Remembering the Store

If you like reading old time things, then you will love this story.

One morning right before Christmas, I walked into the store and laying on my counter was a hand written copy of the wonderful memories and history about my store. I sat on the settee and began to read the wonderful history about my store in Lacie, Kentucky. I didn't know how it got on my counter, but I felt to blessed and thrilled that someone would take the time to jot down their memories.

I later learned the Charlie Ricketts, came over one day while the Amish were working and laid it on the counter as a gift to me.

It is priceless in my opinion, the wonderful memories and history on my store, so I typed it up and have been giving it out to customers in my shop who always come in and tell me about their memories of growing up in my store.....

Thanks so much Mrs. Sue Barnett

To go to the store was a privilege. We felt even though it was along walk from our home to Lacie. I can date that time in the early 1930’s. To get to the store meant I must walk a part of a mile out our lane, then turn left on what is now named Powell Road. At the end of Powell Road, I would turn left again to arrive at Lacie.

Lacie was a very small village. It contained a one room school house. To the left of the white frame school was the store.. Next to the store was the storekeepers home and beside his home stood another very small home. Across from the store was a large private home in which our cousin, Mrs. Ella Dunaway, lived with her husband, daughter, Mabel, her husband George Barnett and their beautiful daughter Leah Mae.

A road of gravel ran by the store going north and south. South took you to our county seat New Castle, while north took you to Port Royal. An intersection at the store would take you west to either Campbellsburg or Turners Station. So Lacie was a good distance in those days for few folks drove cars, from the other larger towns. Thus the store was a very important and necessary place to those of use who lived in and around Lacie.

Lacie also had one other business. It was the blacksmith shop. People kept, Mr. Grinstead, its owner busy shoeing horses and repairing the farming equipment the farmers owned. Another small dwelling stood beside the shop. In the thirties six buildings, not counting the barns and stalls for ponies, comprised the town of Lacie. Today some seventy-six years later it has only added one structure to its contents.

No one was ever elected mayor for there was never a need. Things came and went, yet Lacie seemed to remain the same. During all the passing years the store remained the prime important place in the tiny community. The school was soon swallowed up in consolidation. The building was then turned into a private home.

Lacie school was moved to Campbellsburg to continue our education. The store remained. It was the hub around which the community moved before an after consolidation. The store was a source of education. With in its walls you learned to add and subtract, read labels, and deal with situations that helped you develop into good citizens.

Mother would send my sister Joyce and I with a dozen eggs to sell. After we would purchase whatever the amount the eggs brought sometimes a few cents remained so the store served as a learning tool in managing money wisely.

In the 30’s the storekeepers understanding the plight of the farmers, would allow folks to charge groceries and other items. The year of The Great Depression lingered long in rural America.

Then when our cash crop, tobacco, was sold in later winter, farmers would try and pay off their debts. We lambaste the use of credit cards today, yet had not the storekeeper allowed us to buy on credit, there would hab been even more problems.

The store served as a place, not only to sell our extra eggs, but around Thanksgiving Bob would hunt rabbits to sell. Hunters would come from Louisville to hunt during Rabbit Season. The store would purchase those rabbits.

Women sold off chickens, turkeys and ducks. The store, also provided a place to sell the extra cream that was not used to make butter, desserts, cottage cheese and custards.

Before the cream could be sold it had to be tested. Joyce, my sister, decided one summer she’d apply for that job. She drug me into the venture in order to have someone to wash the cream cans. I can remember the rank smell of soured cream which caused me to wonder how that cream would ever be used or why any company would purchase it. Our career as testers was very short lived. Yet because the store was willing to let us trade eggs and cream we were able to purchase some of the luxuries we needed like vanilla, cinnamon, or cream of tartar. The spices of life that took away some of the bitter taste of poverty.

The store was the place you always entered with a tinge of excitement. A screen door that remained up winter or summer, covered the plate glass door. That glass allowed you to peek in before entering. The door was recessed. Plate glass windows ran the width of the store. Deep windows seats allowed for display yet when I was young they were the spot I selected to sit to enjoy my treat. After trading, if I was lucky, there would be a nickel to spend.

