Nashville Skyline

State troopers man the barricades blocking off the Tennessee State Capitol

So many wonderful sights to see in Downtown Nashville! The County Music Hall of Fame! The Johnny Cash Museum (with a Patsy Cline Museum on the second floor)! Ryman Auditorium! The Ernest Tubb Record Shop! That pedestrian bridge where you can get those awesome views of the Nashville Skyline. Today I planned to play tourist in downtown Nashville. Except that it was closed. Everything. Even the places that Google said would be open were closed. The city was a ghost town. "The Day the Earth Stood Still" Dead. Parking garages (on a Friday morning) were empty. What the COVID-19 did not close, the protest-riots did.

My first destination was going to be the Tennessee State Capitol. It was barricaded shut. The grounds were open, however! The statuary was not on lockdown. Let's walk the perimeter.

This soldier (the famous Sgt. Alvin York) is useless to guard the Capitol grounds with his rifle pointed in that direction.

Up these stairs is a statue honoring a true American great. In other cities, his statue would not be long for this world.

Andrew Jackson!

Traditionally, if the horse is on two legs, it means the rider being honored by the statue died heroically in battle. Jackson, however, died not in battle, but of heart failure and edema at age 78. Old Hickory did not play by others' rules in life, so why should he play by the rules in equestrian statuary?

Nearby is the permanent resting place for Jackson's premier protege:

This is the grave of Mr. and Mrs. James Knox Polk.  This one is taken from Mrs. Polk's side of the grave, with the shuttered Tennessee State Capitol in the background.

This is an equestrian statue in front of the Cordell Hull State Office Building demonstrating the "four hooves on the ground" pose traditional for riders who did not die or get wounded in battle. (One leg raised on the horse means the rider suffered a battle wound somewhat short of death in severity, when traditional is followed.) (And, as mentioned, tradition does not apply when you're Andrew Jackson.)

This is the Bell Tower on the Capitol grounds.

And this is the view of the State Capitol facing southwest.

I walked a bit through the abandoned streets of downtown Nashville. This is the War Memorial.

This is another statue in front of the War Memorial. From the multi-racial group of soldiers, the watr is definitely post-World War Two. Given the way the soldiers are dressed, I'm guessing Vietnam.

The number of protesters across the street from the State Capitol was small (and seemed to make up a disproportionate number of the total number of people in downtown Nashville), as you can see from this picture.

But with everything closed down, and the place being empty, there was no reason to walk around anymore. I headed off to the Parthenon. Yes, Nashville has one of those.