The Old Country Store
by Steve A. Maze
Arab, Alabama
The main focal point of most communities during the first half of the twentieth century was the country store. During the summertime, men wearing faded overalls would sit on a bench located in front of the store to whittle on a stick and spit snuff. When farming was slow during the winter months it was not uncommon to spot several pot-bellied men gathered around the pot-bellied stove inside the store.
Generally, these rural establishments were a combination gas station and general store. Virtually any item a family needed would be available there. You could say country stores came up with the “one-stop-shopping” concept long before today’s chain stores.
The importance of these establishments cannot be underestimated. They were not only a place to purchase needed items, but also functioned as a spot for social gatherings. These businesses were a critical part of our nation’s history, and they were absolutely essential to the survival of many families during the Great Depression and post-Depression era. Some people simply would not have made it had it not been for the little credit account at the country store.
The outer walls of these buildings would be covered in metal signs advertising Red Crown Gasoline, Octagon Soap, Luzianne Coffee, Dictator Flour and Lucky Strike cigarettes and such. Before entering the store a customer could purchase gasoline by the gallon from gravity-flow pumps. A glass bowl container was mounted on top of the pump and lined marks indicated the amount of gasoline inside the bowl. A handle on the pump allowed the storeowner to hand-pump the desired amount of fuel a customer wanted into the bowl. Gravity allowed the fuel to flow from the bowl into a gas nozzle placed in the tank of a customer’s automobile.
There was a huge demand for kerosene – also called coal oil – which was stored on the store porch in a square, metal tank with a pump on top. Not only was this fuel in oil lamps, it was also used as an early disinfectant to treat cuts.
Customers would provide their own glass jug or metal can to transport the kerosene back home. If someone lost the cap off the spout of a metal can, the storeowner would push a small Irish potato over the opening to keep the fuel from spilling.
Most stores had a giant-sized thermometer hanging on each side of the front door that advertised Coca-Cola, Dr. Pepper, RC Cola or 7-Up. The blended, pleasant fragrance of fruit, coffee, leather, cloth and pickles greeted each person who walked inside.
The sound of children’s bare feet could be heard slapping against the wooden floor as they made their way toward a shelf or counter stocked with tasty treats. There were boxes of Milky Way, Baby Ruth and Butterfinger candy bars that were much larger than those seen on today’s store shelves. They only cost a nickel and weighed in at four ounces … a full quarter-pound!
Chocolate drops, orange slices covered in sugar, coconut bonbons and a variety of stick candy were delivered to stores in wooden barrels and sold loose in glass jars. Since many of these items sold for one-cent each, they were referred to as “penny candy,” and a child could often buy two pieces for a penny.
Looking was almost as much fun as eating the treats, and wide-eyed youngsters would spend up to an hour looking at the candy before deciding which pieces to buy with the precious Indian head coins jingling in their pockets.
The most popular treat, perhaps, was an RC Cola and a Moon Pie. Another favorite was drinking Coca-Cola from a bottle that had been filled with salted peanuts.
Drink up ...
Soft drinks were sometimes referred to as soda water or a “dope.” Coca-Cola became so popular that nearly all soft drinks, especially dark-colored ones, were called “cokes.”
Pepsi-Cola, Double-Cola and Royal Crown soft drinks came in 12-ounce bottles and could be purchased for a nickel. Coca-Cola was the same price but came in smaller bottles. There were also a variety of fruit-flavored sodas, most notably the “big orange.”
Soft drinks were usually placed in a metal storage container and cooled with crushed ice. The ice was “crushed” by hitting the bag container with a hammer or dropping it on the hard floor.
Crackers were often stored in barrels and could be purchased individually or by the handful. They went well with a tin of sardines or a piece of hoop cheese cut straight from the block. And there was nothing like sticking your hand down into the salty brine of a pickle barrel to fish out a sour dill.
The lack of refrigeration in the early years prevented storeowners from stocking many fresh vegetables or meats, but a few fruits were kept on hand. A customer could pull a dozen bananas from a large stalk as well as shop for apples and oranges, which were popular items for Santa to deliver at Christmas.
Most storeowners managed to keep a few dried items on their shelves. Peas, beans, rice, peaches, apples and coffee were stored loosely in bags or boxes, which would be scooped into a paper sack and weighed on a balance scale to determine the price.
"Sodie,” sugar and skillets...
Vinegar was usually delivered to stores in large wooden barrels. The storeowner would pump it through a spigot on the barrel and into a glass jar or jug provided by the customer.
