| Sources |
- [S104] Cocke County, Tennessee, and its People, Cocke County Heritage Book Committee, (Walsworth Publishing, 1992), 255.
- [S24] The Newport Plain Talk, (http://www.newportplaintalk.com), 27 Apr 2012.
Just Plain Talk: Week begins with Overholt's closing and ends in tragedies
Lynn Willis may be mixing one of her last batches of paint at Overholt's Hardware store after owners announced its closing. She is married to store locksmith Hubert Willis, a brother to store co-owner, Lee Willis. Hubert will continue his locksmith service nearer the Plain Talk so read about this soon.
Author: David Popiel
It's been an interesting news week in our hometown caught by cool blackberry winter weather, than storms, a highway fatality, tragic fire, but good news too.
If blackberry winter has passed can the Ramp Festival be far behind? That may have been a question in past years but for the first time in my memory there is no local ramp festival, no Maid of Ramps pageant, the first Sunday in May. My day on Thursday began with a call from Linda Ramsey to alert the Plain Talk of the Edwina Highway 73 fatality. Drew Ramsey answered his 2:30 a.m. call for wrecker and found the victim's, Sean Woody, Geo Tracker firmly wrapped around a tree. Drew said his roll back pulled so hard to dislodge the wrecked car that the cable broke. That afternoon at Newport City Park, I photographed another Woody, Audrey who worked with park employees to plant hundreds of her donated lilies. She has left a beautiful and wonderful legacy to all of us. She is 80 and her husband, Luther Woody, 89. I promised to make his birthday photo in January. Another sad event was the fire that destroyed the Robert and Kate (Allen) James home off Crum Hollow Road, Shady Grove community, during the pre-8 a.m. storm. I talked with their daughter, Robbie Cureton, and Kate's brother, Hollis Allen, at the fire scene. WNPC's News Director Ray Snader and myself covered the devastating fire. Robert and Kate were not injured and staying nearby with Robbie and her husband, Herb Cureton. Many concerned and sympathetic neighbors arrived such as Olin Hall, to help.
Earlier last week, it had been quite awhile since my last haircut, so I dropped in at Ken Hall's shop and always leave with a good haircut and a story or two. This one concerns a former barber, the late Tillman Holt. Perhaps he cut your hair in years past. My comments on eating more vegetables such as rutabaga and turnips prompted Ken's story. Someone took a turnip and shaved its purple skin and scalloped it to make it look more like a bar of shaving soap. The turnip went into Holt's shaving mug. So when he was preparing to shave a customer and swirling the brush, he commented to Ken that, "I don't know why this isn't lathering up." This must have brought a laugh from those who knew about the old turnip trick. At 69 with 46 years experience cutting hair, Ken still lags behind Edsel Hall, 81, the most senior active barber in Newport with 60 years in his career. They all made so little money they can't afford to retire, said Ken, no relation to Edsel, who is a cousin to "Handsome" Ransom Hall.
Overholt's Hardware closed April 23
Last weekend we talked about the pending closing of Overholt's Hardware store that had been in business for about 60 years. Perhaps as I am about town between showers we can hear from Lon Ball and Fred Lee, who for many years were associated with the hardware store nestled between Manes Funeral Home and Smith Repair Shop. They can take us before the mid-1980s into the past. But by mid April the shelves were particularly empty and many displays missing lending an open, eerie air to the store where you may have had Jim Overholt help you with new keys or Fred Lee mix paint. Willis Suggs was handling a mop in what used to be the popular paint department. He and Lee Willis knew the closing was eminent and had talked about it for weeks earlier in the year. Along with the two as partners is Chester Suggs, a brother to Willis Suggs, who narrowed their purchase time of the store to June 1984. There were really two purchases: the business from Marjorie Overholt and Jim Correll, and the building & land from Charlie and Ophas Bryant. Lee has a sharper memory of the early years, and both he and Willis Suggs gave me an important glimpse into businesses before the 1970s that have long ago disappeared. While gathering facts about Overholt's, Hubert Willis, the locksmith, and brother to Lee, said the floor space is about 6,500 square feet and two stories that's over 12,000 sq. ft. and so much larger than the Plain Talk's original 1920s structure. The partners had not set a final closing date, but when I stopped by last week it had already closed. They agree the building will be sold. Hopefully, Lee won't sell it to one person and Willis to another. "We have people interested in buying it," they said.
We were in the rear of the store talking and looking at the two old scales: the smaller used to weigh nails and the other floor model to way little and big folks. A lot of people have come in to weigh, little and big. Folks I talked with have always seen the Fairbanks-Morse scale at the store since it opened in 1957. I've been on it. Haven't you too? Don't hold me to the exact date the store opened until I can check the Plain Talk back issues or one of you older readers call and tell me you were the first customer.
"It's been a good experience over the years," said Willis, who you know is co-owner with his son, Steven, of Mister Automotive. That business has become another landmark in Newport and was always located near Douglas Avenue. The background work that brought the partners together occurred elsewhere. I'll talk more about the families and their backgrounds, which is of great interest to me. Willis Suggs is married to Louise (Willis) and is also a brother to Chester, who still works at Mister Automotive, and there's James Suggs, pastor of Cave Hill Baptist Church. The other siblings are Eula Dean Lane, Iva Janiece Reece, and Viola Mae Crawford. They are the six children of Iliff Suggs, who was a preacher and ran a country store east of Newport. Willis pinpointed it to just east of where Dobby Reed ran his motorcycle shop. For you newcomers, this is a mile or so east of the new bridge over the French Broad River. I can't recall the country store but it operated from the early 1960s. Iliff was married to the former Mable Mann, of Hartford and also kin to the Romines. Dad Iliff was raised at Netty Mountain at Manning's Chapel so that begged my question, "Was he kin to the late Plain Talk columnist Mack Suggs?" Yes, a first cousin to Iliff, who died in 1991.
As a young man, Willis Suggs worked for his father and gained valuable retail sales skills and started knowing more citizens. There is also a natural connection to auto parts sales, because Willis was a mechanic at the Crowder garage, built and owned by Charlie Crowder and still standing, yet I can't remember it being open as a business. A "wagon peddler" wanted Willis to sell auto parts. Rather than work for someone else, Willis bought the business and by the early 1970s, Lee was on the road with him. They traveled in multiple states including the Carolinas and Georgia. Lee gave me more specifics about those early years.
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, d. 30 Jan 1990 (Age ~ 67 years)