POWERGRAMS

28 Across a large parking lot of distribution trailers, there are offices and the Magnolia House showroom that opened in February 2017 to display the furniture originated by the Gaines. "We're very happy about this addition," Still says. Builder's Hardware & Supply Co. Nearly a century ago, Dick Owen's granddad of the same name acquired a hardware store in a building across from the courthouse, and later bought the building next door. Lile has changed since then, other than that the spioons are gone and both buildings are air-conditioned. "We're coming up on 100 years for the store and I'm trying to hang in there for that long," says Dick Owen III, whose legal offices are alongside the hardware store. "I guess this is the oldest retail business in town. Virtually all of the mom and pop stores are gone now." In addition to selling mule accessories and dynamite for decades, and nowadays offering electric and plumbing parts, tools, knives, guns, nails, screws and bolts, the Owen family is practically political royalty in Bay Minee. Dick's dad made truck deliveries at 12 years old when there wasn't a requirement of a driver's license, earned his business degree at the University of Alabama, fought in World War II and the Korean War, and then served two terms in the state House of Representatives and two terms in the Senate. He was mayor of Bay Minee when Dick III was growing up. But Dick Jr. saw the writing on the wall, believing the independent hardware store business would be financially unstable in the future. "He steered me away from it," Dick III says. "Even then, the country was geing away from moms and pops, moving toward Kmart and Home Depot." So Owen III went to Tuscaloosa to earn a law degree, clerked for Balch & Bingham during law school, became Bay Minee city aorney for eight years and assistant district aorney for a decade. But he couldn't bear leing the hardware go, choosing instead to take over the store in 2005; he still does payables and purchases. Owen finds it interesting that his legal offices are in a former funeral home, where coffins were sold, a hearse was stored and an ambulance was on call for live folks. When Dick Jr. went to college, there were about 1,000 residents in Bay Minee, and it was the county's largest city and center of commerce. "People would come in from all around on Saturday to buy things from the hardware store, then shop around town," Owen III says. "We still sell one bolt – where you have to buy a whole box at the chain hardware stores. We cut keys, and we're so good at it we get referrals from Walmart." Owen employs three full-time workers and several part-timers in his hardware store, which is open Monday-Friday and a half-day Saturday. When Dick III was growing up, his grandfather closed for a half-day on Thursday. People still like to come by and shoot the breeze about as much as they like to buy something. Practically everyone in the Owen family has worked there at one time or another. Owen's mother was the accountant until she was 91, driving to the store each workday to "chase aer a penny." Owen's children love their careers outside the store and he says "there's no way" they will continue the family business, which he understands. "It's like nursing a baby," he says, "you can't get away for anything else." Owen has had inquiries from investors about keeping Builder's Hardware open into a second century aer he retires. "It's possible I won't have to just lock the door and walk away," he says smiling. "It's an iconic kind of place for Bay Minee. We provide a lot of things you just can't get otherwise." City Recreation Children and parents are skating on a rink separated by a wall where on the other side kids and adults are bowling. On both sides of the rink and the bowling alley are foosball tables, pool tables, Skee-Ball machines, table hockey and other arcade games. Alongside the skating rink an indoor playground rises several levels near the high ceiling. Net baing cages dominate the floor next to the playground. "Not many municipalities have Skating rink is popular. Builder's Hardware has occupied the same corner for nearly a century.

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