Local businessman and philanthropist Jim Ayers passed away on April 1, 2025 in Nashville, TN.
James W. “Jim” Ayers passed away after battling a variety of health issues in recent, reads a statement shared with us.
Ayers was the founder, former executive chair, and CEO of FirstBank and one of Tennessee’s most influential business leaders and philanthropists.
Born on November 19, 1943, in Parsons, Tennessee, Jim grew up learning the values of honesty, hard work, generosity, and the paramount importance of education, instilled in him by his parents.
His father, Paul, was a lumberman and farmer, and like his father and grandfather before him, the elder Ayers owned and operated a sawmill, while Jim’s mother, Wilma, operated a flower shop and managed the duplexes the couple owned while raising Jim and his two siblings.
A self-described entrepreneur from the time he was eight years old, Jim’s first job was shining shoes for 10 cents a pair. At the age of 10, he was driving a tractor on the family farm putting in 8 to 10 hours of labor on the weekends.
After working with his father on the farm and at the sawmill, Jim spent a summer selling books for the Southwestern Company. Traveling to McComb, Mississippi, at the age of 16, he joined the company’s summer sales force, staying in a boarding house, while being paid $10 a week to knock on doors, selling mostly Bibles.
Known as “Speedy Ayers” in high school for his love of drag racing and having fun along the Tennessee River, Jim was a lifelong sportsman, with a particular passion for duck hunting at Grassy Lake in Kentucky, sports fishing off the Florida Keys, and fishing for crappie across West Tennessee. He loved traveling the world with his devoted wife and sweetheart, Janet, but he would always say his favorite place on earth was his beloved Tennessee.
After graduating from Parsons High School in 1961, Jim attended college at Memphis State University, now the University of Memphis. During his sophomore year there, Jim married and started his family. In addition to his studies, he worked part-time in the accounting office at Forest Hill Dairy and later, as a night auditor at the Holiday Inns of America.
After earning his college degree in accounting in 1965, Jim joined Ortho Novo, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, as a salesman in Birmingham, Alabama. He enjoyed the job, but when Jim was 22, his father passed away.
To be near his widowed mother, Jim moved with his family back to Tennessee. Shortly thereafter, he answered an ad to be the controller of a publicly-traded nursing home company in Memphis called Care Inns, where he was quickly elevated, first to vice president and then to chief operating officer, to help turn the company around.
Following the sale of Care Inns in 1971, Jim continued his leadership in the nursing home business, eventually starting a nursing home in his hometown of Parsons, which subsequently grew to 40 American Health Center nursing homes spread across Tennessee. But in the mid-1990s, Jim sold the nursing home business to focus on his growing banking interests.
He partnered with a friend to buy the Farmers State Bank in Scotts Hill, Tennessee. Jim served as the CEO of the bank and soon began adding branches. Later, Jim’s partner decided to sell him his half of the business.
Jim went on to acquire the First National Bank of Lexington, Tennessee, and changed the name to FirstBank, where he served as Chief Executive Officer before becoming Executive Chairman of the Board when he took the bank public on the New York Stock Exchange in September 2016.
Through Jim’s strategic acquisitions and a steadfast commitment to personalized service, FirstBank’s assets skyrocketed from a modest $14 million in 1984 to more than $13 billion today.
As Jim experienced success in his own career, he was also determined to create opportunities to help others from a similar background. He was a big believer in the Bible verse from Luke 12:48: “To whom much is given, much is expected.”
In 1999, as a way to give back to his hometown, he established The Ayers Foundation, dedicated to improving the quality of life of rural Tennesseans through education, conservation, and social welfare.
A lifelong believer in the transformative power of education, Jim and his wife, Janet, have always believed education is the best way to open doors, remove barriers, and give people choices for a better and more fulfilling life.
Over the past 25 years, the Ayers Foundation Trust has worked to directly support more than 20,000 rural Tennessee students — helping each student develop a plan to reach their goals, whether it be an apprenticeship, the military, a workforce certificate, or a college degree.
Starting from a single high school in Parsons, the nationally-acclaimed Ayers Scholars Program now has college access and success counselors working in and delivering outsized results for students in 33 high schools across 21 of Tennessee’s most economically distressed and at-risk rural counties.
His many other philanthropic activities included the establishment of the Ayers Institute at the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center, the Jim Ayers Medical Tower at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, the Ayers Children’s Hospital in Jackson, Tenn., and the Ayers Institute for Teacher Learning and Innovation at Lipscomb University.
In 2019, Jim received an honor of a lifetime by being inducted into the Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans. He also received numerous other awards, including the Silver Beaver Award from the Boy Scouts of America, the Joe Kraft Humanitarian Award from The Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee, and the Distinguished Alumni Award from the University of Memphis. In 2023, he was named Nashvillian of the Year by Easterseals of Tennessee, and in 2024, he was inducted into the Nashville’s Entrepreneur Center’s Hall of Fame. He holds honorary doctorates from Freed-Hardeman University, Union University, Bethel University, Belmont University, and The University of Memphis, where he was the first alumnus to receive this distinction.
Final funeral arrangements and a planned Celebration of Life will be announced soon.
The Ayers family requests that, in lieu of flowers, all memorial donations be made to The Ayers Foundation Trust, 643 South Tennessee Avenue, Parsons, Tennessee 38363, or AyersFoundationTrust.org/
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