The New South
Between 1870 and the 1920s, Tennessee experienced great changes fueled by the post-Civil War industrial revolution. Exhibits on woman's suffrage, Prohibition, and the Tennessee Centennial Exposition illustrate the state's involvement in social issues of the times.
Important artifacts on display include:
- Documents attesting to the rise of a Knox County African-American family, the McKameys, to middle-class status over the years 1860-1930;
- Three Tennessee Equal Suffrage Association banners present at the deciding vote for ratification of the women's suffrage amendment in the Tennessee General Assembly, 1920.
- Quilt made in 1898-99 by the Chattanooga Chapter of the Women's Temperance Union;
- Perhaps the largest collection of Tennessee pottery from the late 19th and early 20th centuries; and
- Chair made by R.H. Macy and Company of New York, displayed at the Tennessee Centennial Exposition.