Knox Heritage continues its series of educational lunches, Lost & Found at the Foundry, on Wednesday, February 3, with special guest Jack Neely. The noted author and local historian will discuss his latest published work, Market Square: A History of the Most Democratic Place on Earth. Mr. Neely will sign books and there will be copies available for purchase.
Lost and Found is held at The Foundry, 747 World’s Fair Park Drive, in downtown Knoxville. Parking is free. A lunch buffet will be served at 11:30 a.m. and the program will begin at 12:00 p.m. The cost of the buffet is $10.00 for Knox Heritage members and $15.00 for non-members. Advance reservations are required for those partaking in the buffet. To make reservations, call 523-8008 by 5:00 p.m. on Friday, January 29.
Here is a description of the book by its publisher, UT Press:
Conceived in 1853 as a canny real-estate scheme by two young investors expecting to get rich off the idea, Market Square came to be Knoxville’s most public spot, a marketplace familiar to every man, woman, and child in the area. By the 1860s, it was the busiest place in a burgeoning city, a place to shop, work, play, eat, drink, and live. In a town that became bitterly divided by politics, race, and background, Market Square became a rare common ground: a place to buy all sorts of local produce, but also a place to experience new things, including the grandiose Market House itself, considered a model in a progressive era.
Beset by urban blight by the mid-1900s, Market Square had become more of a curiosity than a point of municipal pride, and the neighborhood declined. After years of fevered controversy, the city razed the Market House and struggled to modernize the old Square itself. Through a combination of public and private efforts in the 21st century, Market Square seems to be returning to its original diverse spirit.
Jack Neely, a UT grad, worked for several years as a writer and editor for a variety of local publications; for six years he was an editor for various national magazines at Whittle Communications. In 1992 he first penned the popular column “Secret History” in Metropulse. He is now associate editor of that weekly, and is also a regular humor columnist for the related publication, Knoxville Magazine.
Mr. Neely’s first collection of columns, Knoxville's Secret History, was published by Scruffy City Publishing in 1995. A second collection of columns, Secret History II, came out in 1998. He wrote the text for the photographic book, The Marble City, published by UT Press in 1999, and in 2006 Webb School published his book about Robert Webb’s founding of the school, A Splendid Instinct. His collection From the Shadow Side is available from Tellico Books. His most recently released book, This Obscure Prismatic City, is a collection of the best stories from his "Secret History" column and is published by The History Press.