From the seat to the right of the door I could observe the entire length and dreadth of the store. To the right and left were shelves reaching to the ceiling. Far down the store stood an electric chest that hummed happily. No wonder it seemed happy for inside it was cold drinks. To get to them the top slid open revealing grape or orange sodas. There were cream sodas which I never bought. When Coke Cola and Pepsi became popular, I became addicted and was hooked for life.

A stove was located about three-fourths the length of the store. Benches, nail kegs, cream cans and chairs surrounded the stove. There the loafers came to talk. There were some, like my father who used the store for a stage on which he entertained other loafers with stories from his memories. IN the summer the loafers carried the objects out onto the concrete which formed somewhat of a porch. By afternoon the sun was to the back of the store so it wasn’t too uncomfortable.

I remember seeing Mr. George Barnett from across the road, Mr. Harris and Andrew Powell when they’d take time away from their farms. Mr. Tandy Peniston who loved to chew tobacco, Mr. Frank Crawford, Mr. Tommy Heitzman with Podd Tingle, My dad and brother James and sometimes Mr. Den Berry would ride up on a fine horse right up onto the concrete never alighting but remaining in his saddle.

Of all these gentlemen Podd drew the most speculation. He was always with Mr. Tommy Heitzman so I believe the must have lived with him. They lived on Mr. Edgar Peniston’s, farm. Mr. Peniston never loafed and probably didn’t approve of the idea. Podd was eccentric and children were warned against him yet that made him all the more interesting. He never spoke very often and seemed content and harmless. He loved to eat bananas.

One loafer often loafed from his car. That was our Uncle Less Tingle. Somehow he was kin by marriage but only my dad could explain it. Uncle Less was severely crippled by arthritis. He was so bent over from the ravishing force of the disease that he had to use a crutch in order to move about. Because of his large frame, crippled body and bulging eyes I was of him. He would call me Kid-O and invite me to come sit on his knee, I never turned him down for two reasons. First I knew he would give me a nickel and also because my dad loved Uncle Less. So between those two reasons I overcame my fear. I would take my nickel and head back inside the store.

Besides those cold treats there was an endless supply of sweet, chewy candies. Enough to keep a dentist working overtime. Yet we never went to a dentist for he was a luxury, we couldn’t afford. I still had mostly baby teeth and they were suppose to fall out anyway. I usually bought an All Day Sucker, correctly names for it was as hard as concrete. You could never naw off a single bite. So it took all day to suck it. When the treat was eaten at school you soon learned to save the yellow and brown paper wrapping. Then when recess was over you could wrap it again until time to walk home.

When I was in the third grade buying a treat came to an end. During recess if you were in need of a tablet or paper, or a treat, the teacher would let you go, as she watched us skip across the road to the store. Traffic was never a problem, we always felt safe and important making that trip.

In those days some of the kids were left behind, not so much in learning, as in economics. The teachers taught us well without all the electronics available today. There were no grouping of abilities. a lot of teaching of reading was done one on one. Still there was very very little the teacher could do to equalize the children during the depression years. There some children were fairly well off, some with average income and some who were poor. My family was poor. Still now with my sister teaching, someone had a monthly income. Because of her meager salary she was able to give me a nickel once in a while.

One day when it was time to dash across the road to the store, she tried to secretively place a nickel on my desk. I took the nickel and sprang into action, joined the line of children waiting and we made a wild dash out the door.

That was my last time during my third grade year to belong to the lucky ones. By the time my sister and I reached home, one of the school’s trustees was waiting for us. He had come to condemn “the nickel on the desk business.” She was under no circumstance allowed to single out a child and reward them while the others were not treated the same. A lesson we both needed, yet to this day I think of the gentleman as a nosey-busy-body.

Still I went to the store with my family or with my sister after school. To the children of Lacie the outside of the store was an exciting as the inside. The store keeper les us play around it with every few rules to remember. When playing hid and seek, we could not hide inside the store. We obeyed. Since the store was built very close the home of the store owner an alleyway was all that separated them. That alley was a delightful place to duck into during games of tag or hid and seek. The alley was protected almost entirely against the sun. the wind though would find its way through keeping it both cool in the summer and cold in the winter. To me it was a wonderful have, a place of escape.

At the back of the store there was no under penning. If you would stoop down you could walk in under the store. Huge rocks were left there from its early days. These rocks were stacked haphazardly, protruding from the earth, making it very difficult to move about. It was a minor problem for we claimed that area s a playhouse.

