11/16/2017
Dr. Mark Cheathem, members of the administration, and students met with the legislators to provide an update on the Papers of Martin Van Buren project that is housed at Cumberland University. The Van Buren Papers, which include unpublished letters from prominent Tennesseans such as Presidents Andrew Jackson and James K. Polk, Senator John Eaton, Governor William Carroll, and others, provide a window into the growing national importance of Tennessee in the pre-Civil War period. Cumberland University, which was founded the year after Van Buren left office, is the smallest university in the state, not to mention the nation, to own a presidential papers project.