10-4 Magazine October 2022

32 10-4 Magazine / October 2022 The frequent washes and constant weather watching, the weekends spent doing maintenance, and looking back as you walk away from your truck, are all indicators that embody the meaning of “pride in your ride” for many truckers. Their rig is their rolling business card and a direct testament of who they are. The level of pride some have in their truck is often a reflection of themselves, and carries over into other capacities of their life, much like Jesse Merrell (45), with his work, his trucks, and his life. It is common that I find drivers who are first and second generation in the trucking industry, but what is really cool is when the drivers are third and fourth generation. It is not only the thought of that many years of trucking in a family, but the rich history passed on through each generation. Jesse Merrell, COO (Chief Operating Officer) of Medallion Transport Holdings, the parent company of NHH Services, LLC is fourth generation, and next year will mark 100 years of trucking in his family. His great-grandfather was a farmer, but as the economy started declining in 1923, he went into trucking, and continued to do it until he retired in 1969. Jesse’s grandpa was in trucking from 1961 until 2012, and his father began trucking in 1976 – and is still currently leased to NHH Services, LLC without any plans of retiring anytime soon. Jesse was interested in farming, but also had a big interest in trucks and heavy equipment. Unconsciously, he probably knew he would end up in trucking, but he continued with an agricultural mindset. At the age of 18, in 1995, Jesse obtained his CDL as a way of earning money while he was in college at Purdue studying Agriculture. He earned his bachelor’s degree in Agriculture Economics and utilized this degree for about a year after he graduated, but then, trucking happened. Trucking was The Diesel Addict: By Stephanie Haas always in his blood, and like most, he just couldn’t get away from it. With a background already based on heavy haul trucking, Jesse went to work for Dallas Mavis in 2002 as an owner operator with the purchase of his first truck. Native to Indiana, he ended up moving to Texas in 2005 because that is where the movement and exporting of heavy equipment happened. In 2007, Jesse ventured on his own and started National Heavy Haul, while remaining A REFLECTION OF YOU