In our imagination we made I into whatever we needed. Some days it was a shop at sea, a castle, Daniel Boone’s for or a home in which we played Mother and children. There we cooked meals using discarded tin cans or broken bottles. There we discovered some of the play children were hard to discipline. The inner personality surfaced in those games. We loved that part of the store. I have often wondered why we all didn’t become as bent as Uncle Less Tingle, for it was necessary to keep our heads low and our kneed bent. Nails could cut your scalp, rocks scrapped our knees and glass was broken all about. Still we never had tetanus from eroded tin cans or stitches from our cuts. The store must have provided guardian angels to be on duty at those times.

The store at the backdoor had a series of steps leading down to the ground. They were ideal bleachers for any activity we needed.

In the third grade with Miss Thelma, my sister and teacher, I thought I had quite an advantage over the other students. Yet that was only in my childish thinking. So when spring came I decided to use those bleachers on Saturday to service a deep seated need. Somewhere I had come upon a large sticker book. It was a book about birds which I found most interesting. The book was hard bound ad as large as a Life Magazine. On each page was a picture of a bird with a bit of information concerning it. My delight was to find a sticker of that bird and lick it then stick it into a waiting frame. With all this information at my finger tips I decided to start a bird club for the girls on Powell Lane. So Thelma gave reluctant permission to announce my good intension.

Anyone interested come to the store on Saturday. Meet me at the back steps. Bring a nickel for candy or pop. I would give a lecture, show the bird and then we’d walk back down Powell Lane and watch for the bird. This worked out fine except for Nell Batts who would have to walk back by herself. No wonder the club fell through in a matter of a few weeks. All the girls soon grew weary of my ardent enthusiasm for birds. Why should they waste their Saturdays listening to me, never locating the birds and walking up and down Powell Lane six days a week. My interest has never waned. So when I became a real teacher and had a captive audience I would have a birth unit yearly. Some students responded, others like the Lacie Gang were bored, I could tell.

If men found the store a place of amusement, women found it a place of necessity. Mother almost always sent my father to the store to purchase our needs. There was one things she and she alone would take her time to go buy. It was yard goods for some of our dresses. There she could select from bolts and bolts of cotton, her choice. Also there was a tape and trimmings galore, buttons, thread, needles and pins. Everyone took delight in matching up the products for a new dress. I don’t remember ever being fitted for shoes or sandals. Those were ordered from a catalog after she would draw our foot pattern onto a brown paper sack and mail it along with the choice and size. Once they arrived I would insist they fit just right, fearful she’d return the, only to have to wait another three weeks.

Staples such as sugar, soda, baking powder, yeast, tea and coffee had to be bought. For a treat a loaf of bread would be bought on Saturday. The brand I remember was Honey Crust. From that loaf she would prepare her cream Toast. She’d butter the slices, sprinkle with sugar and then put pure, thick sweet cream over the sugar. For sandwiches she’d slice a slice into two pieces, the bread so thin that the contents would seep through. Yet it was necessary as she had to prepare all of our lunches.

Today as I casually select breads of all kind and toss it into my grocery cart, I feel so thankful yet somewhat guilty as I think of that precious loaf so carefully carried home on Saturdays.

There was one time of each year that depression did not enter our thinking. That was at Christmas. Our dad and mother were determined to make Christmas a time of real joy, as it should be. So armed with a white meal sack, Dad would set out for the store. There on credit the keeper filled the sack with an orgy of tastes, smell and textures that have remained in my memory.

Of all the delights, I shall only elaborate on the gallon of oysters which is still purchase some seven decades later, now costing nearly seventy dollars. From the gallon my father brought home we ate our way through oyster soup, scalloped oysters, raw oysters and crowing entrée, fried oysters. One Christmas, cousin Ella Dunaway, kin to the Chilton’s gave me Charles Dicken’s Christmas Carol. When I read that oysters lat at the foot of the throne of the Spirit of Christmas Present, I realized oysters was an absolute part of Christmas. I realized that dad wanted to say like Tiney Tim, “God Bless us Everyone “ with his gift of oysters.

