Early history For thousands of years before European encounter, this area was occupied by succeeding cultures of indigenous peoples. Peoples of the
South Appalachian Mississippian culture, beginning about 900–1000 CE, established numerous villages along the river valleys and tributaries. In the more influential villages, they built a single, large earthen
platform mound, sometimes surmounted by a temple or elite residence, which was an expression of their religious and political system. This area was later part of a large territory occupied by the
Cherokee Nation, an
Iroquoian-speaking people believed to have migrated south from the
Great Lakes area, where other Iroquoian tribes arose. Their public architecture was known as the
townhouse, a large structure designed for the community to gather together. In some cases, these were built on top of existing mounds; in others the townhouse would front on a broad plaza. Their territory encompassed areas of
Western North Carolina, western
South Carolina, southeastern Tennessee, northeastern
Georgia, and northern
Alabama. The first Europeans to reach the area now occupied by Cleveland and Bradley County were most likely a 1540 expedition through the interior led by Spanish explorer
Hernando de Soto. Based on their chronicles, they are believed to have camped along Candies Creek in the western part of present-day Cleveland on June 2, 1540. They encountered some chiefdoms of the Mississippian culture in other areas of South and North Carolina, Tennessee and Georgia. Some writers have suggested that the de Soto expedition was preceded by a party of Welshmen, but there is no supporting evidence and historians consider this unlikely. During and after the
American Revolutionary War, more European Americans entered this area seeking land. They came into increasing conflict with the Cherokee, who occupied this territory. The Cherokee had tolerated traders but resisted settlers who tried to take over their territory and competed for resources. The legislative body appointed to govern the county was required to meet in nearby
Chatata Valley until a site was chosen for the county seat. By a one-vote majority on May 2, 1836, the commissioners chose "Taylor's Place," the home of Andrew Taylor, as the county seat, due largely to the site's excellent water sources. Taylor, who had married a Cherokee woman and constructed a log cabin on the site next to a
spring, had been given a
reservation at the site. A permanent settlement had been established there in 1835, and became a favored stopping place for travelers. The other proposed location for the city was a site a few miles to the east, owned by a wealthy Cherokee named Deer-In-The-Water. Cleveland was formally established as the county seat by the state legislature on January 20, 1838. That year the city was reported to have a population of 400; it was home to two churches (one Presbyterian, the other Methodist), and a private school for boys, the Oak Grove Academy. The city was incorporated on February 4, 1842, and elections for mayor and aldermen were held shortly afterward on April 4 that year. While the overwhelming majority of early inhabitants of Cleveland earned their living in agriculture, by 1850 the city also had a sizeable number of skilled craftsmen and professional people. On September 5, 1851, the railroad was completed through Cleveland. After copper mining began in the
Copper Basin in neighboring
Polk County in the 1840s, headquarters for mining operations were established in Cleveland by
Julius Eckhardt Raht, a German-born businessman and engineer. Copper was delivered from the basin to Cleveland by wagon, where it was loaded onto trains. The city's first bank, the Ocoee Bank, was established in 1854.
Civil War While bitterly divided over the issue of
secession on the eve of the Civil War, Cleveland, like Bradley County and most of East Tennessee, voted against Tennessee's Ordinance of Secession in June 1861. The results of the countywide vote were 1,382 to 507 in favor of remaining in the Union. Cleveland and Bradley County were occupied by the Confederate Army from June 1861 until the fall of 1863. Despite this occupation, locals remained loyal to the Union, and placed a Union flag in the courthouse square in April 1861, where it remained until June 1862, when it was removed by Confederate forces from Mississippi. Confederate forces also seized control of the copper mines in the Ducktown basin and the
rolling mill in Cleveland owned by Raht. Throughout the war both Union and Confederate troops would pass through Cleveland en route to other locations, which led to many brief skirmishes in the area. The most deadly event in Bradley County during the Civil War was a train wreck near the Black Fox community, a few miles south of Cleveland, that killed 270 Confederate soldiers. Some significant Civil War locations in Bradley County include the
Henegar House in Charleston, in which both Union and Confederate generals, including
William Tecumseh Sherman, used as brief headquarters; the
Charleston Cumberland Presbyterian Church, also in Charleston, which was used by Confederate forces as a hospital; and the
Blue Springs Encampments and Fortifications in southern Bradley County, where Union troops under the command of General Sherman camped on numerous occasions between October 1863 and the end of the war. Troops under the command of Sherman also reportedly camped in 1863 near
Tasso, a few miles northeast of Cleveland, on multiple occasions. No large-scale battles took place in and around Cleveland, but the city was considered militarily important due to the railroads. On June 30, 1862, President
Abraham Lincoln sent a telegram to General
Henry W. Halleck, which read, "To take and hold the railroad at or east of Cleveland, Tennessee, I think is as fully as important as the taking and holding of
Richmond." The railroad bridge over the
Hiwassee River to the north was among those destroyed by the
East Tennessee bridge-burning conspiracy in November 1861. On November 25, 1863, during the
Battle of Missionary Ridge in Chattanooga, a group of 1,500 Union cavalrymen led by Col.
