The son of one of the state’s leading geologists, Ted Smith leveraged his own extensive background in engineering and surveying to form Arcilla Mining and Land Company in 1992. “I bought some property, and nobody would come to buy my minerals,” he recalls. “So I asked some potential buyers if I brought the minerals to their doorstep, would they pay me for it? They said they would, and so I did. That was the beginning.”

More than two decades later, Arcilla Mining and Land Company is a family business that employs more than 300 people with operations in Georgia, Florida, Mississippi, South Carolina and Alabama. Built upon his late father’s dedication to geology, Ted Smith’s business acumen has been passed along to the next generation with his three sons to follow suit.