Opening A New Location

Well after a few years of selling furniture and appliances out of the Mrs. P.Y. Waters Grocery and the business was doing so well it was decided that it was time to expand to another location.

After looking at several locations they decided on a building located on Central Avenue. It has a lot of street traffic when Blue Bell let out in the afternoons and it was directly behind Jay's Department Store. Next door to us was The Blue Bell Cafeteria and it later became Champion Mills a clothing store.

The store that we purchase had previously been a ladies dress shop. (Ideal's Dress Shoppe) It was a beautiful building inside and I always thought, even as a young lad that it would have made a beautiful home.
Everyone laughed at my idea but just think of all of the people that now live in remodeled Hotels, Schools, buildings and lofts.

At the front were two 10 foot double oak doors weathered with age and they made you feel so welcome. As you came through the door their were to large windows on wither side of the door and the floors in the windows let the merchandise sit up tall to showcase it well. The ceiling was done in metal plating and each sheet was 3X3 and it covered the entire building. Their were three skylights in the roof to let in natural light during the day and sun shades that you could close during the heat of the day. There was also old oak bladed Hunter ceiling fans every six feet on the ceiling and this helped keep the building cool in the warm summers.
The building was heated by a large gas heater that hung from the ceiling from the middle of the store, it did a perfect job of keeping the building warm.

In the front of the store on both outside walls was white porch columns that held up another row of porch columns on the top and between the post were white railings. When you got half way into the store the building expanded double in size. because the buildings that backed up to our building were smaller buildings than Jay's. One of these buildings was a Barber Shop, and the other may have been Tuckers Men's Ware before they remodeled. On the right side at the rear was a large restroom that had ceilings that were taller that the restroom was long. It had a square window that would open into the alley but the window had bars on it like a jail cell to keep intruders out. On the opposite wall at the rear of the building were a set of large French Doors opening out on to a walled in patio, where the other three buildings joined our building. I loved to sit out here after school and do my homework and enjoy the quietness and calm from the bustle of my day at school. In the middle in the rear of the building was a very large room. It had pained windows mid way down the oak paneled walls with a large fireplace in the middle of the room. We used this room for years for displaying a bedroom group or a living and dining room grouping. I can even remember making it look like a kitchen and breakfast area.

We found in this rear room some mannequins but only one out of all that were on there wasn't broken. We named her Matilda and she became a part of our family.