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Maymead is a family of companies which grew up
out of family farming operations. One story says the name "Maymead"
comes from a train stop called "May's Meadow" which was in fact a train stop on the farm property.
How and why "May's Meadow" got concatenated and truncated is anyone's
guess. The term "Maymead" is also a type of soil found in northwestern North Carolina
and northeastern Tennessee and the origins of this term are also unknown.
The land for the farm, which included land in present
day Tennessee and North Carolina, was granted
to the family by King George the II in about 1747. It is one of only a
very few farms which has had continuous family ownership since the
days preceding independence from England.
The family farm has been governed by three different state governments: North
Carolina, Franklin, and Tennessee. Today it is located entirely
within Johnson County, Tennessee, a county which boarders Virginia and North Carolina.
The farm resides mostly in Roan Valley which is very picturesque and which
was named after Daniel Boone's horse. Legend has it that this horse went lame one fall. That Daniel had to
leave it behind but upon his return to the valley the next spring, he found the horse thriving. Daniel Boone, thereafter it is said,
referred to the river as Roan Creek and the valley as the Roan Valley.
In primitive times, Roan Valley was inhabited by the Cherokee Indians. Many items
found in a cave on the property are now on display at the National Museum of Natural
History - Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC.
Diversification away from farming began during the era of the Great Depression when
lime mining was begun as a government program to help fertilize
the farms of the area. From there, a stone quarry was started.
As our highway systems developed, the various state Departments of Transportation
began to standardize material requirements which in turn caused the products from the
granite quarry to became very much in demand. The quarry itself is quite unique in that
it lies on a fault and is actually half limestone and half granite. Many geologists
have come to study the area as a result. By the way, it is the only granite quarry in the state
of Tennessee.
Vertical integration evolved and Maymead began
to provide highway construction services. Today, construction
services are the main business, but farming, aggregates supply, asphalt production, and real estate
development are also part of the mix. Maymead cares greatly about the environment and consequently has made major investments in machinery that recycles asphalt. Maymead is proud to be a regional leader in the production of asphalt utilizing recycled asphalt.
The separate entities which comprise "Maymead"
today are: Maymead Farms, Inc., Maymead Materials, Inc., and Maymead,
Inc. The Maymead main office telephone number is: 423-727-2000.
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