The Nashville Sit Ins

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THE DEATH OF JAYNE MANSFIELD

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Jayne Mansfield   Jayne Mansfield died way too young on June 29, 1967 at the age of 34 in a gruesome car wreck, She was killed instantly but contrary to urban legend she was not decapitated. Jayne was called the poor man's Marilyn Monroe. She had enjoyed about a four year stint of popularity on Broadway and in Hollywood from 1954 until 1958. Her career was in decline in the late 50's and early 60's but she was still popular in Europe and on the nightclub circuit. She took her last name from her high school sweetheart Paul Mansfield when she married him at the age of seventeen. Her second husband was a former Mr. Universe named Mickey Hargitay who was from Norway. The third and last husband was Matt Cimber. Mansfield was highly educated, attending Southern Methodist University, the University of Texas and U.C.L.A. She supposedly had an IQ of 163 and was called the smartest dumb blonde ever. Of course she couldn't be too smart. In 1966, a year before her death, while...
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CARNTON PLANTATION

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   My first association with the Carnton Plantation in Franklin was when I would see the old house while hunting for Civil War relics in the early 1970's. There is a subdivision near Carnton today in the area where I hunted when it was primarily farm land. I knew it was an antebellum home but I wasn't aware of how historic Carnton was. It was in a horrible state of disrepair and I have learned since then that a farmer was using the house as his hay barn. In 1977 the owner of the property donated the house and ten acres to the Carnton Association and they have done a fantastic job of restoring the plantation to it's former glory. Originally the McGavock's owned 1400 acres. It was built by Randall McGavock in the 1820's. He was mayor of Nashville and a close friend of Andrew Jackson and James K. Polk. Jackson on several occasions was an overnight guest in the home.    His son John took over the plantation in 1843 upon the death of Randall. In 1848 John mar...
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THE PLATT FAMILY

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  Allen Platt was like many bigoted Southern white men in 1954. He would say 'My dad always said Blacks had their place,'' This belief was challenged in October 1954. The Lake County Florida Sheriff Willis McCall paid Platt a visit in his  Mount Dora home. There had been complaints about his children. There were many people who believed the family was Black because of their dark skin color and curly hair. McCall was pretty sure that they had ''nigra'' blood, as he called it. The sheriff told him "You don't belong here. You are trying to mix with white people." Platt told him 'I'm as White as you are and come from better stock." Under the law at that time you were accepted into White society if you only had one-sixteenth black blood. If you had one-eighth you were considered Black. Platt was told to keep his kids out of school until the race issue was settled. He was a fruit picker in Florida and the father of nine children. ...
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