Bearden, also known as Bearden Village, is a neighborhood in
Knoxville, Tennessee
Knoxville is a city in Knox County, Tennessee, United States, and its county seat. It is located on the Tennessee River and had a population of 190,740 at the 2020 United States census. It is the largest city in the East Tennessee Grand Division ...
, United States, located along
Kingston Pike
Kingston Pike is a highway in Knox County, Tennessee, United States, that connects Downtown Knoxville with West Knoxville, Farragut, and other communities in the western part of the county. The road follows a merged stretch of U.S. Route&nb ...
in
West Knoxville
West Knoxville is a section of Knoxville, Tennessee, US. It is west of the city's Downtown Knoxville, downtown area. It stretches from Sequoyah Hills, Tennessee, Sequoyah Hills on the east to the city's border with Farragut, Tennessee, Farragut on ...
. Developed primarily as an agrarian community in the 19th century, this neighborhood now lies at the heart of one of Knoxville's major commercial corridors. Named for former Knoxville mayor and Tennessee state legislator, Marcus De Lafayette Bearden (1830–1885),East Tennessee Historical Society, Mary Rothrock (ed.), ''The French Broad-Holston Country: A History of Knox County, Tennessee'' (Knoxville, Tenn.: East Tennessee Historical Society, 1972), pp. 326-329. the community was annexed by Knoxville in 1962.
Location
Bearden lies along Kingston Pike (
U.S. Route 70
U.S. Route 70 or U.S. Highway 70 (US 70) is an east–west United States highway that runs for from eastern North Carolina to east-central Arizona. It is a major east–west highway of the Southeastern, Southern and Southwestern United States ...
and
U.S. Route 11
U.S. Route 11 or U.S. Highway 11 (US 11) is a major north–south United States Numbered Highway extending across the eastern U.S. The southern terminus of the route is at US 90 in Bayou Sauvage National Wildlife Refu ...
) and adjacent roads, approximately west of Knoxville's downtown area. It traditionally encompasses the Kingston Pike corridor between Lyons View Pike on the east and Sutherland Avenue on the west,Knoxville-Knox County Metropolitan Planning Commission West Sector Plan - Historical Development and Historical Resources 9 August 2007. Retrieved: 1 December 2010. though the term "Bearden" can loosely refer to the entire Kingston Pike area between
Sequoyah Hills
Sequoyah Hills is a neighborhood in Knoxville, Tennessee, United States, named for the Cherokee scholar Sequoyah.Turkey Creek. The West Hills neighborhood lies northwest of Bearden, Forest Heights lies opposite Sutherland to the north, and Ebenezer Mill lies to the southwest.
History
Early history
What is now Bearden began as a small community that developed around a fortified house, which was probably located somewhere near the modern junction of Kingston Pike and Northshore Drive.Center For Transportation Research Knoxville, Tennessee, 40KN201 20 January 2002. Retrieved: 1 December 2010. This community was initially known as "Erin," presumably after the large number of Irish settlers that inhabited the area. In 1792, Knoxville surveyor
Charles McClung
Charles McClung (May 13, 1761August 9, 1835) was an American pioneer, politician, and surveyor best known for drawing up the original plat of Knoxville, Tennessee, in 1791. While Knoxville has since expanded to many times its original size, the ...
surveyed the "Kingston Road"—the forerunner of the modern Kingston Pike—which was built to connect Knoxville with Campbell's Station (modern Farragut). This brought increased settlement to western Knox County.
During the late-18th century, the Bearden area was one of the more hostile areas in Knox County. The area's earliest settler, James Miller, was allegedly murdered shortly after his arrival in the early 1790s. In September 1793, near the end of the
Cherokee–American wars
The Cherokee–American wars, also known as the Chickamauga Wars, were a series of raids, campaigns, ambushes, minor skirmishes, and several full-scale frontier battles in the Old Southwest from 1776 to 1794 between the Cherokee and American se ...
, a large
Chickamauga Cherokee
The Chickamauga Cherokee is a Native American group who separated from the Cherokee from the American Revolutionary War to the early 1800s. Most of the Cherokee people signed peace treaties with the Americans in 1776-1777, after the Second Chero ...
and Creek contingent attacked and destroyed Cavet's Station, which stood near Bearden, and massacred 12 of the station's 13 inhabitants. Even after Native American hostilities had ceased, the Bearden area remained a dangerous place. In the early 1800s, the stretch of the Kingston Road west of Bearden had been nicknamed "Murderers' Hollow."Jack Neely, "Down the Dixie Lee Highway," ''From the Shadow Side: And Other Stories of Knoxville, Tennessee'' (Tellico Books, 2003), pp. 125–139.
