Union City, Tenn.—Discovery Park of America is pleased to announce a permanent exhibit featuring the photography of Verne and Nonie Sabin will open at the museum and heritage park on Friday, June 12, 2026.
The museum, located in Union City, Tennessee, is working closely with the Tennessee State Library & Archives to create this new permanent exhibit that will highlight the work of Verne and Nonie Sabin, a husband-and-wife photography team who documented daily life in Union City and around Reelfoot Lake between 1919 and 1924. The “Sabin Photography Collection,” which includes approximately 10,000 original prints, negatives and documents, was donated to the Tennessee State Library & Archives by the couple’s daughter, Lela Sabin Karweil, in the late 1980s.
Discovery Park’s collections and exhibits staff are selecting a portion of the digitized photographs from the Library & Archives to create their own exhibit that helps to interpret and highlight this remarkable visual record of Northwest Tennessee with accuracy, depth and historical context.
“As I worked through the Sabin Collection at the Library & Archives, I was struck by how many images documented this region — photographs many in our community have never seen,” said Jennifer Wildes Hunter, Discovery Park’s senior director of collections and exhibits and a recent graduate of the Tennessee Archives Institute, a program of the Tennessee State Library & Archives. “Beyond the commercial photographs of businesses, churches, schools and town events, the Sabin family’s personal snapshots revealed a much more intimate layer of history. Because they lived just steps from downtown Union City, even ordinary moments — a sister posing on the sidewalk in her Easter dress, a picnic in the front yard, a father shoveling snow — captured unexpected details of the surrounding neighborhood. Thanks to the Library & Archives’ meticulous cataloging, many of these images are now accurately identified, which was essential to developing this exhibit.”
“We’re thrilled to have this exhibit here,” said Discovery Park’s CEO, Scott Williams, who was recently selected to serve as president of the Friends of the Tennessee State Library & Archives. “Through my role in the Friends organization, and as someone with a passion for Tennessee history, I have had a bird’s-eye view of the incredible resources housed at the Tennessee State Library & Archives. Being able to access this photographic collection from Tennessee’s preeminent archive of our state’s history will provide Discovery Park’s visitors with a unique glimpse into the past for years to come.”
The Sabin exhibit will be free with regular admission or membership. It is one of many programs and activities the museum and park will present in 2026 in celebration of the 230th anniversary of Tennessee’s statehood and the nation’s America250 commemoration.