Herschel Lynn Greer (1906–March 19, 1976) was a prominent

businessman A businessperson, businessman, or businesswoman is an individual who has founded, owns, or holds shares in (including as an angel investor) a private-sector company. A businessperson undertakes activities (commercial or industrial) for th ...

and the first president of Vols, Inc., an ownership group organized in 1959 for the purpose of keeping the

Nashville Vols The Nashville Vols were a Minor League Baseball team that played in Nashville, Tennessee, from 1901 to 1963. Known only as the Nashville Baseball Club during their first seven seasons, they were officially named the Nashville Volunteers (often sh ...

Minor League Baseball franchise in

Nashville Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the seat of Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the most populous city in the state, 21st most-populous city in the U.S., and the ...

Tennessee Tennessee ( , ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked state in the Southeastern region of the United States. Tennessee is the 36th-largest by area and the 15th-most populous of the 50 states. It is bordered by Kentucky to th ...

. Greer worked in the financial sector, co-organizing Guaranty Mortgage Company in 1940. He served as its President and Chairman of the Board until 1969. In January 1959, Greer and thirteen other Nashville businessmen, including

country music Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, ...

star

Eddy Arnold Richard Edward Arnold (May 15, 1918 – May 8, 2008) was an American country music singer who performed for six decades. He was a Nashville sound (country/popular music) innovator of the late 1950s, and scored 147 songs on the ''Billboard'' cou ...

, formed Vols, Inc. The company sold 4,876 shares of stock at $5 each. Vols, Inc. was successful in keeping the Nashville Vols in the city from 1959 to 1961. The

Southern Association The Southern Association was a higher-level minor league in American organized baseball from 1901 through 1961. For most of its existence, the Southern Association was two steps below the Major Leagues; it was graded Class A (1902–1935), Cl ...

, of which the Vols were members, collapsed after the 1961 season. The team did not play in 1962. In 1963, the Vols played one final season in the

South Atlantic League The South Atlantic League, often informally called the Sally League, is a Minor League Baseball league with teams predominantly in states along the Atlantic coast of the United States from New York to Georgia. A Class A league for most of its ...

. The team had a debt of $22,000 that could not be paid, forcing the ownership group to surrender their franchise to the league. This was the last year that professional baseball was played at Sulphur Dell ballpark, the home of the Vols, before it was demolished in 1969. Greer died in 1976. Two years later, in 1978,

Larry Schmittou Larry Schmittou (born July 19, 1940) is an American entrepreneur and former baseball executive and coach. He owns S&S Family Entertainment LLC, which operates a chain of bowling centers in Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, and Indiana. From 1968 to 1978 ...

brought the

Nashville Sounds The Nashville Sounds are a Minor League Baseball team of the International League and the Triple-A (baseball), Triple-A affiliate of the Milwaukee Brewers. They are located in Nashville, Tennessee, Nashville, Tennessee, and are named for the ci ...

, an expansion team of the Double-A Southern League, to Nashville. The Greer family donated $25,000 for construction of the team's new stadium. The ballpark was named

Herschel Greer Stadium Herschel Greer Stadium was a Minor League Baseball park in Nashville, Tennessee, on the grounds of Fort Negley, an American Civil War fortification, approximately south of the city's downtown district. The facility closed at the end of the 2 ...

in his honor. It served as the home of the Sounds from 1978 through 2014, after which they left the stadium for a new stadium,

First Tennessee Park First Horizon Park, formerly known as First Tennessee Park, is a baseball park in downtown Nashville, Tennessee, United States. The home of the Triple-A Nashville Sounds of the International League, it opened on April 17, 2015, and can sea ...

, built on the site of Sulphur Dell. Greer Stadium was demolished in 2019.

References

;General * * ;Specific {{DEFAULTSORT:Greer, Herschel Lynn 1906 births 1976 deaths People from Nashville, Tennessee People from Dickson County, Tennessee Nashville Vols Nashville Sounds 20th-century American businesspeople