Yours to Count On

by Ridley Wills II

Samuel Milton Fleming was born on April 29, 1908 in Franklin, Tennessee. He graduated from Battle Ground Academy in 1924 and from Vanderbilt University in 1928. Fleming served in active duty with the U.S. Naval Reserve from 1942-1945. After college he worked for a time in New York and then came to Third National Bank in Nashville in 1931 and by 1950 was appointed president where he served until his retirement in 1970. He was active in many areas of business and commerce in Nashville and in committee, fundraising, and other charitable work. He served on the Board of Trust of Vanderbilt University from 1952 until 1981 and as its Chairman from 1975 to 1981 . He was Chairman of the Board of Trust at the time of the merger with George Peabody College for Teachers in 1979 and as such played an important role in bringing the two institutions together. He also was instrumental in the creation of the Owen Graduate School of Management in 1969 and for the creation of the Blair School of Music at Vanderbilt in 1981. Sam Fleming held many civic memberships and served in leadership roles as community activist and philanthropist in Nashville and nationally, and was an elder of the First Presbyterian Church. He was honored at Vanderbilt with the dedication of the Fleming Yard on November 6, 1987. Yours to Count a biography of Nashville banker extraordinaire Sam M. Fleming by Ridley Wills, II was published by Vanderbilt University Press in 2007.

Hardcover

Published January 1, 2007

About the author

William Ridley Wills II was an American author and historian, who authored 34 historical and biographical books as of 2024. He received the Tennessee History Book Award in 1991 for his first book, The History of Belle Meade: Mansion, Plantation and Stud. He was president of the Tennessee Historical Society and in 2016, was given an Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from The University of the South. He was an executive of a company founded by his grandfather, the National Life and Accident Insurance Company and was on the boards of trust of Vanderbilt University and Montgomery Bell Academy, a prep school for boys in Nashville.