Up next in 10
Knoxville, TN Walking Tour - University of Tennessee - 4K Virtual Tours of Cities
1K views
Mar 18, 2025
UT is located just outside of downtown Knoxville, Tennessee. The hilly campus has a bunch of beautiful old buildings surrounded, mostly, by residential housing. Downtown Knoxville is within a short walk of campus. Knoxville, Tennessee has a lot to offer and is one of the major cities of Tennessee. It's in the mountains of the eastern part of the state. The University of Tennessee is a public Land grant university. And it dates back to 1794. It has over 33K students and their nickname is the Tennessee Volunteers or "Vols" for short. I filmed this campus tour during the summer months so it's a very quiet walk but the campus is beautiful and very hilly. We end our tour with a look at the Sun Sphere in the Worlds Fair Park Sorry for the mixup. The Downtown walk will be next week. Thanks. -H #walkingtour #CityWalks #virtualwalk #walkathome #treadmillworkout #treadmillscenery #virtualtreadmill Please feel free to share or embed these videos with others or direct them to the searchable website https://citywalksvirtualtours.com/knoxville-tennessee-virtual-walking-tour/ Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/CityWalks Paypal Donation: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/CityWalks Instagram: @citywalks_virtualtravel Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MyCityWalks Twitter: @walks_city You might be interested in our other Channels: CityWalks360 - 360 VR walking videos: tinyurl.com/yg5dkewu TravelingMel - FamilyTravel - https://youtube.com/TravelingMel
View Video Transcript
0:02
hello Walkers and welcome to the University of Tennessee campus
0:07
here in Knoxville Tennessee we're going to start off right around uh volunteer Boulevard
0:15
and Cumberland if you're checking on the map between the bridge between Hanson Hall and stronghold
0:22
it is 73 degrees Fahrenheit 23 degrees Celsius I'm going to flip you around here real quick one two three
0:29
and flip uh I like to give people a warning before I do that if I think about it my name is
0:35
Henry I will be your proxy Walker today your virtual travel guide your co-discoverer and it's going to be
0:41
mainly discovering today because I am not an expert tour guide here at the University of Tennessee I'm going to
0:47
flip you around again here we go um
0:52
here this is if you're not aware well first of all let me tell you what we're gonna do we're gonna wander around the
0:57
campus see the cool cool buildings because I love an old college campus
1:03
I'll talk about that I'll talk about these Magnolias too we do virtual tours
1:09
of cities virtual nature hiking scenery that sort of thing this is a magnolia tree
1:14
I had two of these trees there's a big Magnolia cone that'll turn black release red seeds
1:22
and when you're 10 years old they look remarkably like hand grenades
1:28
from the movies and so you can throw them at each other it's great fun I assure you
1:33
anyway we do virtual walks of Tours visuals tour guide Virtual City Guides
1:39
and travel guides I talk most of the time and um
1:46
share my Impressions share my thoughts that sort of thing and point out various things I think are
1:53
interesting you can always turn the audio off or if you like the ambient
1:59
sounds and don't like my talking there's a ton of other channels out there I'd be happy to recommend some just hit me up
2:05
in the comments section so University of Tennessee we're going to look at the stadium we're going to
2:10
look at some cool old buildings some new buildings and I'm going to talk about I
2:16
don't know the college campus a little bit um thank you to our patreon supporters I
2:23
really do appreciate your support I know I only have the one small tier and
2:29
um but I don't really I feel a little odd asking for that for your help um I appreciate it
2:35
though and it is helpful and very much appreciated also the folks who have given
2:42
um one-time donations for via Paypal in the link below as well as a patreon link
2:47
below um I appreciate that too great help very much appreciate it all right
2:53
so we're walking down volunteer Boulevard which is really what 16th
2:58
Street turns into when it comes up onto campus okay 31 000 students undergrad and
3:06
graduate students um here at the University
3:11
and it's actually pretty old I think it's 1794. it started out as blunt
3:16
College and has been operating ever since it is a land grant University
3:25
which I believe means it's funded by back in the day
3:31
the federal government I believe it was granted land to the states for the purpose of funding education
