Thomas Emmerson

Emmerson ended his life as a newspaperman. After a short stint on the state's Superior Court in 1807 and a later term on the Court of Errors and Appeals from 1819 to 1822, he moved to Jonesborough to practice law and farm. In 1833 he bought the Farmer's Journal and renamed it the Washington Republican, then sold it to Mason R. Lyon in early 1837, a few months before he died on July 22 at sixty-four. Knoxville had chosen him as its mayor in January 1816, and he is buried in Jonesborough's Old Cemetery.

What the plaque says

Thomas Emmerson Born in Brunswick County, Virginia, June 23, 1773. Moved to Knoxville in 1800 where he practiced law. First Mayor of Knoxville, judge on Superior Court and State Supreme Court. Charter member of Board of Trustees of East Tennessee College, now the University of Tennessee, and one of the founders of Knoxville Female Academy. Settled on a farm near Jonesboro and was editor of the Washington Republican and Farmer's Journal. He died July 22, 1837, and is buried 100 yards north.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Jonesborough Historic District — steps away
  Tennessee's oldest town, chartered in 1779, where Elihu Embree printed The Emancipator in 1820 and a hay wagon by the courthouse started the National Storytelling Festival in 1973.
• Unicoi County Heritage Museum and the Erwin Rail Yard — 10 mi
  A museum in the old fish hatchery superintendent's house in Erwin, a Clinchfield railroad town where the elephant Mary was hanged in 1916 and Black residents were driven out in 1918.
• Rocky Mount Museum — 11 mi
  William Cobb's log house at Piney Flats, where Governor William Blount ran the Southwest Territory from 1790 to 1792, now a living-history museum set in 1791 with a reconstructed cabin for the enslaved.
• Sycamore Shoals State Historic Park — 12 mi
  A shoal on the Watauga River where the Transylvania Company bought about 20 million acres from the Cherokee in March 1775, Dragging Canoe refused, and the Overmountain Men mustered in 1780.

More markers nearby

• Warner Institute — steps away
• DeVault Tavern — steps away
• Chester Inn — 0.3 mi
• State Seal — 0.3 mi