Jimmy Driver Honored as SNA Honorary Member

This year’s recipient of the SNA Honorary Member Award is Jimmy Driver, Jimmy Driver Plant Brokerage & Consulting, McMinnville, TN. Jimmy Driver served as President of Middle Tennessee Nursery (1974 – 1975); President of the Tennessee Nursery Association (1984 – 1985); Member of the Board of Governors of the American Nursery Association (1990 – 1993). He was honored as Tennessee Wholesale Nurseryman of the Year in 1992. He has served on various committees of state, regional and national associations. Jim, along with Otis Floyd, led the delegation to facilitate the legislative and funding activities to move the nursery research center to McMinnville – the Otis Floyd Nursery Crop Research Station. Jim also served on the legislative committee of the American Nursery Association. He attended conferences in Washington, DC at the Capitol and the White House.

Jimmy Driver

Mr. Driver joined the US Navy at the age of 17 in 1957. He began his nursery experience by selling trees on the side while working other jobs. Living in Chattanooga, and close to McMinnville, he would take orders and sell trees during the week to neighbors and fellow employees at his other jobs. After several years, he and his family moved back to Smithville. Because there were no nurseries who would sell to the public, Jim started a retail center in the heart of the wholesale nursery industry named Cumberland Nursery in Smithville. From a meager beginning in 1970, the nursery grew to a 150-acre operation with twenty employees, Mr. Driver sold wholesale as well as retail. He was one of the first to grow trees in containers in many sizes. This maintained the operation year around regardless of weather conditions.

Raised primarily by his grandparents on a small farm in DeKalb CountyTennessee, everything revolved around producing food in order to keepthe family going. Jim looks at this time of working with his hands inthe dirt as the beginning of his love of farming and working with theground.

In 1995, Jim embarked on a new adventure. He began a new business, Jimmy Driver Plant Brokerage & Consulting. Representing nurseries across several states, he still works full time to this day. He currently lives in McMinnville, TN where the trees are!

Jim would like to remember two individuals who were instrumental in his success in the nursery industry: Tommy Henegar and Edward S. Porter, both loved the SNA.

The SNA Awards Program is designed to recognize professionals for their distinguished talents, extraordinary service and life achievements, and who have demonstrated their commitment to the Southern Nursery Association and the industry through these annual awards.