MY DEAREST FRIEND ON TOBACCO ROAD PART II

George’s story continues as he set out as an entrepreneur with tremendous odds against any success.

HIS OWN BUSINESS

In 1958, he opened his own business. With borrowed money he bought a truck for $450 and hauled lumber from sawmills to a local lumber yard - 3 loads at $5 a load - $15 a day.

Then disaster struck. He bought a truck tire, but the supplier mounted it improperly on the wheel. George drove only a mile and the tire separated, wrecking the truck, and sending George to the hospital. He recovered and bought another truck for $850.  Now, he owed $1,300. Eager to pay this debt, on rainy days when most lumber haulers gathered at the local store and swapped stories, George would buy oak lumber at $200 a load and deliver it to one of the local furniture factories, yielding a $150 profit. Other rainy days, he searched for old tractors to trade, making $100 a trade.

He paid his debts and expanded. A friendly banker loaned him $3,000 without collateral to buy a sawmill. In retrospect, the job rejection at R. J. Reynolds was fortuitous. Those who did get a job there often saved little of their pay.  But George invested in a sawmill and began to cut lumber.  His 5 workers each made about $1.25/hour. 

Now he was only 20 years old, but had his own business. Startup challenges led him to the brink of failure.  He remembers a Thursday evening when he had only $1. This was his financial low point.  After supper, he sold two used chain saws for $149.  He got to work on Friday, collected payment from his customers, and met his payroll. 

Sawmilling was hazardous.  He was dragging a log with a tractor; the log caught on something, pulling the tractor over backwards, trapping him between the tractor and the log. Battery acid and gasoline leaked on him, but one of his workers lifted the tractor enough for George to escape. (Just before my senior year in college, I worked six weeks as his “logger,” giving me respect for his business challenges.)

A NEW BUSINESS

A local gun club could not readily get skeet targets. A partner at George’s best customer, Bingham & Parks Lumber, offered a solution. Their trucks carried lumber to norther states and returned empty.  They began to bring targets back from a Remington Arms plant in Ohio.  Other area gun clubs asked to buy targets too.

Bingham & Parks switched to the Winchester brand. They eventually sold targets, shells, powder, brass, and guns in nine southeastern states -the biggest firearms distributor east of the Mississippi. With their truck fleet, they built a reputation for quick delivery.

George became a partner in Bingham & Parks.  He handled sales, with a specialty in guns. Always outgoing, he developed a network of several hundred customers that extended across every state and several foreign countries.

A LIFE PARTNER

In 1961 George met Eleanor who worked at a nearby horse barn. He could only afford to treat her to a barbecue sandwich and a coffee. Their big nights out, they attended calf roping events at a local farm. They married in 1963 and have celebrated their 61^st   anniversary.

Eleanor’s father, from Scotland, met her American mother in England. Older sister, Elizabeth, was born in England. The grandmother and an aunt from America came to England in the summer of 1939.  The aunt and Elizabeth returned to America. But the mother was delayed, expecting a baby.  Eleanor was born September 5, 1939. The War had started four days earlier and a German U-boat had already sunk a British passenger ship. The grandmother, mother, and baby Eleanor got passage on a freighter three weeks later, the last British ship to cross the Atlantic with civilian passengers - a perilous trip. 

AN INVALUABLE NETWORK

In 1980, George sold his interest in the distributing business, opened a retail gun shop, and soon built a commercial building to house it. He became one of the top five dealers of high-quality firearms in the U.S. The Krieghoff national representative said that George had 25% of their high-end gun sales in America.

Hunting companions were often astonished at his network of friends. Flying to Canada on a hunting trip with three friends, they stopped in Illinois to refuel, then in Manitoba and Saskatchewan.  At each stop, they marveled that George saw some of his customers. Returning, they jested that surely George would see no one who knew him.  But he saw more friends at stops in Minot and Yankton in the Dakotas.

His business occasionally brought him unexpected contacts.  Jerry Lewis, the comedian, married a lady whose mother lived near George’s business. When visiting her, Lewis golfed at a local course. The course owner introduced Jerry to George, and the three would often spend the morning at the gun shop. 

George’s phone rang at 3:30am. Answering, he heard a strangely familiar voice say, “George, this is Jimmy Stewart.” George assumed it was some friend, with too much to drink, playing a joke.  But it really was the famous actor. He explained that he was at a potential movie location in a small midwestern town. He had met one of George’s many friends at a bar that evening. His friend had invited Stewart to his home. The friend wanted a witness that Stewart was there, and he said that the only person who would take a call at that hour was George. Jimmy Stewart and George chatted for a half hour.

George’s story will conclude in Part III.

This is a [LINK] to a video.  George recalls his life and times.