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Jesse Ely Wills
Jesse Ely Wills (1899–1997) was an American businessman and poet. He was the chairman of the National Life and Accident Insurance Company and the author of four poetry collections. National Life was founded by his father, William Ridley Wills in 1902. Jesse Wills began working there at age 23 when he was a student at Vanderbilt University and remained with the company his entire career. In 1925, the company created radio station WSM to help promote their business and built a studio on the fifth floor of their building. National Life Insurance and station WSM achieved international recognition in creating the "''Grand Ole Opry'' " which was broadcast nationwide and became the longest-running radio broadcast in U.S. history. In 1922, while a student at Vanderbilt, Wills was a member of the " Fugitives," an influential literary movement. The Fugitives wrote and published poetry, and included notable writers Robert Penn Warren, Allen Tate, John Crowe Ransom and Donald Davidson. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ridley Wills II
William Ridley Wills II (born June, 1934) is an American author and historian living in Nashville, Tennessee, who has authored 28 historical and biographical books as of 2021. He received the Tennessee History Book Award in 1991 for his first book, ''The History of Belle Meade: Mansion, Plantation and Stud''. He is a past president of the Tennessee Historical Society and in 2016, was given an Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from The University of the South. He is a former executive of a company founded by his grandfather, the National Life and Accident Insurance Company and was on the boards of trust of Vanderbilt University and Montgomery Bell Academy, a prep school for boys in Nashville. Family history Wills' grandfather was businessman William Ridley Wills, one of the founders of the National Life and Accident Insurance Company in Nashville in 1902. In 1925, the company launched radio station WSM on the fifth floor of its building and created the country music broadcas ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Allen Tate
John Orley Allen Tate (November 19, 1899 – February 9, 1979), known professionally as Allen Tate, was an American poet, essayist, social commentator, and poet laureate from 1943 to 1944. Life Early years Tate was born near Winchester, Kentucky, to John Orley Tate, a Kentucky businessman and Eleanor Parke Custis Varnell from Virginia. On the Bogan side of her grandmother's family Eleanor Varnell was a distant relative of George Washington; she left Tate a copper luster pitcher that Washington had ordered from London for his sister. In 1916 and 1917 Tate studied the violin at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music. College and the Fugitives Tate entered Vanderbilt University in 1918. He was the first undergraduate to be invited to join a group of men who met regularly to read and discuss their poetry: they included John Crowe Ransom and Donald Davidson on the faculty; James M. Frank, a prominent Nashville businessman who hosted the meetings; and Sidney Mttron Hirsch, a J ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Poets From Tennessee
A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or written), or they may also perform their art to an audience. The work of a poet is essentially one of communication, expressing ideas either in a literal sense (such as communicating about a specific event or place) or metaphorically. Poets have existed since prehistory, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary greatly in different cultures and periods. Throughout each civilization and language, poets have used various styles that have changed over time, resulting in countless poets as diverse as the literature that (since the advent of writing systems) they have produced. History In Ancient Rome, professional poets were generally sponsored by patrons, wealthy supporters including nobility and military officials. For insta ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
People From Nashville, Tennessee
A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of property, or legal responsibility. The defining features of personhood and, consequently, what makes a person count as a person, differ widely among cultures and contexts. In addition to the question of personhood, of what makes a being count as a person to begin with, there are further questions about personal identity and self: both about what makes any particular person that particular person instead of another, and about what makes a person at one time the same person as they were or will be at another time despite any intervening changes. The plural form "people" is often used to refer to an entire nation or ethnic group (as in "a people"), and this was the original meaning of the word; it subsequently acquired its use as a plural form of per ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Businesspeople From 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] |
1977 Deaths
Events January * January 8 – Three bombs explode in Moscow within 37 minutes, killing seven. The bombings are attributed to an Armenian separatist group. * January 10 – Mount Nyiragongo erupts in eastern Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo). * January 17 ** 49 marines from the and are killed as a result of a collision in Barcelona harbour, Spain. * January 18 ** Scientists identify a previously unknown bacterium as the cause of the mysterious Legionnaires' disease. ** Australia's worst railway disaster at Granville, a suburb of Sydney, leaves 83 people dead. ** SFR Yugoslavia Prime minister Džemal Bijedić, his wife and 6 others are killed in a plane crash in Bosnia and Herzegovina. * January 19 – An Ejército del Aire CASA C-207C Azor (registration T.7-15) plane crashes into the side of a mountain near Chiva, on approach to Valencia Airport in Spain, killing all 11 people on board. * January 20 – Jimmy Carter is sworn in as the 39th Preside ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United States Poet Laureate
The Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress—commonly referred to as the United States Poet Laureate—serves as the official poet of the United States. During their term, the poet laureate seeks to raise the national consciousness to a greater appreciation of the reading and writing of poetry. The position was modeled on the Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom. Begun in 1937, and formerly known as the Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, the present title was devised and authorized by an Act of Congress in 1985. Appointed by the Librarian of Congress, the poet laureate's office is administered by the Center for the Book. For children's poets, the Poetry Foundation awards the Young People's Poet Laureate. The incumbent poet laureate (since 2022) is Ada Lim%C3%B3n. Overview The Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry is appointed by the Librarian of Congress and usually serves a two-year term. In making the appointment, the Librarian consults with c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Donald Davidson (poet)
Donald Grady Davidson (August 8, 1893 – April 25, 1968) was a U.S. poet, essayist, social and literary critic, and author. An English professor at Vanderbilt University from 1920 to 1965, he was a founding member of the Fugitives and the overlapping group Southern Agrarians, two literary groups based in Nashville, Tennessee. He was a supporter of segregation in the United States. Early life Davidson was born on August 8, 1893 in Campbellsville, Tennessee. His father, William Bluford Davidson, was "a teacher and school administrator," and his mother, Elma Wells, was "a music and elocution teacher." He had two brothers, John and William. Davidson received a classical education at Branham and Hughes Military Academy, a preparatory school in Spring Hill, Tennessee. He earned both his bachelor's (1917) and master's (1922) degrees at Vanderbilt University. He served as a lieutenant in the United States Army during World War I. Career Davidson was an English professor at Vande ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Crowe Ransom
John Crowe Ransom (April 30, 1888 – July 3, 1974) was an American educator, scholar, literary critic, poet, essayist and editor. He is considered to be a founder of the New Criticism school of literary criticism. As a faculty member at Kenyon College, he was the first editor of the widely regarded ''Kenyon Review''. Highly respected as a teacher and mentor to a generation of accomplished students, he also was a prize-winning poet and essayist. Background John Crowe Ransom was born on April 30, 1888, in Pulaski, Tennessee. His father, John James Ransom (1853–1934) was a Methodist minister. His mother was Sara Ella (Crowe) Ransom (1859–1947). He had two sisters, Annie Phillips and Ella Irene, and one brother, Richard. He grew up in Spring Hill, Franklin, Springfield, and Nashville, Tennessee. He was home schooled until age ten. From 1899 to 1903, he attended the Bowen School, a public school whose headmaster was Vanderbilt alumnus Angus Gordon Bowen. He entered Vander ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Penn Warren
Robert Penn Warren (April 24, 1905 – September 15, 1989) was an American poet, novelist, and literary critic and was one of the founders of New Criticism. He was also a charter member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers. He founded the literary journal ''The Southern Review'' with Cleanth Brooks in 1935. He received the 1947 Pulitzer Prize for the Novel for ''All the King's Men'' (1946) and the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1958 and 1979. He is the only person to have won Pulitzer Prizes for both fiction and poetry. Early years Warren was born in Guthrie, Kentucky, very near the Tennessee-Kentucky border, to Robert Warren and Anna Penn. Warren's mother's family had roots in Virginia, having given their name to the community of Penn's Store in Patrick County, Virginia, and she was a descendant of Revolutionary War soldier Colonel Abram Penn. Robert Penn Warren graduated from Clarksville High School in Clarksville, Tennessee; Vanderbilt University (summa cum laude, Phi Beta K ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Ridley Wills (insurance Executive)
William Ridley Wills, (September 19, 1871 – November 21, 1949) was a founder of the National Life and Accident Insurance Company in Nashville in 1902. Born in west Tennessee, Wills came to Nashville in 1893 to serve as Tennessee's deputy commissioner of insurance. There he met C.A. Craig and C. Runcie Clements and the three men formed the National Life and Accident Company after purchasing another insurance company which was being sold at auction. The new company sold health and accident insurance policies to industrial workers, a large percentage of whom were African-American. The company grew and moved into a large stone building in downtown Nashville where, in 1925, it launched radio station WSM (AM), WSM which won international fame in creating the broadcast the "Grand Ole Opry". Wills died of a stroke in 1949. His nephew (identically named) was poet and novelist William Ridley Wills, and his grandson is author and historian Ridley Wills II, William Ridley Wills II. Biography ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fugitives (poets)
''The Fugitives'' also known as ''The Fugitive Poets'', is the name given to a group of poets and literary scholars at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, who published a literary magazine from 1922 to 1925 called ''The Fugitive''. The group, primarily driven by Robert Penn Warren, John Crowe Ransom, Donald Davidson, and Allen Tate, formed a major school of twentieth century poetry in the United States. With it, a major period of modern Southern literature began. Their poetry was formal and featured traditional prosody and concrete imagery often from experiences of the rural south. The group has some overlap with two later groups Southern Agrarians and New Criticism. History About 1920, a group consisting of some influential teachers of literature at Vanderbilt, a few townies, and some students began meeting on alternate Saturday nights at the home of James Marshall Frank and his brother-in-law Sidney Mttron Hirsch on Whitland Avenue in Nashville. They met as a po ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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