19th century
Early businesses in the Bearden area catered to travellers along the Kingston Road, and included early 19th-century inns operated by Thomas Hudiburgh and John Gamble. In 1838, Knoxville businessmen Marcus De Lafayette Bearden (1799–1854) and Gideon Hazen established a paper mill along Third Creek in the Middlebrook area. This mill, the namesake of Papermill Drive, operated until 1886, when its milldam failed."Ask Doc Knox, Tracking Down the Mythical Paper Mill of Papermill Drive ''Metro Pulse'', 22 September 2010. Retrieved: 1 December 2010.
In 1817, an Irish immigrant named John Reynolds purchased what is now Bearden Hill from Knoxville founder James White. Reynolds's son, Major Robert Reynolds, inherited the property and built a house, Knollwood, that still stands atop the hill, overlooking Kingston Pike (his sister oversaw its construction, as he was away fighting in the
Mexican–American War
The Mexican–American War (Spanish language, Spanish: ''guerra de Estados Unidos-México, guerra mexicano-estadounidense''), also known in the United States as the Mexican War, and in Mexico as the United States intervention in Mexico, ...
at the time). During the
Civil War
A civil war is a war between organized groups within the same Sovereign state, state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies.J ...
, Knollwood served as the headquarters of Confederate general
James Longstreet
James Longstreet (January 8, 1821January 2, 1904) was a General officers in the Confederate States Army, Confederate general during the American Civil War and was the principal subordinate to General Robert E. Lee, who called him his "Old War Ho ...
while he planned his assault on Knoxville.
Bearden's namesake, Marcus De Lafayette Bearden (1830–1885), was a Union officer, Mayor of Knoxville, and state legislator who owned a farm in the community along Weisbarger Road. He was a cousin of the older Bearden (the paper mill founder). In 1888, while serving in the state legislature, he managed to secure funding for the Eastern State Hospital (later known as Lakeshore Mental Health Institute) on Lyons View Pike, which provided a major economic boost to the community.
Commercial development
In 1900, Bearden remained a largely rural community concentrated around a railroad depot, a post office, a
gristmill
A gristmill (also: grist mill, corn mill, flour mill, feed mill or feedmill) grinds cereal grain into flour and Wheat middlings, middlings. The term can refer to either the grinding mechanism or the building that holds it. Grist is grain that h ...
, and two stores. Within a few years, more businesses began to appear, due mainly to Kingston Pike's location along two cross-country tourism routes, the
Dixie Highway
Dixie Highway was a United States auto trail first planned in 1914 to connect the Midwest with the South. It was part of a system and was expanded from an earlier Miami to Montreal highway. The final system is better understood as a network o ...
and the
Lee Highway
The Lee Highway was a United States auto trail initially connecting from an eastern zero mile marker on the Ellipse in Washington DC to a western zero marker, the Pacific Milestone, in the center of San Diego, California — via the Ame ...
. In the late-1920s, Knoxville's first motel, Edd's Tourist Camp, opened in Bearden. In subsequent years, dozens of filling stations, motels and restaurants sprang up catering to the Dixie-Lee Highway tourist traffic.
While the completion of the
Interstate Highway System
The Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways, commonly known as the Interstate Highway System, or the Eisenhower Interstate System, is a network of controlled-access highways that forms part of the National Hi ...
in the 1960s drew away most of Kingston Pike's cross-country traffic, the construction of Western Plaza (Knoxville's first shopping center outside of the downtown area) in 1957 and
West Town Mall
West Town Mall is a shopping mall located in Knoxville, Tennessee, United States. Opened in August 1972, this one-level mall is located in the western portion of Knoxville in the West Hills community. West Town Mall is located along Interstates ...
in the early 1970s sparked a retail boom in West Knoxville.Knoxville-Knox County Metropolitan Planning Commission West City Sector Plan - Land Use and Development , 9 August 2007. Retrieved: 1 December 2010. Numerous shopping centers and retail outlets sprang up in the 1970s and 1980s, and Knoxville's primary commercial corridor shifted from Downtown Knoxville to West Knoxville.
Economy
The Bearden area is home to over 30 shopping centers, covering over three million square feet of floor space. Along with West Town Mall, major centers include Homberg Place, Bearden Center, Knox Plaza, Papermill Plaza, and the Centre at Deane Hill. Most of these shopping centers have one or two large anchor stores flanked by various smaller stores. The Bearden area is also home to several dozen office buildings with over of office space. In recent years, Knoxville and the Bearden community have taken steps to create a more pedestrian-friendly "village" atmosphere, mainly through the construction of greenways and sidewalks, and the revision of zoning laws to allow a mix of residential, commercial, and office uses.Knoxville-Knox County Metropolitan Planning Commission West City Sector Plan - Land Use, Community Facility, and Transportation Plans 9 August 2007. Retrieved: 1 December 2010.