Clarksville

Clarksville, a city and the county-seat of Montgomery county, Tennessee, U.S.A., situated in the N. part of the state, about 50 m. N.W. of Nashville, on the Cumberland river, at the mouth of the Red river. Pop. (1890) 7924; (1900) 9431, of whom 5094 were negroes; (1910 census) 8548. It is served by the Louisville & Nashville, and the Illinois Central railways, and by passenger and freight steamboat lines on the Cumberland river. The city hall, and the public library are among the principal public buildings, and the city is the seat of the Tennessee Odd Fellows’ home, and of the South-Western Presbyterian University, founded in 1875. Clarksville lies in the centre of the dark tobacco belt—commonly known as the “Black Patch”—and is an important tobacco market, with an annual trade in that staple of about $4,000,000, most of the product being exported to France, Italy, Austria and Spain. The city is situated in a region well adapted for the growing of wheat, Indian corn, and vegetables, and for the raising of live-stock; and Clarksville is a shipping point for the lumber—chiefly oak, poplar and birch—and the iron-ore of the surrounding country, a branch of the Louisville & Nashville railway extending into the iron district. The city’s principal manufactures are flour and grist mill products, chewing and smoking tobacco and snuff, furniture, lumber, iron, and pearl buttons. The value of the factory product in 1905 was $2,210,112, being 32% greater than in 1900. The municipality owns its water-works. Clarksville was first settled as early as 1780, was named in honour of General George Rogers Clark, and was chartered as a city in 1850.

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