Author: admin

The Ark Restaurant

[Show as slideshow]

From skirting liquor laws to finding fame as the place for catfish

Story by Jerry C. Smith
Photos by Jerry Martin
Submitted photos

St. Clair folks are passionate about two basic food groups: barbecue and catfish. While the debate still rages among barbecue aficionados, the Pell City/Riverside area hosts a restaurant called The Ark, which has for decades set a gold standard in the catfish genre.

They also serve steaks, frog legs, shrimp and other fine fare, but the owner attests that about 60 percent of Ark customers ask for catfish. In fact, you can decline a menu and simply hold up one, two or three fingers to indicate how many fillets you want with your fries, slaw and hushpuppies.

Their Alabama pond-raised, deep-fried catfish entrees are excruciatingly delicious and served in a warm, home-style venue whose long, colorful heritage dates back to the Roaring Twenties. The Ark’s bio is like a story made for Hollywood.

At one time, St. Clair County was dry. If you wanted alcoholic spirits, you either went to Jefferson County or to a local bootlegger. Things got even tighter during Prohibition, when alcohol became illegal everywhere.

But E.O. “Red” Thompson had a better idea. He bought an old dredge barge at salvage, formerly used for deepening river channels and clearing debris, refitted it as a speakeasy, and christened it The Ark.

Thompson anchored it about 30 feet from the west bank of the Coosa River, near present-day US Highway 78. The Coosa borderlines St. Clair and Talladega counties, so The Ark was technically in either (or neither) county, depending on from which direction the law was coming.

It was known to be a rip-roaring establishment, catering to most any vice you can name. Patrons boarded The Ark from their boats, or they could use a 4-foot-wide catwalk. In a 1990 Birmingham News story by Marie West Cromer, George Scisson of Riverside related, “More than one inebriated customer had trouble getting back to shore on that walkway.”

Scisson continued, “They served river catfish and hushpuppies and all the beer you wanted, and neither St. Clair or Talladega law could touch them because it wasn’t located in either county. … I was too young to buy beer then, but I drank it on the old Ark. Beer was 15 cents a can, and a sign said, ‘All the catfish and hushpuppies you can eat, 60 cents.’ They put more fish in a sandwich for 35 cents back then than you get on a platter today.”

Eventually, the original Ark caught fire, burned and sank. Undaunted, Mr. Thompson built a new log building on the river’s west bank. In Cromer’s story, the late Bob Cornett described this second Ark, “It was a rustic building … breezes from the river whistled through cracks in the floor and walls. … Some customers came by boat, and some were served from a pier.”

Ferry boats were used in those days to cross the Coosa, which was much narrower than today’s impounded waterway. In 1938, a new highway bridge was built on US 78. Because the bridge had replaced a ferry, it was opened as a toll bridge at first. In fact, Cornett’s father, Sam Cornett, operated the tollbooth.

Thompson was described as a “gruff old gentleman who ran a tight ship.” Cornett told of two men who told the cashier their food was no good and walked out without paying their bill. Thompson forcibly brought them back in, and told them, “Now pay the lady for what you done et.”

Waitress Hazel Castleberry, who invented The Ark’s special fish sauce that’s still in use today, recalls her days of service with Thompson. “Menus were not used back then. Customers just told us what they wanted, and we wrote it down quick and got away from them as fast as we could because Thompson didn’t believe in his hired help socializing with customers.”

But, alas, this new Ark also burned. Thompson built yet another roadhouse on the other side of US 78, where today’s Ark is located, and renamed it Red’s Place. It was a true Southern hangout in every sense, much like the Boar’s Nest on Dukes of Hazzard. They say Thompson was much like Boss Hogg, and Sheriff Roscoe P. Coltrane also had a counterpart at Red’s. Many St. Clair middle-agers will tell you Red’s did almost as much business from the back door as from the front.

Eventually, the aforementioned Mr. Cornett purchased Red’s Place, and named it The Ark once again. That was some 34 years ago, just a few days after Bob and Sylvia Cornett were wed. Before long, the Cornetts’ Ark had built a reputation for fine food, atmosphere and community appreciation that still prevails today.

The Ark’s ambience is something you just have to experience for yourselves. In an Anniston Star item by George Smith, Cornett described The Ark’s decor: “This is no hoity-toity joint. Anyone is welcome here. Our only requirement is that you wear a shirt and shoes, and the reason for that is the health department. Shoot, if it were not for [them], we probably wouldn’t worry about shoes or shirts.”

