A lot has happened in Knoxville since it was founded in the late 1700s.
You can learn a lot about that history on foot during a Knoxville Walking Tour.
Laura Still holds several part time jobs including leading walking tours.
"I thought ok that's what I need to do. I can be an ambassador for Knoxville. I love to tell stories and there's so many great stories in Knoxville," she said.
The tours appeal to visitors and locals alike.
"I only moved here in 2006 so I'm a relative newcomer so I think this is a great way to learn the history of Knoxville which I know is very very rich," Angie Campbell of Fountain City said.
Campbell showed up wearing sneakers.
"I'm ready to walk," she said.
The group moves at a moderate pace and depending on the tour you'll walk a mile or two.
"I try not to make it too strenuous. Knoxville is built on a hill but we try to stay on top of the ridges and not go up and down too much," Still explained.
Morning tours focus on the early days of Knoxville, the frontier days.
"The evening tours I'm doing right now are the gunslinger tours. And those are gunfights, murder, mayhem, we have all kinds of great stories. It was a wild town right up until the 1950s so there's all kinds of great stories about gunfights right on Gay Street," she said.
Future options include a literary tour and a ghost tour. She also offers custom tours on special interests.
Angie Campbell said, "The downtown area particularly fascinates me because you have so many things in such a tight compact area."
On the tour Laura Still explains the stories behind the historic markers, history tucked into a modern downtown.
"James White's grave is that with the brass plaque right there. And his family is all around him," she pointed out to the group.
She points out tombstones in a historic cemetery including Tennessee's first Territorial Governor, William Blount, and his family.
"This is one of the first families of Knoxville and we're going to walk down to their house and take a seat in their garden while I tell you a little more about them," she said to the group.
The walkers enjoyed a chance to sit in the shade of the garden at the Blount Mansion and hear the highlights of the man who lived there.
"If it weren't for William Blount there wouldn't be a town called Knoxville," she said.
A favorite last stop is enjoying lemonade at the Bistro at the Bijou, the century old theater that's part of the history of Knoxville.
It's a history you can learn about on a Knoxville walking tour.