3:37
and so I assume this is partially supported by that uh in a prior walk in downtown I
3:46
mentioned the university and the volunteers and I mentioned that the volunteers the Tennessee Volunteers got their
3:53
nickname for a bunch of volunteers showing up and I said Wars against Native Americans
4:00
but it was actually um I learned the war of 1812. let's go up
4:06
here I don't know what street this is um
4:11
when 1500 Tennessee Volunteers fought with General Andrew Jackson in
4:19
the War of 1812 down the Battle of New Orleans
4:24
it's a neat old the Tyson Alumni Center and we'll just duck up here because I
4:30
guess we're on Melrose Avenue why not
4:35
um and then they continued to have a reputation for
4:40
sending volunteers to the nation's Wars and when they were
4:46
called or needed so there's the derivation of the name
4:53
it's also known as the volunteer state colors of orange and white as you might
4:59
have guessed
5:06
I may not talk as much on this one just because I don't know as much about the university but
5:12
I'm just going to comment on the
5:17
experience of being here in all this brick buildings oh it's great
5:23
um you know I went to a small University about
5:29
1200 1500 people and uh
5:36
I had a great time definitely uh
5:42
fortunate to have been able to do that and I learned a lot about myself
5:49
as much as anything learned how to think about things more than a bunch of
5:56
facts it was a little it was a liberal arts degree in history
6:01
but just the quiet peaceful Ambiance of a university
6:10
is brings back a lot of nostalgic feelings
6:16
and it was a really exciting and liberating time for me
6:22
um that was 30 some odd years ago 30 years ago and
6:30
the economic calculus back then was much different much I think more manageable than it is
6:37
today I look back at what the annual cost is of that University
6:43
today and it's it's unachievable
6:48
unless you have extremely you have extreme wealth to begin with so
6:56
anyway that's a whole other discussion and it's not really complaint more as much as a comment on
7:03
the way the society has changed a little bit anyway I just I love coming back to
7:09
these college campuses not because I want to relive my Old Glory Days or anything but because it's a good reminder of
7:21
when the world was open and the future was
7:27
open and so many possibilities so much newness and
7:32
excitement of learning if you have memories of if you attended
7:40
the University of Tennessee and have memories or or when I get something wrong a tidbit or
7:47
fact that's incorrect please comment in the um comment section Below on YouTube also
7:55
you can probably watch this on the website
8:01
citywalksvirtualtours.com and you can also search for other this is The Hodges Library you can search for other
8:09
walks by walking videos by runtime and location
8:14
so as well as keyword so check that out
8:22
oh look at this over here like it kind of blows my mind that there's
8:28
only 30 000 students at this campus it's big it's very Grand
8:35
and really beautiful cross over here
8:41
um and it's summer session so I said the
8:48
temperature I didn't tell you that it was about a little before 11 A.M and on
8:53
a I guess it's still I've been saying Late July but it's mid-july um
8:59
it's been up into the 90s recently so even though it's a little overcast today
9:06
I still appreciate the cool air relatively cool air
9:16
as I said it's in Knoxville it's um which is in Eastern Tennessee we're
9:23
getting into the Appalachian Mountains Appalachian Mountains and so it's pretty hilly here
9:31
which is good for you if you're eating dining hall food and
9:38
drinking a lot of beer
9:47
I saw a tour of prospective students earlier walking around
9:54
there's also um there's still up there actually
10:00
I think there's a basketball camp going on here I think the
10:05
Women's Basketball team is a Powerhouse
10:12
basketball looks like some folks are playing a
10:17
long game of some sort of here I remember doing the local the University is doing
10:23
Camps summer camps Sports Camps when I was a kid I think they also did
10:29
although at the time I wasn't really on that track a lot of
10:36
throwing Hacky Sacks at each other or beanbags um
10:44
and uh there's a lot of like math camps and science camps and art camps now which is super cool
10:50
love love that the opportunity to go and
10:55
stay on a campus and sort of push yourself a little bit in terms of
11:01
education wow this lawn is like a
11:06
um it's like a golf course lawn crop short
11:13
and uh immaculate
11:40
it's like they're moving on from here this group is
