This week, we will enjoy readers’ responses to previous articles.
• Jim Cole gave a history of the Cole Houses at 209 and 211 Peachtree Street. His grandfather J.M. Cole Sr. had the two-story home built at 209 Peachtree Street in 1927. Then in 1950, his son J. Mariner Cole Jr. and wife Lucille, Jim’s parents, hired Alton Staton and his son Gary Staton to build a home for their family next door to the east at 211 Peachtree. The lot had previously been an orchard with chickens and a tennis court for J.M. Sr.’s home. The backs of both houses face Jackson Road.
• Barbara Roebuck remembers that Clyde Chamblee built a store on the edge of Union on the Conehatta Road. He sold it to Ruth and Carey Gordon. Barbara, their niece, worked there at one time.
• Mike Ross remembers that Rush Turner, Emmitt Viverette, and S.B. Reeves were town marshals. He recalled one marshal who had a habit of hiding among the vehicles for sale in Jack Laird’s car lot on Jackson Road. However, the big blue bubble on top of the police car was a give-away to the teenagers to slow down. Another officer would see teenagers speeding but would not chase after them. They thought they had gotten away with another run until they got home and found that he had actually written tickets and left them attached to the front doors of their homes.
• Jim Shackelford was asked to be marshal, so he bought a house on Peachtree Street and moved his family into town. He served as marshal for several years until he resigned to go to work with the state of Mississippi.
• Allen Carlson remembers that the entire west side of the Luke’s Sunflower Store was one long white stucco wall with only a door in the back. The sidewalk along that wall was at least two feet above street level all the way around the front of the building. At the intersection, there were steps leading down to street level. Today, that entire area serving as Union’s mini-park is street level.
Allen Carlson also remembers that Mrs. H.G. Hawkins was his fifth-grade teacher, and her husband was the shop teacher when Allen went to school here in the 1940s. Mr. Hawkins also helped with crafts in the First Baptist Church’s Vacation Bible School and taught the boys how to make birdhouses that had the general appearance of cardinals. Although Allen was a Presbyterian, he visited the Baptist Church’s Bible School with his friend Jimmy Ferrill. Allen also recalls that Murray James was his Scoutmaster of Troop 29.
• Jim Brooks worked milking cows on the Grade A dairy farm of Frank and Ray Richardson.
• Mary Ware remembers that Bruce and Carolyn Moore, Harry’s brother, followed Banks McNair in the Stephens Funeral Home in 1962. They lived in the upstairs apartment. Minnie Nelson also lived there later. She moved out when they built the new funeral home in 1997.
• Fred Allen Barfoot remembers living on the west side of Decatur Street across from Gomillion Marble Works and Gardner’s Florist when he was a child. He, his sister, and another friend Jean Watkins were allowed to watch their first television in the work room of the florist where Clyde and his sister Mary Lou Gardner arranged their flowers. The children also received the Gardners’ permission to dig through the “unwanted” flower bin for flowers for every deceased pet’s “funeral.” Each “funeral” then had to have a tombstone, so they got Mr. Fate and Mrs. Arie Gomillion’s permission to dig through piles of scrap marble and granite for the perfect marker. Their pets were put to rest in style. Fred Allen still has treasured memories of that early time of his life on Decatur Street.
• Andy White recalls that his first job after he graduated from Beulah Hubbard High School in 1972 was at Lee Chevrolet. He worked in the parts department with his uncle James McCorkle. John Lee was the owner while his son Jackie Lee ran the dealership. When John interviewed Andy for a job, he told him that he would start him at $1.75 an hour. Andy thought he would be rich.
Andy remembers other employees at that time: Ralph Germany, sales; I.E. Chaney, shop foreman; Lev Ferguson, mechanic; Doc Smith, mechanic; Frank Smith, body shop; Dale Germany and wife Jolene, office; Don Gomillion, office; Rubin Stevens, car detail; John Thrash, sales; W.H. ‘Skinny’ Herrington, sales; Omar Pierce, front end alignment; and Leon Cooksey, body shop.
• Harold Cleveland remembers many times as a child that he would go romping out into the N. Decatur Street neighborhood playing with friends. Before he left home, his mother Connie Cleveland would give him a reminder: “Be home when the 5:00 whistle blows.” Harold might be playing hard and let the time get away from him, but when that Buckwalter Lumber Mill whistle blew, he scampered home as quickly as he could.
Do you have post cards of early Union that you would share? If you have memories to share, contact me at teresablount26@yahoo.com or 601-774-5564.