Smith added, “The walls are Ponderosa pine paneling, the ceiling is plywood and batten, the tables wear checkered oilcloth, and the booths are hard as any church bench you can remember.”

It’s always been blessed with loyal, long-term employees. Hazel Castleberry’s daughter, Alesia Moore; her sister, Tammy Truss; and Tammy’s daughter Sheree Smith, have worked there for years.

Considering its present atmosphere and colorful past, The Ark might well be described as a road house for catfish lovers. Autographed photos, media clippings and other memorabilia cover every inch of wall space.

It’s been written up in a host of local and national newspapers and food and travel magazines. The Ark’s catfish platter is listed on the Alabama Bureau of Tourism and Travel’s coveted “100 Dishes to Eat Before You Die” list. The Ark was also pictured in a 1995 New York Times story by a photographer sent here when St. Clair first went Republican.

It has been featured in USA Today’s “Top Ten Catfish Restaurants In The Nation,” an annual list compiled by the Catfish Institute of America. In a 1997 St. Clair News-Aegis story by Stan Griffin, Bob Cornett said, “Anyone who wouldn’t take a national honor like that seriously would be very foolish. I feel very fortunate, and we try to maintain the quality of our food service to justify such a ranking.”

In a recent interview, current owner Sylvia Cornett named a few celebrities she and her late husband, Bob, have hosted. They include former Gov. Don Seigelman, former state Sen. Larry Means, movie director Terry Gilliam, “Little Jim” Folsom, Supreme Court Justice Mark Kennedy (George C. Wallace’s son-in-law), the Temptations on tour and CNN reporter John King.

Practically every major NASCAR driver has graced their tables, including Richard and Kyle Petty, Jim and Bill France, Neil Bonnett, Ryan Newman, Buddy “Leadfoot” Baker, the legendary Red Farmer who built Talladega Speedway, Mario Andretti, Tony Stewart, Dale Earnhart Jr., and Bobby and Davey Allison, to mention a few.

They’ve hosted large business groups from Norway and Japan, including the Honda folks. In fact, the deal that brought the Honda assembly plant to Lincoln was signed over a catfish dinner at The Ark.

In all its various incarnations, The Ark has long been an integral part of eastern St. Clair’s civic persona. Many families have dined there for several generations. In fact, two of the restaurant’s most loyal patrons, Jim and Ann Riddle Burton of Low Gap, became engaged to wed while driving to The Ark in Jim’s new ‘65 Corvette.

They’ve been together ever since and are still devout Arkies. When asked how Jim and Ann have lived together so happily for more than 47 years, he replied, “We’ve never had an argument. But sometimes neighbors a block away can hear us reasoning together.”

The Burtons weren’t the only folks to link The Ark to matrimony. Gloria Anderson, who still works at The Ark, was married there. Bob Cornett himself gave away the bride, who wore a long, flowing white gown. After the ceremony, The Ark opened for business as usual.

Sylvia’s son, Warren Smith, related a story about the time when The Ark served dinner to a monkey. Other customers and wait staff did double takes as the little simian, about the size of a two-year-old child and well-dressed in a shirt and shorts, sat beside his (human) lady companion while sipping a drink.

Actually, he was a service monkey whose sole job was to push a medic alert button worn on a chain around his neck in the event his mistress had a sudden seizure. Smith said. “He had medical papers and everything, just like a seeing-eye dog, but nobody else knew that.”

The Cornett family is of St. Clair pioneer stock, almost from the time Pell City began. Cornett House Hotel was a frontier hostelry located near the railway in Pell City. It was heavily damaged in 1902 when a huge store of dynamite in a railroad warehouse blew up, doing some $1,500 worth of harm to the hotel (a very substantial sum more than a hundred years ago), also wrecking much of Pell City.

Mentored by noted Ashville author/historian Mattie Lou Teague Crow, Bob Cornett operated a popular local newspaper, the St. Clair Observer, before investing in The Ark. The Observer was later sold and absorbed into the present day St. Clair News-Aegis. Always the entrepreneur, Cornett had also owned a bar called The Fatted Calf, which he opened in 1967, just after St. Clair County voted to go ‘wet.’

Today’s Ark hosts a multitude of catfish fans, some of them third or fourth generation customers. The place teems with action during Race Week at Talladega. Regular customers often come from as far away as Georgia.

The Ark’s daily attendance is amazing, considering that they have only one tiny, time-worn sign out front, partially hidden by bushes. Like with any really successful restaurant, word of mouth is everything.