11:46
what an exciting time
12:00
kind of neat
12:06
the Vic Davis Plaza this is a tribute to the volunteer Creed
12:12
one that beareth a torch shadoweth oneself to give light to others
12:25
sort of thing seems a little hokey in our modern door Modern Age but honestly
12:33
pretty meaningful and probably be helpful if we
12:38
took it upon ourselves to take that stuff to Heart
12:49
now one of the things that is sort of a I don't know if it's a
12:55
cliche or just a standard for University seems to be the use of brick
13:00
so much brick I was thinking about this earlier as I
13:06
drove through campus and I have to be honest with you I kind of like it alternatively what is
13:13
there's glass and steel there's Stone there's a lot of universities back East
13:19
with a lot of stone buildings that's pretty cool it just seems more organic and more
13:28
sword I'm looking for more welcoming I guess
13:34
than a more sterile steel and glass
13:40
type and I don't I'm not one of those people that rejects all modern architecture I like really good modern
13:46
architecture London has a lot of great modern architecture
13:52
but also I also enjoy the classic buildings classic look and I think
13:59
there's something starting to pontificate here um
14:06
I think there's something about a university that begs for
14:13
um or it doesn't beg but asked for benefits from
14:20
this organic warm welcoming
14:27
peaceful almost despite this destruction environment that says hey this is a safe
14:33
place to learn questions to challenge conventional
14:39
wisdom to push boundaries a little bit and sort of puts the
14:45
Hurley Burley of the rest of the life outside to give
14:50
space for um for Inquisition inquisitory thought I
14:57
don't mean that in a political way I know that that universities
15:04
several universities have a reputation for
15:10
political extremism around extremism that didn't work but uh
15:18
get time talking myself into a corner here for for being more than would be
15:25
considered acceptable um thought and that's both left and there's some on the right
15:31
and that's a shame because I think the vast majority of
15:36
academics and the vast majority of learning institutions institutions learning while they
15:43
may have a few people that are extreme most of them just want to have an open
15:49
dialogue and and
15:55
put forward and promote learning and thought
16:00
and I that's one of the things I love about that level of Education
16:11
the freedom to express oneself and to challenge conventional wisdom all right that's it
16:18
probably
16:28
I do Envy these kids that are coming to school here or anywhere uh and that feeling of excitement and
16:36
newness that I was talking about before
16:48
is the Haslam College of Business ahead that is newer
16:55
sure
17:01
off to the right is the Claxton complex and then in the distance you can see all
17:07
right so Tennessee is also a football Powerhouse I believe and that's the Neyland or Kneeland
17:15
Stadium over there and I can only imagine they play typically play college football on
17:21
Saturdays I can only imagine what this campus is like on those days not so peaceful I
17:26
would guess not violent or anything just a party
17:35
you just look at these white blossoms on those Magnolias really pretty
17:42
they smell really good too when you get get up close to them
17:50
I've seen this dog it's a Blue Tick Hound a couple statues we just saw one saw one
17:58
another place must be uh let's go read it it must be a
18:05
mascot or something smokey 10.
18:16
required in 2022 I guess that's uh
18:21
they have those dogs as the mascots
18:28
is dedicated to an individual dog you can see somebody walking on that top tier
18:33
and the box seats off to the right it is massive luckily I'm not gonna
18:38
I impose my views on college and professional sports teams at
18:47
the moment
18:54
the sun's coming out it's going to warm up here
19:07
I've seen several um several little signs
19:15
with phone numbers for people that are in crisis as the U terminology they use
19:22
and that is a good point that while it is a peaceful
19:27
and many ways idyllic place there's also a lot of pressure on
19:34
students or there can be you don't want to sugarcoat it too much
19:41
neat although it looks like stadium seating but also not there's no stage or
19:48
anything let's go see this
19:59
I saw a sign earlier calling this the hill so I think that
20:04
must be what it's referred to Chloe colloquiality
20:10
University
20:24
that is Birchfield Geography building
21:37
here's a historical marker about the desegregation of the University of Tennessee
