A business history that is both accurate and interesting is a rare find. In this comprehensive volume, Bill Carey tells the inside stories of the most important businesses in Nashville history, mixing fascinating anecdotes with bottom-line analyses to give a perspective of Nashville that has never been captured before. It's a complete history of Genesco, an apparel giant led by Maxey Jarman that fell on hard times in the 1970s. Carey chronicles the National Life & Accident Insurance Co., a business so important that it helped Nashville become the home of country music and a major tourist destination. He also tells the bizarre saga of Minnie Pearl's Fried Chicken, a company founded by brothers John Jay and Henry Hooker that went from stock market darling to legendary failure in only a few months.

A book that details aspects of slavery in Tennessee and its relationship with the economy, newspapers and the government. Based largely on newspaper advertisements and first-person accounts, this book is full of revelations that prove that slavery was a much bigger part of Tennessee's culture than people realize today.

Jack Massey is one of the unsung heroes of American business. To this day he is the only person ever to take three companies to the New York Stock ExchangeóKentucky Fried Chicken, Hospital Corporation of America, and Winner's Corporation. According to Forbes, he "deserves credit for creating the modern fast-food industry." He should get credit for for-profit hospitals as well. The list of people who claim Massey as a mentor includes one U.S. senator, two former Tennessee governors, and the Wendy's founder Dave Thomas.Incredibly, Massey did all of this after he tried to retire. Massey spent his childhood working in his uncle's drugstore in small-town Georgia. Passing the pharmacy exam and receiving his license at age 19 (two years below the minimum legal age), Massey built up a chain of drugstores in Nashville, which he expanded into a surgical supply business in 1937, and became a bank director and head of Nashville's Baptist Hospital. In 1961 he sold his surgical supply company and retired.

Trivia questions covering a wide range of areas, such as science, sports, history, pop culture, and more.

A compilation of stories written with humor and emotion about life, death and Southern culture by a retired United Methodist minister. Some stories are God or church oriented; others are simply sanctified silliness.

In September 2000 Bill Carey released his first book Fortunes, Fiddles, and Fried Chicken: A Business History of Nashville. It quickly became a local bestseller, reminding people of the fascinating stories behind the companies and industries that put Nashville on the map -- such as Genesco, the National Life and Accident Insurance Co., Kentucky Fried Chicken, and the country music industry. The Tennessee Library Association and Tennessee Historical Commission named the book History Book of the Year. "I was amazed with how much Bill Carey uncovered that even I didn't know," former Tennessee governor Ned McWherter said upon reading it. Now Carey has turned his attention to the most revered institution in Nashville, Vanderbilt University. And, much like with his first book, the author proves there are fascinating stories behind everything -- anecdotes about chancellors and students, buildings and campus plans, schemes that succeeded, and ideas that failed. Most of these tales are long forgotten.