Eli Long arrived in Cleveland. Over the next two days they destroyed twelve miles of railroad in the area, burned the railroad bridge over the Hiwassee a second time, and destroyed the copper rolling mill, which Confederate forces had been using to manufacture artillery shells, percussion caps, and other weaponry. This would prove to be a major blow to the entire Confederate army, as approximately 90% of their copper came from the Ducktown mines. The next day Long's troops were attacked by a group of about 500 Confederate cavalrymen led by Col.
John H. Kelly, and quickly retreated to Chattanooga. The defeat of Confederate forces in Chattanooga resulted in Union troops regaining control of Cleveland and Bradley County by January 1864, and they retained control for the remainder of the war. Within a few days of the Battle of Missionary Ridge and Long's raid, several Union units, including members of the
9th Indiana Infantry Regiment, arrived in Cleveland. The Civil War resulted in much damage to Cleveland and Bradley County, and much of the area was left in ruins.
Reconstruction and industrial revolution . Despite the devastation of the Civil War, Cleveland recovered quickly and much more rapidly than many cities in the South. Numerous factories were also established, including the Hardwick Stove Company in 1879, the
Cleveland Woolen Mills in 1880, and the Cleveland Chair Company in 1884. By 1890, this industrialization helped the city support nine physicians, twelve attorneys, eleven general stores, fourteen grocery stores, three drug stores, three hardware stores, six butcher shops, two hatmakers, two hotels, a shoe store, and seven saloons. It is regarded as the city's most famous landmark and is one of Tennessee's most photographed buildings. Behind Craigmiles Hall is a reconstructed bandstand, first built in 1920. The reconstruction was built in 2005 by the Allan Jones Foundation, based on the 1920 blueprints. The city failed to renew its charter in 1879, with the result that it disincorporated on January 1, 1880. Residents worked to reincorporate the city, and on March 15, 1882, they voted overwhelmingly in favor of recharter. The first city elections under the new charter took place on May 20, 1882. Public amenities were developed in the late 19th century: A mule-drawn trolley system was founded in 1886, and the city received telephone service in 1888. In 1895 the city received electricity and public water. During this period, Cleveland's population more than doubled, from 1,812 in 1880 to 3,643 in 1900. The Reverend
Billy Graham attended Bob Jones College in Cleveland for one year beginning in 1936. Following World War II, several major industries located to the area, and the city entered a period of rapid industrial and economic growth as part of the
Post–World War II economic expansion. That same year
Cleveland High School was established and schools in Cleveland and Bradley County were
integrated.
Cleveland State Community College was established in 1967. In the 1970s and 1980s, the city gained a national reputation for the crime of
odometer fraud after 40 people in Bradley County, including multiple owners of car dealerships, were sent to federal prison for the crime. Cleveland was the subject of a November 1983
60 Minutes episode about this crime. The city came to be known as the "Odometer Rollback Capital of the World" to some. Beginning in the 1950s, the city began to gradually expand to the north as a result of most residential and industrial growth taking place there, but prior to 1987, the city limits of Cleveland did not extend west of
Candies Creek Ridge. In 1988, the city began annexing large numbers of adjacent neighborhoods and industrial areas north, northeast, and northwest of the city. These major annexations continued until the late 1990s, and led to the city's land area increasing in size from approximately 18 square miles in 1989 to about 29.5 square miles in 2000. As a result of this growth, the downtown business district is now geographically located in the southern part of the city. Cleveland officially adopted the nickname "The City with Spirit" in 2012. In 2018 voters approved a referendum allowing for package liquor stores to be located within the city. In 2020, the city completed construction of a public park at the site of
Taylor Spring, where the first settlement that became Cleveland was founded. ==Geography==