A history of Parsons,
then and now
Postcards, papers and photographs of Parsons from public archives, woven together by decade. Neighbors fill in the gaps.
The story
from WikipediaRead it all ↗Created around 1889 by the Tennessee Midland Railroad Company (TMRC), the city of Parsons was founded by Henry Myracle as he deeded 1431⁄3 acres to the TMRC to start a town on his land. The railroad established Parsons Improvement Co. and Myracle maintained the town. The rail depot was located where the present day BP One Stop is located. A commercial lot, which was used as a tie yard was at present location of CB&S Bank. A storage lot and livestock pens were located where Townsend Chevrolet is presently located. There was a large water tank beside the depot and two packing houses nearby for farmers' produce. There was also a town pump and a small park near the water tank.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Timeline
built from the dates on the items belowFinish Parsons’s story
Most archives stop around 1920. The photos from after that are in family albums, not libraries.
1 of 10 decades since 1900 have photos 🔁Retake an old viewBusiness district, 1940: stand where they stood+15 📦Share a family photoSign in to add one+10Parsons, decade by decade
1990s
1 historic place in Parsons
1 place in Parsons is on the National Register of Historic Places, the country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.
Where they are
When they were listed
Then & now
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as Business district (1940) and it appears here side by side.
🔁 Retake this view · +15Stories next door
nearby towns’ historyFrom Wikimedia Commons (5) and the National Register (1). Images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.