Unionville, TN

Unionville grew from a merger. Two rival settlements in Bedford County joined in 1827, and the new name marked that union; a post office has operated here since 1837. Meredith Blanton and James Roy owned the early townsite, and a blacksmith shop opened in 1828, giving the place a working center from its first decades. Unionville remains a rural census-designated place northwest of Shelbyville, with ZIP code 37180 and a population of 1,394 in 2020.

Schools give today's community a clear center: Community Elementary, Community Middle, and Community High are all in Unionville, with the high school at Community Crossing. Bedford County Schools administers all three campuses, from elementary grades through high school. The high school's Vikings and Viqueens compete in Tennessee's public-school athletics system, giving the unincorporated place a named team and a clear school center. Unionville was also the birthplace of Tennessee governor Jim Nance McCord, so the local story reaches from an 1827 joining of settlements to the state's twentieth-century political history.