John Cocke
The Tennessee School for the Deaf, originally called the Tennessee School for the Deaf and Dumb, or the "Deaf and Dumb Asylum," was authorized by the state in 1844, following legislative efforts initiated by state senator John Cocke of Grainger County. Knoxville merchant Calvin Morgan (1773—1851) donated the property for the school, and construction began in 1846. Jacob Newman oversaw the building's construction, and was probably the building's architect. St. John's Episcopal rector Thomas William Humes delivered the dedicatory address upon the school's opening in 1848.