1940: Tennessee

Area and Population.

A southern state with an area of 42,022 sq. mi., Tennessee looks like a huge parallelogram extending from the Great Smoky Mountains, a range of the Appalachians, on the east, to the Mississippi River on the west, the parallelogram leaning sharply to the east at the north.

According to the 1940 census, the state's population was 2,915,841, an increase of 114 per cent over the 1930 figure (2,616,556). About 2,400,000 are native-born whites, and 400,000 are Negroes. The largest city in the state is Memphis, with a population of 292,942. Nashville, the capital, has 167,402; Chattanooga has 128,163; and Knoxville, 111,580.

Education.

Placing heavy emphasis upon its educational system, the state, together with the counties and cities, spent a total of $31,143,481 on education in 1939-40. During the school year a total of 5,627 elementary and 591 high schools employed 15,729 teachers in the elementary schools and 4,935 in the high schools. The number of students enrolled in elementary schools was 524,459, while 123,672 were enrolled in public high schools. The average salary paid to teachers in county elementary schools was $77.14 monthly; county high schools, $96.84 monthly. City systems paid an average salary of $92.28 monthly to elementary teachers, and $117.78 to high school teachers.

Legislation enacted in 1939 to provide free textbooks for elementary schools went into effect in grades 1, 2 and 3 in 1940. The state spent nearly $300,000 on this program.

Industry.

Tennessee has made notable advances industrially, although agriculture continues to employ a larger number of workers than do the manufacturing industries. Approximately 325,000 were employed in industry outside of agriculture. Payrolls reached approximately $40,000,000. Textile manufacturing is by far the most important manufacturing industry, employing more than 50,000 and having an annual payroll of more than $4,000,000. Coal and iron mining and quarrying employed 12,369 men and paid wages of over $1,250,000. Coal production rose from 4,472,403 tons in 1938 to 5,280,000 in 1939. Lumbering ranked next to mining in total numbers employed and wages paid. Following in importance were chemicals, food, iron and steel, leather, nonferrous metals, stone, clay and glass products, publishing, paper and allied products, machinery, auto bodies and parts, rubber products and tobacco.

Agriculture.

The fertile valleys of East Tennessee and the rich soils of the Middle Tennessee table-land and the West Tennessee lowlands make Tennessee a heavy-producing agricultural state. Planters produced during 1940 about 520,000 bales of cotton on an acreage of 736,000; and a corn yield of about 67,130,000 bushels. Burley and dark-fired tobacco growers harvested a crop of 106,004,000 pounds. Production of other major crops were approximately as follows: tame hay, 1,541,000 tons; lespedeza seed, 15,725,000 pounds; Irish potatoes, 3,311,000 bushels; sweet potatoes, 4,150,000 bushels; peanuts, 5,920,000 pounds; sorghum for sirup, 944,000 gallons.

With an all-year pasture available, dairy and beef cattle production provides a major source of income for Tennessee farmers. Sheep and hogs also are raised extensively, and the state boasts two of the world's leading mule markets — at Columbia and Memphis. The state is also a major fruit producer with many large peach, apple, and pear orchards.

Finance.

The total assessed valuation of property in Tennessee is $1,501,861,042. During the fiscal year total receipts by the state in all funds were $72,752,466. Total disbursements were $70,954,907.

Banking.

Banking institutions in Tennessee reported increased strength in 1940. The total resources of 226 State Banks with 32 branches, and 72 National Banks with 19 branches, reached $665,487,500, an increase of 10 per cent in resources over 1939. Capital accounts amounted to $72,331,000. Deposits, time and demand, increased during the year from $522,593,467 to $585,247,500.

Events of the Year.

No session of Tennessee's General Assembly was held in 1940, therefore elections provided the chief political news. Although Governor Prentice Cooper faced opposition in his campaign for re-election to a second term, he defeated George Dempster, Knoxville Democrat, in the primaries and C. Arthur Bruce, Memphis Republican, in the general election. Senator Kenneth McKellar was re-elected over the opposition of Howard Baker, Huntsville Republican. Tennessee gave President Franklin D. Roosevelt a heavy majority over the Republican Candidate, Wendell Willkie. An attempt to amend the state's 70-year-old Constitution failed when voters turned down two proposals: one to increase the Governor's term to four years, and the other to increase the pay of state legislators from $4 to $10 for each day that the General Assembly is in session.

The Tennessee Valley Authority completed Chickamauga Dam at Chattanooga during 1940, and started production of hydroelectric power there. Work was started on three new dams in the TVA system — Watts Bar Dam and Fort Loudon Dam on the Tennessee River between Knoxville and Chattanooga, and Cherokee Dam on the Holston River north of Knoxville. The whole system of power, navigation, and flood-control dams and lakes was dedicated at a Labor Day celebration in Chattanooga, with President Roosevelt as speaker. One hundred and six municipalities and cooperatives which, with the TVA, took over the principal holdings of private utilities in the state for $78,600,000, completed during 1940 their first year of operating the various systems. They reported that, after expansions and enlargements, an aggregate net income of $4,023,000 was earned and that residents were saved $9,000,000 by reduced power rates. The TVA denied claims of heavy tax-revenue losses in the six valley states, declaring that the total revenue loss is only $51,000 annually for all the governmental bodies affected.

State Officers.

Governor, Prentice Cooper; Secretary of State, Joe C. Carr; Treasurer, John Harton; Comptroller, Robert Lowe; Attorney General, Roy H. Beeler; Commissioner of Education, B. O. Duggan.

United States Senators:

Kenneth McKellar, Tom Stewart.