Town file
Dickson, Tennessee
Dickson, Tennessee (Dickson County, Tennessee) is the town in one episode of Small Town Murder, the comedy true-crime podcast: episode 142, "Where Is The Head??" (24 October 2019). In late September 1995 Virginia Jackson, known to everyone as Jenny, disappeared from Dickson, Tennessee.
- Town
- Dickson
- County
- Dickson County
- State
- Tennessee
- Country
- USA
- Episodes
- 142
- Approximate location
- 36.063, -87.369
Episode 142 / 24 October 2019 / 159 min / full
Where Is The Head??
"We're going to Dickson, Tennessee... This is in Dickson County... forty five minutes west of Nashville, north central Tennessee." about 0:06:01
The case: Murder of Virginia 'Jenny' Jackson (September 1995). Read the case file.
The figures, as told in 2019
- Population
- 15,128
- Median age
- about 37 years old
- Median household income
- $40,000
- Median home value
- $171,500
- Two-bedroom rent
- about $920
- Cost of living
- 100
- Religious
- 43%
- Property crime
- ▲ more than double
- Violent crime
- ▲ double
History, in brief
- Named for Congressman William Dickson, a Nashville physician who served in Congress in the early 1800s and was a close friend of President Andrew Jackson. about 0:09:12
- Dickson County was created in 1803, the twenty-fifth of ninety-five counties created in Tennessee. about 0:09:31
- General James Robertson built the first ironworks in West Tennessee and Dickson County, then sold the furnace to Montgomery Bell, who became one of the state's leading capitalists. about 0:11:59
- The Ruskin Colony, a 250-member Utopian socialist cooperative, was established in the area; internal conflict dissolved it by 1899. about 0:12:26
- The communal newspaper The Coming Nation moved there, and another paper became The Appeal to Reason, which supported the Farmers Alliance and People's Party before folding into the Socialist Party of America. about 0:14:22
- In 1917 a meeting at the Alamo Theater in Dickson raised $760, about $25,000 today, in under fifteen minutes to pay for surveying the Bristol to Memphis highway through Dickson County; it became Highway 70, the Broadway of America. about 0:14:44
- The town motto is A great place to live, work, and play. about 0:08:17
- Zip code 37055, area code 615, about twenty square miles of mostly rural land with farms and large properties. about 0:07:56
- Luke Perry is apparently from the town. about 0:15:37
The reviews read out
"Been here a bit less than a year; a lot of uneducated people, a lot of ignorance and general lack of caring for people around them; not my favourite place, but the cost of living is not terrible."about 0:15:53
"Because of the corruption there are no neighbourhood watch groups, and if the police feel you are a threat they will terrorise you."about 0:17:59
1 star
"Due to the corruption in the area, one does not know who to trust."about 0:18:08
Nearest Small Town Murder towns
- Brentwood, Tennessee34 miles
- Springfield, Tennessee41 miles
- Pembroke, Kentucky49 miles
- Parsons, Tennessee51 miles
- Lawrenceburg, Tennessee56 miles
- Cadiz, Kentucky61 miles
Everything here is as told in the episode, on the date it went out; figures and places may have changed since. Endings are covered: open an episode and use the spoiler switch to read them.