21:45
1960 November 18 1960.
21:55
this is the hesler building for biology
22:26
um so I've done several University campuses in on the channel
22:32
uh did I think it was UC Davis did Idaho Montana State Missoula
22:40
Boise Boise sorry um and
22:47
University of Denver
22:52
University Colorado Boulder University of Northern Colorado or
22:58
something like that up in Fort Collins anyway a bunch of them if
23:03
you guys have any suggestions on how to better these
23:09
campus walks tours let me know obviously there could be more information I know that
23:17
this is a beautiful old building
23:29
anyway if you have any suggestions on how I could better film these campuses
23:35
um and uh let me know in the comment section I I would like to
23:41
tailor them a little bit more right you know not not being 18 years old or 17 years old
23:47
or the parent of one going to college I am not really aware
23:53
of the questions you guys might have that would be answered
23:59
so if I can something's plausibly doable
24:06
I would love to add that sort of content in
24:14
these hydrangeas is that what those are Big Balls of flowers
24:21
you need to curious which
24:31
uh
24:36
which Hall this is
24:46
big holly bushes in the fall they get red but or some point they get red berries really
24:52
beautiful
25:20
did mention the summer session right so they're not really doing full term here science and engineering research
25:27
facility over there and we're gonna swing over here
25:33
this is Dabney Hall not sure what the story on that is neat old
25:41
individually paint windows
25:57
well repair work down there
26:15
Bueller Hall Circle Drive
26:38
Uncle coming back to Cumberland
26:58
it's like hot work today
27:31
let's go back up here
28:12
surprisingly weedy section of Campus everything else is so
28:18
immaculate interesting
28:24
I don't mean that as criticism it's just a fact
28:46
this I guess this is maybe an oak tree really pretty
29:39
thank you
30:03
the grounds crew here must just work constantly keep this place up
30:09
it looks great
30:16
looks like there's a trolley system here similar to what I saw in Gatlinburg
30:23
I don't know if it's free or not but I've seen several
30:28
Vehicles trolley motor motorized trolleys they call them trolleys because they're
30:34
dressed up to look like trolleys but they're not actually more like a bus
30:44
here's what I was talking about the University of Tennessee the hill
30:54
photo of that
31:24
oh oh wow wait I'm just gonna go over a
31:30
little Footbridge and I forgot
31:35
here we go
31:40
you can look back towards downtown Knoxville see the Footbridge I was talking about
31:46
we're going to kind of head that direction and see what where the you pass along the campus take us
32:06
starting to warm up with the sun coming out
32:12
it's a new building 2018 sure what that is
32:33
coming up on 13th Street
32:41
love these giant magnolia trees
32:53
it's the James W Harris Building over here
33:05
this is uh looks like a camp of some sort
33:13
foreign
34:11
that students have and faculty have to walk around over here I kind of wonder if there's a
34:19
if e-bikes are getting more popular on these cop college campuses
34:25
I know they're expensive but on a hilly place like this really make a difference
34:43
let's go out to this bridge because I just wanna take a look
35:16
so you can see downtown a few blocks away
35:30
so I think what we're getting over into here is um sort of a little residential area I assume that the majority of these
35:37
houses will be rent it out to students but I really don't know
35:42
there is a giant parking garage off to the right which is probably pretty nice
35:49
good use of space
36:06
if you're wondering why I'm focusing on the parking garage just because there's a um it's like a daycare off to the left
36:13
and I try not to I make an effort not to film schools and daycares just
36:21
seems like a better idea simple thing to do here we go
36:27
so something I noticed um when I came up here is we're gonna
36:32
there's like three or four streets going left right uh see any signs right now
36:38
they're all one way to the right I believe except for church Church
36:44
Street up there we are on well we're not on anything I guess
36:50
oh so that is the sun sphere
36:56
and it is a remnant of the 1982 world's fair
37:01
that I mentioned this in the um prior walk
