By Ray Hill Camille McGee Kelley, judge of the Shelby County Family Court, was a jewel in the crown of the Memphis machine of Edward Hull Crump. At the time of her appointment in 1920, Kelley was only one of two female judges in the South and the only woman to sit as a […]
By Ray Hill One of the more fascinating, as well as disturbing, stories in Tennessee history is that of Camille Kelley who became Judge of the Memphis Juvenile Court. A widow, Camille Kelley was a star in the crown of the Crump machine and when she assumed the bench, she was one of only two […]
By Ray Hill Bryant Winfield Culberson Dunn was born July 1, 1927, the son of Aubert and Dorothy Dunn. Anyone who has had the pleasure of hearing Winfield Dunn cannot help but hear the soft Southern lilt in his voice, which is a reminder of the fact Governor Dunn was born in Mississippi. In fact, […]
By Ray Hill President Franklin Delano Roosevelt came to Tennessee several times during his presidency. It gave local politicians the opportunity to bask in the glow of Roosevelt’s magnetic presence and the people of Tennessee to actually see the jaunty tilt of FDR’s large head, cigarette holder firmly clenched between his teeth. The popular image […]
By Ray Hill Just a few years following America’s bloody Civil War, as states were readmitted to the Union, old Confederates began to arrive in Congress. The United States Senate particularly came to be dominated by Southerners, who occupied most of the powerful committee chairmanships. It has been frequently said the Senate was the South’s […]
By Ray Hill West Virginia was once one of the more reliably Republican states in the country. Following the Great Depression and the rise of the machine headed by U. S. Senator Matthew Mansfield Neely of Fairmont, the election of 1932 changed the political landscape in West Virginia. Herman Guy Kump was elected governor […]
By Ray Hill Before Strom Thurmond, Theodore Francis Green was well known for some years as being the oldest member of the United States Senate. First elected when he was sixty-nine years old, Theodore Francis Green frustrated several generations of aspiring politicians who figured a vacancy was imminent. Green served twenty-four years in the Senate […]
By Ray Hill Margaret “Peggy” Timberlake Eaton has been the subject of books and even one Hollywood film (The Gorgeous Hussy) and is oftentimes portrayed as the vixen who nearly caused the collapse of President Andrew Jackson’s administration. The controversy over Peggy Eaton certainly did cause Jackson’s Cabinet to collapse. At the heart of the […]
By Ray Hill Francis Biddle, was Attorney General of the United States under President Franklin D. Roosevelt and noted Tennessee’s Senator Kenneth D. McKellar could be “obstinate” and “vindictive”, but was careful to note McKellar was “shrewd”. Biddle also added that McKellar “never forgot”. It was McKellar’s long memory that caused the Tennessean to bedevil […]
By Ray Hill Prentice Cooper was barred by state law from seeking yet another term as Tennessee’s governor in 1944; there was no Senate seat to contest and he was faced with the prospect of retiring from public office. Cooper clearly wanted to remain in public life and at age 48, he was unmarried and […]
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