Tennessee Birth Records - 1923

The Tennessee State Library & Archives holds birth records that are older than 100 years. Birth records are confidential for 100 years under state law. Records less than 100 years old are held by the Tennessee Office of Vital Records and must be requested from that office. Tennessee began requiring birth records be kept statewide in 1908. However, the law requiring records to be kept lapsed at the end of 1912, therefore no records were kept in 1913. Statewide recordkeeping resumed in 1914. The larger cities in Tennessee did keep earlier birth records: Nashville (beginning in 1881); Knoxville (beginning in 1881); Chattanooga (beginning in 1879); and Memphis (beginning in 1874).