It was one of those “drippy” winter days, temperature around 40 degrees, Fahrenheit, with an almost fog and a light mist falling, and we had hunted hard that morning with poor results.  We, were, James Walton, Norman Shelter, my friend from Houston who had just been promoted to Atlanta, and myself and had chosen this particular Saturday to go after some quail around Thomaston, Georgia.  James and I had hunted the area the past weekend with fair success, but the farther south we drove on Hwy. 19, from our homes in Sandy Springs, the worse the weather got.

Driving back into Thomaston for lunch, the three of us, and our two dogs, were wet, cold and hungry.  Pulling into town on a farm road, at the edge of town, what do we see ahead, but “J. H. Bryan Groceries”.  With his name the same as mine and my dad’s I think, relatives, but as we pulled up in front of the store we saw it was closed and looked like it has been for a long time.

Forgetting about the cold and mist and being wet, cold and hungry, we got out and walked around the old place and found that was on its “last legs”.  Norman jumped out and snapped the above picture and with me following, back into the warm truck we climbed.

During lunch at the local cafe a strategy arose.  Let’s come back next week when the weather will be better (hopefully) and after our hunt, we will “liberate” the sign from the old building.  It would “make” the great room in my basement.  We headed on home, eagerly looking forward to next weekend’s hunt.  Wouldn’t you know it, more rain, so we made plans for the next Saturday.

Driving into Thomaston, we found where the store was located. Yes, “was located”, because in the past two weeks, it had been demolished and everything, signs and all, were gone.  At least I still had the picture!