Features

St. Clair Horse Country

[Show as slideshow]

Lusitanos, Arabians find home in St. Clair

Story by Elaine Hobson Miller
Photos by Jerry Martin

From the deserts of ancient Arabia and the bullfighting rings of Portugal, two distinctly different yet equally majestic horse breeds have made their way to St. Clair County. World-class Arabians prance and play at Don Olvey’s Aradon Farm in Odenville, while purebred Lusitanos strut and cavort at Robert and Carolyn Crum’s Shangrila Farm in Gallant.

The owners of both farms started their breeding programs for the same reason: They fell in love with a breed. Olvey’s passion started with a day at a friend’s barn, while the Crums began by admiring an exhibition horse. In each case, a spark was ignited instantly, and their encounters changed the course of their lives.

“I had a friend in the Arabian horse business, and he had an Open Barn with food and tours and invited me to come out,” says Olvey, 76, who rode American Quarter Horses as a child. “I saw these beautiful Arabians, a breed I had never seen before. I decided then and there to get into raising them.”

Olvey bought his first Arabian in 1985 while living in Hoover. He built a barn on his stepfather’s farm in Tuscaloosa County, where he kept his horses until he could find a place of his own. He considers his discovery of the land that was to become Aradon Farm as something magical.

“I wasn’t familiar with this side of town,” he says of Odenville. “I went to Pell City one day, looked on a map and saw Highway 174. I thought I would ride through there on my way home. Through the trees I saw this beautiful pasture, and I said to myself, ‘Oh, would I love to have that.’ I drove another block, and saw a for-sale sign. I called the Realtor immediately and signed the contract that day. It was just what I wanted.”

That first horse Olvey purchased was a stallion, because “every man thinks he wants a stallion,” he says. Then he bought four mares out of Missouri and had them shipped to Alabama. He did a lot of research to learn the industry, studying national Arabian horse publications to get familiar with the bloodlines. “Even in the Arabian breed, there are several different bloodlines,” says Olvey. “You’ve got the Egyptian strain, the Polish, the Russian, the Spanish, and the American strain — called domestic because we’ve taken all those others and blended them together.”

Although his original horses were either sold or died, they gave Olvey his start toward becoming one of the largest Arabian breeders in the Southeast. He has two domestic Arabian stallions, both of them champions. Giaccomo was a Scottsdale Arabian Horse Show Champion 2-year-old colt, a U.S. National Top Ten Yearling Colt and a Region 15 Champion Stallion. PS Andiamo is a U.S. and Canada Top Ten Stallion. Both were sired by Marwan Al Shaquab, who is “the hottest thing in the (Arabian) breeds right now,” according to Olvey.

His two stallions and 12 broodmares produce six to 10 foals per year, which are weaned at four months and sell for $5,000 to $80,000 each. He also breeds to other people’s stallions, and ships semen from his own stallions to other breeders for a $2,500 stud fee. He has eight babies due next year. “We breed for halter horses, and that’s what we mainly show,” Olvey says.

Charlie Watts, one of the Rolling Stones rock group, bought one of Olvey’s mares and flew her to England. Olvey has spent time around Wayne Newton, one of the top Arabian breeders in the country, as well as the late actor Patrick Swayze. “At a horse show, everybody is just an Arabian horse person,” Olvey says. “Even Swayze you wouldn’t have thought was anybody special. He was there because he loved the horse and he wanted to compete and blend in.”

Until recently, his resident trainer, Les Sichini, handled the horses at shows. But three years ago Olvey started showing as an amateur with two of his Aradon-bred colts, Pysnario and Phantasy. He started winning right out of the chute.

“I’ve never had so much fun,” he admits. “I won in Scottsdale, won the Region 12 (a big Southeast show) and at National, I was in the top 10 out of 29 horses. I was thrilled with that.”

While he used to enjoy trail riding, he can’t ride anymore due to back surgery. His carpet business, Don’s Carpet One, keeps him pretty busy, and so does his fight with cancer. “In 2003 I was told I had two years to live,” he says. “Three and a half years later, I was told that again. I’ve been undergoing treatments for nine years, and I’m still in the battle. I’m really a strong believer, I’m a Christian, and I’m at peace with whatever God wants.”

Portuguese roots planted in Gallant

Robert and Carolyn Crum were living in West Palm Beach, Fla., when they saw their first Andalusian horse. “He was a gorgeous black exhibition horse, and we started talking to his trainer,” Carolyn relates. “We decided to start breeding Andalusians.”

In 2001, they went to Mexico to get married on the farm of a breeder of Andalusians and Lusitanos. Intending to buy an Andalusian, they came home with a Lusitano stallion and mare instead.