Salt and baking “sodie” were always in demand. Salt was primarily used to cure pork. It would be rubbed onto hams, shoulders and middlin’ meat before it was placed in a homemade salt box to cure. Baking soda was a primary ingredient used in baking cakes and bread products.
Sugar was available in 100-pound bags and used for canning apples, peaches, pears and blackberries. It was also an essential ingredient in the making of jellies, jams or preserves. In addition, there is little doubt that some of the precious sugar (especially after it was rationed during World War II) was used in the making of moonshine.
A large variety of cooking utensils was always stocked on store shelves. Iron skillets of all sizes, as well as single and double aluminum broilers could be purchased for cooking. Coffee pots, sifters, plates, pitchers, drinking glasses, cups and saucers were also in demand.
Tinware items included well buckets, dippers, blue wash pans, chamber pots and washtubs of all sizes.
Bluing for whites ...
Octagon was the only brand name washing powder that most stores carried in the 1920s and ‘30s. Many customers bought an additive called “bluing” that was used to whiten clothes as they were washed.
Octagon and Proctor & Gamble were among the few bar soaps available. Most people made their own soap at home from ashes and Red Devil Lye.
Stores usually had a small medicine section where people could buy aspirin, liniment, iodine and Carter’s Little Liver Pills. Black Draught and Epsom Salts were taken in liberal doses when a person’s body got a little too sluggish. Other “medications” included turpentine and castor oil.
There were two varieties of the medication 6-6-6 (referred to as three-sixes). One variety was used to fight malaria and the other to fight chills. Cardui tonic was sold to women to build iron in their blood. There was even gall lotion to treat mules when collars wore their shoulders raw.
Before health warnings...
Tobacco products were a very popular item at every country store. In the late 1920s, the only packaged brands of cigarettes available were Camel, Chesterfield, Lucky Strike, Picayune and Wings. They sold for 15 cents per pack, but the cheaper Wings brand could be bought for a dime.
Stud, Country Gentleman and Bull Durham were loose smoking tobaccos sold in small cotton bags with a drawstring. It was quite common to see a drawstring dangling from the bib pocket of a man’s overalls. Young boys frequently carried their marbles in the empty tobacco bags, but they were just as handy for girls to store their jacks in.
Prince Albert tobacco came loose in a tin, but also contained cigarette papers so a customer could “roll your own.”
Chewing tobacco came unpackaged in wooden boxes. The storeowner would cut it into square plugs with an old-fashioned tobacco cutter. A whole plug sold for 20 cents, a half-plug was a dime and a quarter-plug cost a nickel. Beechnut was one of the first chews to come in a pouch.
Snuff appealed to both men and women. Most snuff came in five or 10-cent cans, bottles or glasses. The most popular brand was the bottled Levi Garrett that sold for 35 cents and now for $7.50 per bottle.
Skeetin’ Garrett snuff was sold in a brown bottle with bubbles or “notches” imprinted around the bottom of the container. There were one to four of these notches on each bottle, and most people thought that they represented the strength of the tobacco – one notch being the weakest and four notches being the strongest. Some folks swore by these notches and dipped accordingly. Actually, the bubbles or notches indicated the location of where the bottle was made and had nothing to do with flavor or strength.
Leather goods, dry goods, freebies...
Some manufacturers began using free items to entice customers to purchase their products. Flour, guano (fertilizer) and animal feed were packaged in decorative cloth bags. Dairy feeds were packaged in bags made from gingham cloth that came in a variety of colors.
The soft cloth from these bags, as well as some flour sacks, was used to make women’s clothing – blouses, slips, underwear and dresses (two cloth bags would make a dress). Guano bags were used in making bed linens, pillowcases, men’s shirts and underwear.
Other manufacturers joined the trend and began placing “premiums” inside the containers of their products. Mother’s Oats placed a drinking cup inside their cardboard containers. A few brands of peanut butter came in glass containers that were suitable as drinking glasses.
“Depression glass” was packaged in some products during the 1930s. Ladies were sometimes reluctant to set this glassware on their table when neighbors or relatives visited since it was almost impossible to complete a full set, and some wives did not want their visitors to know that they had to use free glassware.
The dry goods section would be located in the rear section of the store. Women had a large choice of products to choose from, including cotton hosiery, bloomers, “outing” for bed covers and “domestic” for sheets.
A lady might buy a section of calico or gingham if a matching piece of printed material wasn’t available on the flour or feed sacks. (A ready-made gingham dress sold for $1.98) There were also a number of dress patterns, threads, needles, safety pins, ric-rac dress trimmings, buttons and Rit Dye for tinting.
Buy a poke full of nails...
