Trimble Casey Meaders

Probably the least known of the original Meaders potters is Trimble Casey Meaders, better known as Casey. Although he was actively involved in the family business and had his own shop down the road from his father’s, Casey left Georgia around 1920 after separating from his first wife. He moved to the Long Island area of Catawba County, North Carolina. There he established a shop, dug clay from the Catawba River Bottoms and became known for the quality of his ware.    In 1923, Casey married Essie Lee Fry and they had two daughters, (He also had a daughter named Lucille, with his first wife) Louise Meaders and Martha May Meaders. Casey traveled by horse and wagon throughout the western and northwestern areas of North Carolina and became well known for the beauty, quality and durability of his work, which was mostly large churns, and vases that were five gallons or more. Casey made very few small pieces. (Although his nephew, Edwin Meaders recalls that, “Casey could made 50 one-gallon pieces in a day. He’d sit down to make fifty jugs and he wouldn’t quit turning until he was finished. It was amazing to watch.”    He died in North Carolina and is the only one of the brothers not buried in the Mossy Creek cemetery in White County, GA.