Wheat was a farming community in Anderson County, Tennessee. The earliest settlers moved into the area in the late 1700's. However, it was not until 1846 that the area was established as the community of Bald Hill. The name was changed to Wheat in 1880, when a post office opened. The first postmaster was Frank Wheat.
Early farming residents included John Henry and Elizabeth Inman Welcher. They owned Laurel Banks plantation on the Clinch River from the early 1800's until circa 1840. A Gallaher purchased the property in the 1840's, and it is now referred to as the Gallaher-Stone Plantation. The Wheat Community African Burial Ground (AEC #2) and Gallaher-Welcher cemetery (AEC #1) still survive. At least some of those buried in the African Burial Ground are believed to have been part of the Gallaher-Stone Plantation; a monument to those held in slavery is on the cemetery grounds.
Wheat eventually included several churches, a seminary/college, several stores, a gas station and a masonic lodge. George Jones Memorial Baptist Church and Cemetery was one of the churches. Poplar Creek Seminary, founded in 1886 by a Presbyterian minister, later became Roane College. In 1908, the college transfered ownership of the building to Wheat High School. The community of Wheat was dissolved in 1942 when the United States Government purchased the land as part of the Manhattan Project. The residents were displaced as part of the Manhattan Project.
In East Tennessee, a high tumbled plateau area broken by innumerable narrow valleys and steep ridges, the size of the farms was limited.
Tennessee farmers were pioneers in the introduction of lespedeza (Japanese clover), under the direction of the University of Tennessee College of Agriculture.
In 1936 the 454,000 acres sown in wheat harvested 4,858,000 bushels.
We farm all grain, soybeans, wheat, rice and corn.
Back in 1984 we wheat farmers in Arkansas passed a check off and became the first winter wheat state to become a member of U.S. Wheat Associates and a lot of this information, a lot of the policies that I have opinions on actually came through the board of directors U.S. Wheat which I serve.
On Cuba we think it's very important for wheat and rice that our competitors and legislation and when I was sworn in we could not sell to Cuba until the legislation had changed, and there were some senior senators in Congress who did not wish to change that legislation.
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