Once upon a time the road signs that welcomed travelers to Tennessee read-
"Welcome to the Three States of Tennessee"

The "Three States" theme was quashed in the 1980s in the interest of statewide unity.
Though the motto has fallen from popular use, its meaning is more apparent than ever.
Tennessee undeniably has three distinct regions even though the signs now read,

"Welcome to the Great State of Tennessee."

But a slogan, or the death of one, can't hide what the eye can clearly behold.
Tennessee is environmentally diverse yet strongly bound together by
Nature, Tradition, Music and Friendly Folks.

"West Tennessee"
Largely flat and rural
Cotton and The Blues have historically been king.

"Middle Tennessee"
Rolling to steeply sloping with exceptionally fertile soil
The home of Country Music.

"East Tennessee"
Mountainous and historically isolated
The birthplace of Bluegrass and Mountain Music.

Tennessee is not a state divided, you will discover the distinctly different environments and cultures that make up Tennessee life are all bound
together by two common threads,
Friendly Folks and Great Music .

These distinctly different landforms, waterways, and soils spawned equally distinctive cultures. Though modern transportation and communication have succeeded in homogenizing the state to some extent, old differences die hard. How this three-grand-division thing began and grew is an interesting story. It all began in East Tennessee, where the earliest settlers were mostly family farmers. Settlement came southwest along the valleys. Actually the origin of the area is back in southwestern Pennsylvania with the Scotch-Irish and Pennsylvania Dutch. These people were mainly family farmers. They followed the topography southwestward and settled in the best valleys first. Later, as population pressure built up, there was a 'back settlement' into the mountains and the plateau area. Adventurous settlers next migrated into present-day Middle Tennessee and soon after the differences between East and Middle started cropping up. Even in the early 1800s, Middle Tennessee began to develop differently than the eastern part of the state. The Nashville Basin had better soils, and it had better accessibility by river than East Tennessee. While Middle Tennessee began to diversify into tobacco, livestock, and distilling, shipping goods along its friendly waterways from the Cumberland to the Ohio and Mississippi, East Tennessee continued as an area of relatively isolated small farms. West Tennessee, settled later, was largely agricultural, and cotton dominated the economy.