37:08
and uh aft in the in the depression a lot of
37:14
the manufacturing jobs it had industrial stuff that was here and helping to not Knoxville to thrive
37:20
crashed and I think the term was cratered they used and then in 1982 they brought the
37:28
World's Fair in and
37:33
what has yeah and so anyway the investment the city really kind of helped turn things around according to
37:39
this Wikipedia article um I don't know the details so if you
37:45
challenge that feel free um I thought that was interesting because
37:51
these types of things now are kind of portrayed as a boondoggle these cities invest
37:56
billions of dollars to get the Olympics or some major sporting thing and then it
38:03
just doesn't pay off it's just a giveaway to an organization or
38:09
individuals but apparently this one really did really helped turn the city around
38:19
so we're gonna head down here
38:26
I do want to say that there are there's way more to Knoxville than I
38:32
have filmed in the last couple walks and we'll continue to film on this one and I just
38:39
didn't have time to get down to a couple of the other places that are really pretty interesting
38:46
and um I would encourage you to check out Knoxville it's on kind of
38:52
the Nexus of I-40 and 75 and a couple other places
38:58
and I like these there's a bunch of row houses up here and they're multi-colored
39:05
just a sort of a kind of a cool set of colors up there here's a World's Fair Park
39:12
um I would encourage you to check out Knoxville it's a pretty neat Town I'd like to come back and
39:18
um go out and at night and explore more and see what what else it has to offer
39:25
all the various activities and things to do here they have a zoo they have sporting teams
39:31
they have great Parks they have a river I can't remember which river it is but they do
39:38
um and restaurants and theaters like we saw
39:43
in the earlier walk and all kinds of stuff so a lot of history
39:48
museums all that stuff so I think it has a lot to offer
39:54
a visitor and it's easily accessible I don't know I assume it has an airport
40:00
third largest city in Tennessee I don't know what kind of accessibility
40:06
that has they do have a lot of these rental scooters
40:14
so I think um and I have a train track down there but this is
40:20
World's Fair Park you probably Saw the Sign earlier and there's a pavilion down here and that I read that those are kind of the
40:27
only two remnants of the World's Fair from was that 40 years ago now
40:35
but apparently it's had a pretty big impact I just want to swing around here sorry
40:42
I'm easily distracted squirrel um this old place has been renovated and it
40:48
looks like turned into condos or apartments and that looks pretty cool
40:55
anyway and it's kind of a neat uh little park and Pavilion down here so it's tented
41:02
and it's kind of shown its age there where weather but look at all those seats in the stage
41:09
and then the water behind it Apple place would be an awesome place to see a
41:14
concert fantastic
41:20
there's a Convention Center here and I think the I'll cross over here after I
41:27
give you a little look-see at the sun sphere
41:34
pretty fun this water feature here
41:39
I don't know how far along it goes but
41:45
anytime you have a water feature well-designed water feature I'm in I'm
41:52
going to cross over here is where Rebels
42:00
and this is the World Fair Park I don't know what the maker exchange is
42:06
and I don't know if this is kind of like a splash Fountain where you can get into it
42:13
but really cool I want to thank you guys for joining us on our tour of the University of Tennessee campus
42:20
and a glimpse at World Fair Park here in Knoxville Tennessee I hope you enjoyed
42:26
it I hope you found it interesting let me know in the comments section uh what I could do better on these campus tours
42:33
obviously more information more detail but if there's a type of
42:40
building you want to see uh you want to go inside uh all that sort of thing so
42:47
let me know in the comment section and what else check out wait for our new uh
42:53
new videos coming out we're going to go up to the Cincinnati area maybe hit Lexington and film a couple walks up
43:00
there um so I hope that you will join us for those hope you'll tell your friends and
43:05
family and most of all I hope you will
43:10
keep on stopping