In 1945, my folks, Claude and Poleda Hawkins, sold the grocery store they owned in Gould to Tom Scivally and Aubrey Anthony and bought the Louis Hill grocery store and filling station combination, located 7 miles South of Gould, from Jewell Thomason. Our newest family member, little brother Claude Jr, was six months old. Mother and Daddy both worked in the store, so Claude Jr literally grew up in the store. He became the community's child. It was not unusual for one of the farmers to ask him to go along with him, to do a farm chore, run an errand, or go fishing. He learned a lot from those good people.
To me the store was BIG. We sold groceries, gas, oil, tractor gas, feed, seed, cotton sacks in season, flour in printed sacks (which women in the community would make into dresses) - just anything the farming community needed. Daddy fixed flats, pumped gas, even candled fresh eggs while Mother waited on customers, registered voters, and sold Tim's Funeral Home burial policies. The family all worked in the store through the years, all except Ramona, whose job was to take care of our home.
When we first bought the store not everyone in the community had electricity, so we sold ice for their iceboxes. Daddy would take the old green pickup to the ice plant in Hollis to get a block of ice. He'd store it in the Icehouse, which stood beside the store. When a customer needed ice, he's chip off a block with an ice pick. (Claude Jr always went with Daddy on these runs to Hollis and would take his afternoon nap standing up by the pickup seat, with his head on the seat.)
The store had the only telephone in the community, and it was an antique. Our phone number was Louis 2 out of Eldorado (two long rings.) Every call was a long distance call. When relatives of our community members had emergencies (illness, death, etc.) they would call the store. We'd take their number and go tell their relative, who would then come to the store to return the call to the family member who had the problem.
We had the only adding machine in the community too; teachers from Louis Hill School would sometimes come to the store to add up grades.
When I was ten, I started working in the store after school and on Saturdays. I waited on customers, writing down each item on a ticket for credit customers, which is mostly what we had; it amazes me to this day that the customers trusted a 10-year-old to get their bill right. Of course, they did get a copy of the bill. We gave credit; they paid when they could, usually when the crops came in. When customers paid their bills, we often gave them a handful of candy and gum as a bonus.
We had wonderful customers. To mention them all would be to name almost everyone in the community. A particular memory, from the far edge of the community, is Fern Allison bringing her mother-in-law in once a month to buy a month’s worth of groceries. Only one shopping trip a month! How’d she do that?!
We had a fresh meat case, and we sliced lunchmeats and cheese to order. (Once Mother sliced the end of her thumb off also, but that's a whole other story.) One of my favorite memories is farmers coming into the store to have a quick lunch. They'd buy a slice or two of meat and cheese or a can of Vienna sausage, a small box of crackers, a small can of pork and beans and make a wonderful meal. They'd stand at the counter to eat it, with a Coke, of course, from the Coke Box that opened from the top to reveal the Cokes in a bed of water and chunks of ice. One of my favorite guys, E. H. Mefford, spent many an afternoon sitting on that Coke box, observing our world and drinking Cokes.
The store was a center for the community. Men would come sit and talk about the drought, how much it rained last night or discuss farming techniques and politics. Good-natured teasing and joking was very common. There weren't any chairs for them to sit on; the store was too full of groceries and supplies for that. But they were happy to sit on nail kegs and wooden pop bottle cartons stood on their sides. I remember fondly those men who came to the "community meetings", some during the day, more in the evenings after a day of farming. "Uncle" Ira Owens, Bill Sells, Bill Burge, Roy Lee Owens, sometimes Jesse James and Ovid Patrick, occasionally others. When a crisis occurred in the community, the information would be disseminated at the store. Our neighbors depended on each other, so when they learned of fires, car accidents, etc. they were eager to help.
Wayne Wade ran a blacksmith and welding shop in the building next door to the store and was Claude Jr's tricycle mechanic. He'd come into the store and buy cakes of yeast to snack on. Even then I thought it was weird. I liked him though. He teased me a lot and gave me some good advice. "Quit reading those romance magazines and read a good novel."
Cotton harvest was a special time in the store. Mother and Daddy always worked from sunup to sundown. But it seemed even longer then. Transient boll pullers invaded the community to help get the cotton out. After a long day in the field they came into the store to buy supper – and sometimes to have a before supper cocktail in the form of lemon or vanilla extract from the spices rack! We'd find the empty bottles later.
Life in the Louis Hill community was simple and genuine. Lessons the community taught were good for a lifetime.
In 1960, about the time the community lost its school, Mother and Daddy sold the Louis Hill store to Roy Lee Owens and purchased the store in Gould from Aubrey Anthony. The same store they had owned in the 40's. It was hard for them to leave the community they loved.
