The Volunteer Orange Book serves as a source for the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, College of Education, Health & Human Sciences. It is modeled after The Negro Motorist Green Book with an emphasis on resources for historically underrepresented populations. It is our desire that colleagues (graduate students, staff, faculty, and administrators) find this resource helpful.
Orange Book: Submission Suggestions
Submit your ideas for the Volunteer Orange Book
About the Green Book
The Orange Book is based on The NegroMotorist Green Book—also known as TheGreen Book—published by Victor HugoGreen.
“An annual guidebook for African-American railroads founded and published by NewYork City mailman Victor Hugo Green from 1936 to 1967. From a New York-focused first edition published in 1936, Green expanded the work to cover much of North America. The Green Book became ‘the bible of black travel’ during the era of Jim Crow laws, when openly and often legally prescribed discrimination against African Americans and other non-whites was widespread. Green wrote this guide to identify services and places relatively friendly to African-Americans so they could find lodgings, businesses, and gas stations that would serve them along the road. It was little known outside the African-American community. Shortly after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which outlawed the types of racial discrimination that made the Green Book necessary, publication ceased and it fell into obscurity.”
About the Area
What began in 1794 as a small college in the Southwest Territory has grown into Tennessee’s flagship university and premier public research institution. UT Knoxville, which includes the UT Space Institute and the UT Institute of Agriculture, serves the state by educating its citizens, enhancing its culture, and making a difference in people’s lives through research and service. We embody excellence in teaching, research, scholarship, creative activity, outreach, and engagement.
Knoxville
Our home is a thriving Southern city known for its festivals, great outdoors, diverse music scene, and wide variety of eateries.
- Located at the crossroads of Interstate 75 and Interstate 40.
- Zoo Knoxville is the birthplace of more red pandas than any other zoo in the world.
- The Urban Wilderness boasts 1,000 forested acres plus lake and river access.
- Where the French Broad and Holston Rivers converge and the Tennessee River begins.
- Average annual temperatures: high 69° F and low 49° F.
- The Great Smoky Mountains National Park is a 45-minute drive from campus!
Nearby Cities
- Chattanooga, TN – 1.5 hours, 115 miles
- Asheville, NC – 2 hours, 110 miles
- Nashville, TN – 3 hours, 180 miles
- Atlanta, GA – 3.5 hours, 200 miles
- Charlotte, NC – 4 hours, 240 miles
- Cincinnati, OH – 4 hours, 250 miles
- Louisville, KY – 4 hours, 240 miles
- Memphis, TN – 6 hours, 390 miles
- Charleston, SC – 6.5 hours, 375 miles
- St. Louis, MO – 8 hours, 500 miles
- Washington, DC – 8 hours, 500 miles