Mr. Crowe
Mr. John Crowe was the manager of Alford
Brothers’ General store in Fayetteville. Dry goods,
clothing, shoes, groceries, meats, animal feeds, farm
supplies, appliances, bicycles, ice cream and almost
anything you can think of was sold there. Half of the store
was dedicated to groceries and farm supplies. This was the
section I worked in. Alford’s was the first Fayetteville
store to have shopping carts and self service and it was a
thriving business.
I worked for Mr. Crowe on weekends and more in the summer.
He was a good manager and ran a tight ship. He and Mr.
Willie Huddleston refereed all of our home basketball
games. He took a special interest in my playing and liked
to tease me when I had not played well. Many of our home
games were on Friday night and I knew that the next day at
work he would point out all of the things I’d done wrong,
especially if we had lost. I believe this was his way of
trying to help me, but at the time I didn’t always
appreciate that kind of help.
I made more money working at Alford Brothers than I had
made at other grocery stores where I’d worked. And there
were times when Mr. Crowe gave me extra pay when the work
was unusually heavy. One time Mr. Crowe even gave me a
special price on a bicycle.
We sold a lot of livestock feed that came in large heavy
bags. We had a pair of hand trucks that was used in take
the bags to customers’ vehicles (even wagons). The hand
trucks were large, heavy, and hard even to manage. A ramp
that ran down from the storage room made control even more
difficult when the trucks were loaded.
Mr. Crowe had placed a couple of refrigerators at the front
of the store near the ramp, so people could see them and
maybe become interested. One Saturday as I came out of the
storage room and down the ramp with a load of feed, I lost
control of the hand trucks. They veered away from me and
hit one of the refrigerators knocking the porcelain off in
a large spot on the side. I was petrified! Mr. Crowe was
standing nearby. As I stood there watching, he slowly
walked over to the refrigerator and rubbed the spot with
his hand. He said in a very calm voice, “It might have been
better if I had loaded the feed.” That was all he ever said
and he never showed any other emotion. The damage I’d done
to the refrigerator was more than I’d make in a lot of
Saturdays. The incident was never mentioned again. That’s
the way he was. If he had thought I had been careless he
would have let me have it, but since he didn’t, it meant he
felt I was doing my best.
Mr. Crowe made a big impression on me. I respected him and
I still appreciate all he did for me.