As I mentioned before Joyce and I were often asked to walk to the store. One such day we’d been sent for apples. The name eluded us. She’d just asked us to buy some apples. As we arrived at the store a huge produce truck with the name of Detillo was parked out front. We were in luck for the driver was unloading both apples and bananas. When the truck pulled away the store owner asked “ What do you need girls?” we answered “Apples”. He replied “old apples or new apples” To this day I find his question amusing. I’m sure joyce asked for old apples for they sounded cheaper. Now as i look at the selections of Gala, MacIntosh, Red or Yellow Delicious, eve a Granny Apple, I think of Cecil’s categories, Old or New.

When consolidation took us to Campbellsburg to school we felt excited. No more walking to and from Lacie in all kids of weather. Though we changed schools the store remained. It still served as it had before. Used as a polling place, a place to spend idle time and if our Big Yellow Bus driver would allow we’d alight, dash in and spend our nickels. But mostly we’d drive right on by, the wonderful games all but forgotten. We had much more on our minds. Our nation was at war. Young men called into service by the draft or enlisting into other branches of the service, and were leaving our community. Terribly young men such as James Russell, Snookie and Buddy, Baby Carter, L.T. Peniston, Merle Thomas Powell, Robert, “Little Bob” Batts, Bob Chilton, Buddy Pryor, John Devore, Abbie Rickets, Rice and Duddie Blackby, Leon Taylor and Whitey, Kenneth Sharp, Virgil and Charles Ricketts and Charlie Ricketts. All of those marched away. Three never completely returned. Two died in battle, Joho Devore and Buddy

Baby Carter. My own brother chose a career in the Navy Air Force and fought in World War II and the Korean Conflict. Circumstances never allowed him to come home completely, only on visits which we cherished.

While young men fought and died, the store was forced to deal with our ration cards and stamps. We guarded the ones for sugar. We heard of civilians who hoarded it and thought of them as traitors.

Some how the school board permitted the buses to be used to haul us to local games. I would to go the store to catch the bus. Cecil Hayden, the store keeper would keep the store open on game nights. He was a very frugal man, running a very tight ship. No need but for one forty watt bulb to light the store, a few lumps of coal for the stove that was putting off a sputtering sound and a rancid smell of coal. But we didn’t mind, we were young, warm-blooded and on our way to cheer for Old C-Burg High, to cheer our royal sons on to Victory. Such events kept our minds off the war that seemed to drag on forever.

In the spring of 46, with the European conflict ended. The President ordered the atomic bomb to be dropped on Two cities in Japan. Life changed forever, yet we would not be aware of it at that time. All we considered was at last the Lacie boys would be coming home. In 1946 I went away for the first time in my life. I went to college, graduated, married and started a family all in the span of about seven years. Now J.B, my husband, would take me past Lacie Store in order to shop in other towns. I was not alone in passing up the store to purchase most of our needed groceries. Suddenly the store became unnecessary, save for bread, milk, coke and gasoline.

When the ruling from the government from the United States Government dealing with environmental safety was passed, the gas pumps had to be removed. THE STORE CLOSED. A new generation of loafers drifted to other locations. Memories of all we’d seen, heard, smelled, tasted and felt in the years in which the store was a vibrant necessity in our lives, often returns to me.

I can still see the bolts of colorful material being measured where a yardstick had been tacked to the counter. I can hear the ting of a bell as the cash register swallowed my nickel. I can smell the stale order of cigars and tobacco smoke, proof that the loafers had been enjoying themselves. There comes to my senses the taste of effervescent coke on my tongue and the feeling of being home when I’d open the squeaking door to the store, for no one was ever turned away. Yes, all of ones senses came into focus when I remember the store.

I wonder if the children of today will have those pleasant memories as the automatic door slides open to Walmarts huge interior. I hope so, for it is very important to be able to remember with love the people and places that effect our lives as did The Store at Lacie.

Footnote:

I was to lazy to research ownership of the store before my times. Still my ninety four year old sister can remember only four owners; Mr. Bates (early 1900), Mrs. Guartney (early 30’s) Cecil Hayden (40’s & 50’s) and finally Jimmy Ricketts the last owner (70-80’s).

Cecil Hayden stands out in my mind most clearly for he kept the store in my youth. He was very friendly and welcomed our business. His wife Wilma, worked along side of him but never seemed happy in her job. Cecil developed cancer and took his own life. It was a sad time for the small community.

The store stood idle for years, but once again is opened It is a craft store dealing in primitive items. Its proud owners are Bruce and Tiffany Carnal.

By Sue Chilton Barnett

Winter of 2006