Part of a roof lays in front of a home, destroyed by a powerful tornado in Defiance, Missouri on Sunday, December 12, 2021. A tornado hit the small town west of St. Louis on Friday, December 10, 2021, destroying 25 homes and killing one.
Credit: © Bill Greenblatt, UPI/Alamy Images

Devastating tornadoes tore through Arkansas, Illinois, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, and Tennessee on Friday, Dec. 10, 2021. At least 22 tornadoes were reported throughout the 6 states. The storm started with a powerful thunderstorm, which meteorologists believe generated the tornadoes. The largest of the tornadoes broke United States history as the longest tornado. From touch down to the point where the tornado picked back up, the tornado measured 227 miles (365 kilometers).

Most of the destruction occurred in western Kentucky. Although tornadoes can occur any time of the year, they are more common in spring and summer. Tornadoes rarely form in Kentucky in the month of December. In Mayfield, Kentucky, a tornado hit a candle factory where 110 people were working the night shift. The building collapsed in the storm. Reports show eight people from the factory were killed in the storm and six people are still missing. At least 64 people have been confirmed dead in Kentucky with more than 105 people still missing. Rescue efforts are still underway to locate missing people. On Sunday, President Joe Biden approved Kentucky’s request for assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

More than a dozen people were killed from the storms in Illinois, Tennessee, Arkansas, and Missouri. The storms hit an Amazon warehouse in Illinois, killing six people. One tornado tore through a nursing home in Arkansas, killing one resident. Rescue workers and family members are still searching for missing people throughout the wreckage. Thousands of businesses, houses, and schools have been damaged. Across the affected states, more than 50,000 people have been without electricity since the storm Friday night. Rescue efforts have been complicated because many power lines and cell towers were damaged in the storms.

March 18, 2020

Earlier this month, on the night of March 2-3, massive thunderstorms spawned a cluster of tornadoes in Tennessee, killing 25 people and causing widespread destruction. The two most powerful tornadoes struck Nashville, the state capital, and nearby Putnam and Wilson counties. Tornadoes from the same storm system also touched the neighboring states of Alabama, Kentucky, and Missouri. Tennessee’s tornado outbreak was the worst since a group of more than 50 tornadoes killed 35 people in the state in April 2011.

Storm debris litters Putnam County, Tennessee, on March 4, 2020, a day after a tornado ravaged the area. credit: Brett Carlsen/Getty Images

Thunderstorms grew in size and intensity over Tennessee on March 2, and tornadoes were reported in eastern and northern parts of the state. Just after midnight, an EF3 strength twister hit downtown Nashville (in Davidson County) and quickly tracked eastward more than 60 miles (100 kilometers) into Wilson County. EF stands for the Enhanced Fujita scale, used to rate the strength of tornadoes. The scale rates tornadoes from 0, the weakest, to 5, the strongest. EF3 tornadoes have winds between 136 and 165 miles per hour (218 and 266 kilometers per hour) and can tear away roofs and walls from houses and overturn cars. An even stronger EF4 tornado—with winds up to 200 miles per hour (322 kilometers per hour)—then hit nearby Putnam County, but spared most of Cookeville, the county’s largest town. Of the 25 deaths from the Tennessee tornadoes, 18 of them occurred in Putnam County. Hundreds of people were injured in the storms, and numerous buildings were destroyed.

Tornadoes struck Nashville and nearby ares of central Tennessee on the night of March 2-3, 2020. credit: World Book map

In the days after the storms, Tennessee Governor Bill Lee declared a state of emergency, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) provided millions of dollars in assistance to the hardest-hit areas. Schools, public offices, and interstate highways were closed for days in the region, and tens of thousands of people were without electric power.

October 19, 2018

On Oct. 19, 1818, 200 years ago today, the Chickasaw Indians signed a treaty with the United States government that opened Chickasaw lands in western Tennessee and Kentucky to white immigration. In exchange for the land, the U.S. government paid the Chickasaw $20,000 per year for 15 years and forgave certain debts owed by the tribe. The treaty came after years of government pressure and the threat that Chickasaw lands would be taken whether they signed a treaty or not. Future U.S. President Andrew Jackson, then a major general in the U.S. Army, negotiated the 1818 agreement with the Chickasaw, who had ceded other nearby lands to white settlement in 1805 and in 1816.

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The Chickasaw Nation seal. Credit: © Chickasaw Nation

Chickasaw territory originally included northern Mississippi, northwestern Alabama, and western Tennessee and Kentucky. The Chickasaw lived in villages of small, one-room log cabins. Each village was headed by a chief. The people supported themselves by farming, fishing, hunting, and trading with neighboring tribes. The Chickasaw were one of the so-called Five Civilized Tribes, a group that also included the Cherokee, Choctaw, Muscogee (Creek), and Seminole Indians. White settlers gave the tribes this name in the 1800′s, after the tribes had adopted a number of European customs. Many settlers considered European ways more civilized than Indian ones.

The Chickasaw were also fierce warriors. In 1541, they drove off an expedition led by Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto, and more than 200 years later, they helped Great Britain fight France and Spain for control of what is now the southeastern United States. Chickasaw warriors also fought for the British in the American Revolution (1775-1783) and for the Confederacy during the American Civil War (1861-1865).

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The Indian Territory was land set aside by the U.S. government for Indians from about 1825 to 1906. It covered most of present-day Oklahoma. Credit: WORLD BOOK map

In the “Great Removal” of 1837, the U.S. government forced the Chickasaw from their remaining lands east of the Mississippi River to make room for additional white immigration. Thousands of Chickasaw died on the forced march to their new lands in the Indian Territory, a region west of the Mississippi that was temporarily set aside for the residence of Indians. In 1907, the Chickasaw and other Indian nations were forced into reservations when the Indian Territory became part of the new state of Oklahoma.

According to the 2010 census, there are about 28,000 Chickasaw today, most of whom live in Oklahoma. A tribal government elected by the Chickasaw helps provide for the nation’s general welfare.