hey Tom, I don't have a problem with you writing an article on NashvillePost.com so long as everything in the article is properly cited and conforms to the Neutral Point of View policy. Every fact and assertion in the article must be verifible through a reputable published source, i.e. you cannot write from your own experiences and knowledge unless that knowledge is already published somewhere. Articles about commercial websites are always viewed with extreme skepticism on Wikipedia. Please read over Wikipedia:Notability (web), and make sure that your article explains why NashvillePost.com meets those criteria. Otherwise the article will likely be deleted within a week. Using inline citations will also help your chances. Kaldari 00:32, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the counsel, Kaldari. I think I can work something up that will meet those standards. I'll get to that as soon as I can. --Tom Wood 16:46, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Celsius?

How many people living in Nashville could tell you when it's around 32 C in their town? Or if they received 10 or 15 mm of rain in a day?

Well I couldn't tell you when it's 32 C, but I could tell you when we get 10mm of rain (since I work on Volkswagon Beetles in my spare time). Occassionally I'll accidently describe something in millimeters and people will look at me like I'm from another planet :) Kaldari 05:06, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

Raises hand. 25 C right now. :) -- nyenyec ☎ 05:34, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Nashville's Kurdish population

A few weeks ago, someone deleted the paragraph about Nashville's Kurdish population from the demographics section. The paragraph was as follows:
"An interesting note is that more Kurds call Nashville home than any other city outside of the Middle East, according to Vanderbilt University. The city has a large and active Kurdish neighborhood of more than 5,000 in the Nolensville Road area. During the Iraqi election of 2005, Nashville was one of the few international locations where Iraqi expatriates could vote. Like most American cities, Nashville has a mix of many nationalities, ethnicities, and religions."
Perhaps someone would like to find some references for this information and add it back into the article. Kaldari 02:49, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Crap, I actually remember hearing something about that (on the Daily Show of all things; Jon Stewart made a crack about Kurdish country music). I'll see if I can't dig up a real source at some point. EVula 04:22, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

I have completely rewritten the paragraph, with references. Kaldari 21:52, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Food

I've noticed that some city articles (Chicago for example) include a paragraph about the city's signature foods. Would something like that be appropriate for the Nashville article? What are Nashville's signature foods? Add any suggestions below (with references if you can find them):

• Hot wings [3] [4]
• Meat-and-three [5]
• Barbecue?
• Yazoo beer
• Pulled Pork, Pulled Chicken

[edit] Highest point in Nashville

The current reference for the highest point in Nashville is a book from the 40s (before Nashville was consolidated). It seems that statistic may not be accurate anymore. Does anyone know what the current highest point in Nashville-Davidson County is and how high it is? It seems there are several conflicting claims on the internet:

• Lea's Summit in Percy Warner Park (1100 ft above sea level?)
• Skyline Medical Center on Dickerson Road
• Dyer Observatory near Radnor Lake
• Love Circle
• Tennessee State Capitol (not likely)

Kaldari 05:50, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

According to the USGS, the highest point in Nashville is 1,160 ft above sea level, although it doesn't say where that point is. Kaldari 20:54, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Survey on proposal to make U.S. city naming guidelines consistent with others countries

There is a survey in progress at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (settlements) to determine if there is consensus on a proposed change to the U.S. city naming conventions to be consistent with other countries, in particular Canada.

This proposal would allow for this article to be located at Nashville instead of Nashville, Tennessee, bringing articles for American cities into line with articles for cities such as Paris and Toronto.--DaveOinSF 16:54, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

However the proposal would allow U.S. cities to be inconsistent with the vast majority of other U.S. cities and towns, which (with a few exceptions) all use the "city, state" convention. -Will Beback 23:41, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Nashville's suburbs

"The suburban areas however tend to vote more in line with the Republicans." What are the suburban areas? Is Hillsboro Village the suburbs? East Nashville? 12 South? None of those are urban or rural by character. What is the source for this claim, and perhaps we can find a more clear appellation?Cka3n 21:47, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

I have removed the statement in question. If anyone would like to re-add it, please provide a citation. Kaldari 23:56, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] MTA

I started the Nashville MTA article. Gaming Freek 01:27, 27 January 2007 (UTC)