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Cookeville City History

Location has always favored Cookeville. Chosen for its two springs and its central spot in the new county of Putnam, it was chartered in 1856 as the county seat and named for Richard Fielding Cooke, a major landholder in the area, who was the state senator instrumental in founding the county in 1854.

Local individuals honored Cooke by naming the new county seat after him. In July of 1854, 40 acres of land that had been purchased from Charles Crook was auctioned off. The first streets were Broad, Jefferson, Spring, East, Monroe, Narrow, and Glade. A log grocery store was the first building contructed in Cookeville and stood where the Cumberland Presbyterian Church stands at Dixie and Broad Street today.

Cookeville Square (circa 1930's)

Joe Copeland built the first courthouse in 1854 that stood until it was destroyed by fire in about 1863. The second courthouse, constructed of brick, stood until it was destroyed by fire in 1899. The present courthouse was constructed in 1900 and has been added on to.

The town continued to grow but was briefly cut short by the onset of the Civil War. After the Civil War ended, the routing of the Nashville and Knoxville RR (later the Tennessee Central) through Cookeville in 1890 greatly stimulated its prosperity. When the railroad first reached Cookeville, the town only had a population of about 400 and was smaller than either Livingston, to the north, or Sparta, to the south.

The coming of this railroad would serve to elevate Cookeville into becoming a city and the locating of vital services to the communities within its limits. The rails carried out products of its farms and forests and brought in manufactured goods. After the TC built a depot west of the square, businesses and residences sprang up nearby, giving Cookeville two commercial districts, Westside and the Square. The city grew to a population of about 3,600 by 1925.

Highway 70 near Cookeville (circa 1930's)

Cookeville was in the right place when U.S. Highway 70N in the 1930's, Interstate 40 in the 1960's, and U.S. Highway 111 in the 1990's were routed through or near it. Cookeville maintained a slow growth up until about 1966 when Interstate 40 passed by just south of town. The interstate provided even better access to the area and the most rapid periods of growth for the town came following this major development. The superhighways spelled the demise of the rails but put Cookeville on the map as a commercial center. The community began attracting light industries in the 1960's, bringing about a healthy diversification of the economy and ensuring Cookeville's position as the industrial center of the region. Today, Cookeville has over 30,000 residents.

Education was important to Cookevillians early. Isaac and Jonathan Buck opened Monticello Acadamy (later Buck College) in 1852. After the Civil War, the two story brick Washington Academy drew high school students from all over the county. Tennessee Polytechnic Institute, which became Tennessee Technological University in 1965, located in Cookeville in 1915.

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