West Meade was built in 1886 at the current 6204 Old Harding Pike by the Hon. Howell Edmunds Jackson (1832-1895) and Mary Elizabeth Harding Jackson (1850-1913). She was the daughter of W.G. and Elizabeth McGavock Harding of Belle Meade and Jackson’s second wife. (Jackson’s first wife was Sophie Molloy Jackson, 1837-1873, who he married in 1859 and she died of yellow fever.) Howell and Mary wed in 1874. It is a red brick Victorian style mansion originally with 2,600 acres that W.G. Harding had given them. The property sat on the western portion of the Harding lands on the west side of Nashville.
Photo by Kentondickerson
Jackson was a United States Senator (by appointment in 1881) and a judge on the 6th U.S. Circuit Court by Pres. Grover Cleveland in 1886. In 1893, Justice Jackson was appointed by Pres. Benjamin Harrison to the U.S. Supreme, but died of tuberculosis just two years later. By 1895, the West Meade estate encompassed about 3,000 acres. The Jacksons were very prosperous - also owning a Washington home near the White House; a farm with a wool mill in Jackson, TN,; a Memphis home; investment in Nashville’s Richland Turnpike Co.; and a good amount of cash.
After Belle Meade mansion was sold in 1906, the Jackson family began selling their property to develop neighborhoods of Belle Meade and West Meade. In 1944, 1,750 acres were divided between three trustees and developed under the name West Meade Farms, Inc. The mansion and surrounding 50 acres were sold to Margaret Elizabeth Price Voss Brown (1903-1996). She had been married to Ronald Lafayette Voss (1899-1957) and to William Charles Foskett Brown (1895-1969 - wed in 1967). Margaret lived separately on Belle Meade BL and renovated West Meade Mansion.
From 1997 to 2007, Tom Black owned and lived at the mansion. Black was affiliated and a leader with the Southwestern organization and then an entrepreneur with several other businesses including FISI-Madison Financial Corp and a co-founder of Private Business (now Goldleaf Financial Solutions).
In 2007, Black sold West Meade with its 8 acres to Robert and Emily Butts. Rob is co-founder of Southpoint Capital Advisors, a New York-based hedge fund. The name West Meade came from its geographic location on the Belle Meade Plantation. The family owners are remembered through Hardingwoods Pl, and Vossland Dr. NRHP 1975 See also Belle Meade Plantation, Clifflawn, Lynnwood, Belair (Lebanon Rd.), and Two Rivers
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