Nashville History Corner

Herman Lay built his potato chip empire in Nashville

BY RIDLEY WILLS II

Does this name ring a bell? It should. Herman Lay was one of Nashville’s Haratio Alger success stories. When banker Sam Fleming Jr. and his wife, Josephine, were living on Grabar Lane in the 1930s, one of their neighbors was a young man named Herman Lay.

In 1983, Mr. Fleming reminisced about Lay, saying “My first recollection of Herman Lay was when he lived around the corner from me off Granny White Pike. He had a small pickup truck (a Model A Ford) and used it to deliver potato chips to the few customers he developed. He was always extremely pleasant-one of those people whose company you always seek. He was tremendously enthusiastic and persuasive, so much so he convinced Ed Johnson, who had an ESSO service station at 2001 Belmont Boulevard (now Circle K) to take stock in his new company rather than cash, for the gasoline that Lay needed, but had no money to pay for.”

The stock that Mr. Johnson took in lieu of cash would, in time, make him a multi-millionaire. Before moving his company to Atlanta, Herman Lay produced potato chips in what is today the Belmont Store, a small brick building at the corner of Portland Avenue and Belmont Boulevard.

Mr. Fleming said “we (Third National Bank) financed Lay in the early days when he was in Nashville and then when he went to Atlanta and then on to Dallas.” Lay’s company, Lay Food Products, merged with a Texas company to become Frito-Lay. In time, Herman Lay became a loyal member of the board of Third National Bank.

Over the years, Herman and Bernice Lay and their daughter Mary gave Belmont College (now University) $23 million, made possible by the stock given them by their good friend, Ed Johnson, many decades ago.