Butch Remembers Local Businessmen . . . Final Chapter

   My hometown had several thriving businesses on Main street when I was a youngster. There were also many individuals who practiced a trade and operated out of their homes. Many people purchased their first TVs in the early 1950s. Dad bought our first TV in 1952 when I was 4 years old…two years before we had an indoor toilet (not sure what his priorities were!)

The TVs in those days had many tubes inside that often failed after time and needed to be replaced. Fortunately there were two TV repairmen we could call. Husted “Shoney” Peterson had been a Darlington Telephone lineman, but after Bell Telephone took over, he took a course at Purdue to become a TV repairman. Shoney was very friendly, and his wife Naomi was my third grade teacher. George Bottom worked at Campbell Hardware, but later set up a shop in his garage to sell and repair radios, washers, dryers and TV sets. In the late ’60s, John Shumaker opened up a shop to sell and repair appliances, TVs and radios. Eventually TVs, radios and appliances became so technologically advanced that people rarely needed a repairman.

   If someone needed some painting done, they were in luck. Charlie Hankins had worked for a painting contractor since 1936, and he started up his own painting business after WWII. Hobart Davenport began at an early age painting houses and commercial buildings. Paul Dickey became a self-employed painter at age 18 and was well known all over the county. Rupert McCafferty’s father taught him how to paint when he was a child, and he was also a very skilled paper hanger. I often saw him driving around town in his little Ford Model A truck, with large buckets of paint in the bed. He worked as a painter and paper hanger into his eighties! All four of these men wore white outfits and white hats . . . decorated with various colors of paint spills!

   Behind the IOOF cemetery was a slaughter house where people took farm animals to be butchered. Through the years there were several owners. I accompanied my Dad one afternoon when he took a pig to be butchered. I was only 10 years old, and although I had helped my folks kill and dress out chickens at home, I had never seen any other farm animal butchered. I will never forget that day at the slaughter house…I never wanted to see that again! I think that is one reason why I have never eaten much pork or beef during my lifetime.

  Some other businessmen were Raymond Haas (sawmill), Dwight Vermillion (dry cleaners), Ralph Bunton (laundromat), Joan Evans (beauty shop), Ham Cox and Bill Campbell (hardware), Bob Lehe (International Harvestor sales), Fred Butler and Ralph Budd (Metzger Lumber), Harry Yount and sons (elevator), Holt brothers (well drilling), Bob Anderson (trucking), Stewart brothers (electrical and plumbing), Ollie Crull (plumbing, HVAC, and concrete work), Harry “Buck” Royer (welding), Leon Holt (welding and repair), Jack Ward and Eddie Bradshaw (carpenters), Henry Lidikay and Lewis Runnels (veterinary clinic), Curtis Bright (funeral home) and Charlie Marshall (theater and newspaper)….just to mention a few. We also had two doctors, Ralph Otten and John Humphreys, and a dentist, Dr. Southworth.

   There are very few businesses or people who specialize in trades in my hometown today. And in the other little towns in Montgomery County, you will likely discover the same . . . a sad but true fact of life. I will always remember the people I have mentioned in these past few columns. They were an important part of my childhood years.

John “Butch” Dale is a retired teacher and County Sheriff. He has also been the librarian at Darlington the past 36 years, and is a well-known artist and author of local history.