Men could buy overalls, blue chambray work shirts, work shoes, boots, suspenders and jumpers (denim jackets).
The hardware section was always packed with men digging through kegs of nails for a six-penny, eight-penny or even a “dime” nail. They could also shop for barbed wire, chicken wire, baling wire and roofing tin.
Leather goods and farm implements were in ample supply. Bridles, horse collars, calf muzzles, loggerheads, plow points, plow handles and lines, sweeps, scratchers, trace chains, middle-busters, single and double-trees, and Georgia stocks filled the walls, ceiling and shelves of the store.
The storeowner didn’t have to look up the prices of items in a book when a customer was ready to total up the bill. He knew how much each item sold for by memory. In fact, the proprietor didn’t mark any prices on a product unless he was running a special. The storeowner would add up long lists of purchases with a pencil and paper (usually a paper sack used to bag the items), normally without any mistakes.
Items that needed packaging were wrapped in brown paper torn from a huge roll that sat atop the counter. The package would then be neatly tied with a string that dangled from a dispenser attached to the ceiling. Other items would be packaged in a paper “poke”, cardboard box or wooden crate.
Social centers and changes...
The country store was not only a place to purchase needed items, but also a place for men to gather around the pot-bellied stove. These stoves usually sat in a box of sand to prevent fires in case a hot coal fell out. The sandboxes were also a good place to spit their tobacco juice as men sat around the store on empty nail kegs, cane-bottomed chairs or a stack of feed sacks.
Customers often entertained themselves by telling a lot of tall tales and passing along a little dirty joke they had heard. The men would immediately clean up their language, however, if a woman or small child entered the store.
Another popular past time was playing checkers. If all the checkerboards were taken during these “tournaments,” another was quickly constructed from a scrap piece of cardboard or wood. Lines would be drawn on the impromptu checkerboard, and bottle caps from empty soft drinks would be used as checkers. The bottle caps would be turned face up for one player and face down for their opponent.
Every now and then one of the players clenched his teeth and spat tobacco juice toward the small triangular-shaped vent in the pot-bellied stove. Their aim often went astray and the spray of juice would emit a sizzling sound as it ran down the side of the hot, cast iron stove.
Electricity made its way into most communities during the 1930s and ‘40s, bringing major changes to the country store, including modern gas pumps and refrigeration.
Refrigeration was good for most country stores since that meant they could sell frozen products. Ice cream was sold in five-cent, 10-cent and 25-cent cups (a whole pint). The cup had a lid with a pull-tab and came with its own wooden spoon. Frozen Kool-Aid and ice cream on a stick became something called Popsicles.
An influx of department and hardware store openings during the ‘50s hurt the rural business establishments because they could sell many of their items for less than the rural business owner was paid for them. As a result, country stores began stocking fewer and fewer items. The dry goods, hardware, farm implements, leather goods and other lines of merchandise eventually disappeared from their shelves.
Still, country stores remained the center of attention in most rural areas. Customers satisfied their hunger by eating a sandwich made from bologna (cut from the stick) and a piece of cheese sliced from the block.
Abba Zabbas (white taffy with peanut butter filling), Peanut Logs, Jawbreakers, Tootsie Rolls, candy cigarettes, tiny wax soft drink-shaped bottles containing colored sugar water, and Bazooka bubble gum that came with a small comic strip wrapped inside were popular with children.
A new brand of snuff called Topps was introduced in the 1950’s. Along with Rooster and Bruton, it quickly became a favorite of customers. Most snuff was sold in short and tall cans, but bottles were still an option.
In addition, men would line up to purchase Brown Mule, King B Twist and Days Work plug chewing tobacco.
Farewell to an era...
By the 1960s and early ‘70s, country stores were almost gone. The few that managed to hang on were only a shell of glory days when a proprietor would hand a newlywed couple a sack of flour from his shelf as a wedding gift and patrons could get a haircut on Saturday. Essentially, they were reduced to the equivalent of today’s convenience stores. And no longer was the country store the community post office or polling place.
In today’s modern stores we are waited on by cashiers with matching uniforms who scan bar codes through their computerized cash registers. Some of these chain stores now have more floor space than an airport runway, which they use to entice customers with “one-stop-shopping.” They don’t realize that country storeowners came up with that idea years ago.
Still, it seems that the item I need to purchase is never in stock when I shop at one of these “super-duper” stores. Why you should have seen the look on the young cashier’s face the other day when I asked her where I could find a Georgia stock. She scratched her head for a minute before replying, “You might want to check in one of our Atlanta stores …”
Great keepsake ornaments for memories of old Country Stores:
Old World Christmas
Potbellied Stove
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