Exhibit to Celebrate New Jacksonian-Era Collection

During the past year, Tennessee businessman and collector William C. Cook donated his impressive collection of rare books and imprints to the University Libraries and the Center for Jacksonian America. To celebrate this significant donation, the Special Collections Library is presenting an exhibit of materials from the Cook Collection. The exhibit opens on Monday, October 23 at 3:30 p.m. The event is free and open to the public and refreshments will be served.

Andrew Jackson was the seventh president of the United States, serving from 1829-1837. Born in South Carolina in 1767, he joined the Continental Army during the American Revolution and was captured and imprisoned by the British during the war. By 1787 he had moved to Tennessee and became a frontier lawyer. He rose to national prominence with his service during the War of 1812. He was elected as Tennessee’s first congressman, and also served the state as a senator and on the Tennessee Supreme Court.

Some of the more controversial aspects of Jackson’s presidency included his opposition to a national bank, tariff legislation and most famously, American Indian Removal, which caused more than 45,000 American Indians to be relocated from the Eastern United States to the West. After his presidency, he retired to his estate, The Hermitage, in Nashville. He died in 1845.

The William C. Cook Jacksonian America Collection is a significant addition to the Special Collections Library. The collection covers variety of topics on Jacksonian America, and contains rarities such as first editions and autographed texts. The collection contains children’s literature from the period, biographies about Andrew Jackson, and many pamphlets that reflect both the pro- and anti-Jackson political rhetoric of the day.

The exhibit will be on display through Spring 2007. Also in celebration of this significant donation, the Center for Jacksonian America is hosting a lecture by noted Andrew Jackson scholar Harry L. Watson. The presentation, “Freedom and Majority Rule: Andrew Jackson’s Complex Legacy,” was held on October 24 in the Kefauver Room on the second floor of Hoskins Library, 1401 Cumberland Avenue.

For more information about the exhibit and events, please contact Aaron Purcell, Coordinator for Research Services and University Archivist, at 974-3674 or at apurcel2 at utk.edu.