The Andalusian and the Lusitano are related, both having come originally from Spain, according to Carolyn. That country used them for bullfighting. When Spain outlawed bullfighting, there was nothing for the Spanish horse to do. So Spaniards started breeding them for beauty and elegance. The Portuguese still used these horses for bullfighting and trained them for the ring by having them work cattle in the fields.

“The Portuguese horse stayed more true to its roots than the Andalusian did,” Carolyn says. “The Lusitano is from Portugal.”

Originally from Birmingham, Carolyn was an attorney in Atlanta for several years when she decided to make a change and moved to Florida. That’s where she met Robert, who was in the construction business. It was a second marriage for both of them, and they shared a common interest in horses.

For the next 10 years, the Crums bred, trained and showed their horses. They concentrated on quality, rather than quantity, and their two stallions and two broodmares produced one or two babies each year. But they usually had half a dozen foals, colts and fillies of various ages and levels of training. Then the economy went sour, construction work dried up, and their health took a turn for the worse. The Crums had to make a difficult decision. “We almost got out of the horse business,” Carolyn says. “But we enjoy being able to see them every day. So we downsized to a smaller operation and changed our focus to breeding only.”

They also decided to leave Florida. With Carolyn’s roots in Alabama, they looked in this state and in Tennessee for some farmland and found a place in Gallant that was already set up for breeding warmbloods. They moved there in January, bringing trainer Whitney Wenzel, an Auburn University graduate from South Carolina, with them.

“It was a difficult move for 11 horses and all that equipment,” says Carolyn. “Half of my furniture is still in my guest house in Florida.” The Crums live in an apartment that’s part of their 17-stall barn, with plans to build a house one day.

Their breeding stock now includes three stallions and two broodmares. The grand old man of Shangrila Farms is Exaustivo, a 27-year-old who was born and trained at the Alter Real Stud in Portugal. The Alter Real was founded by the king of Portugal in the 1500s to breed classical equitation horses. Veneno Imperial is their 10-year-old exotic, buckskin-colored stallion imported from Brazil. Bolero (nicknamed Muffin) is a 6-year-old Shangrila Farm baby, whose grandsire was an international champion jumper, Novilheiro, ridden by famed British horseman John Whittaker. Bolero and Veneno have been featured in several international equine calendars.

They also have a couple of pets, including a rescued thoroughbred and a miniature horse named Cooper who loves to escape his corral and do laps around the barn. In addition, Whitney has five horses of her own.

At seven months, the Shangrila foals are weaned and ready to be matched up with a buyer, if they haven’t already been sold in-utero (before birth). The latter sell for $6,000, while the foals go for $8,000 and the weanlings for $10,000. The average would be $18,000 for a 2- to 3-year old, $22,000 – $25,000 for a 4-year-old under saddle with basic training. It isn’t unusual, however, for a Lusitano with great bloodlines and basic dressage training to go for $45,000, while one at the Grand Prix level of dressage could command $125,000.

“Lusitanos are used primarily for dressage. That’s where the market is,” Carolyn says. “They make wonderful cow horses, but no one wants one for that. They are too expensive for that discipline.”

After two heart surgeries, Carolyn, 75, can no longer ride. Neither does Robert, 72. The horses keep them young in mind and heart, though. They produce a calming effect on Carolyn, whether she’s rubbing their necks or watching them frolic in the pasture. The babies are her biggest joy, and she’s looking forward to a new crop next year.

“We haven’t had any babies for the last two years because of the economy, ” she says. “The number of our semen shipments are down, too. Horses are a reflection of the economy. But I‘m optimistic about this year.”

Features

Men of Steel

[Show as slideshow]

Fincher family sharpen skills as bladesmiths

Story by GiGi Hood
Photos by Jerry Martin

In today’s ever-changing and fast-paced world, where one technological wonder is all too quickly followed and then bested by yet another, the Fincher men of St. Clair County might best be defined as an anachronism.

Ray, his brother Jack and his nephew Jon are creators, designers, craftsmen, fabricators. But their works are light years removed from the technological wonders of our time. The passion of their work reverts to a much slower and simplistic time where ideas were born in the brain and created by the hand.

The Finchers have discovered a little known world — the universe of bladesmiths (or more commonly known as knife makers). Each and every blade is unlike any other; one of a kind. Metal is the common thread that links their trade. Placed in a coal, charcoal or propane fire, it is heated to temperatures sometimes in excess of 1,800 degrees, where its physical properties become softened to the point it can be hammered out until it fits the puzzle that exists within the mind of the maker.

Ray was the first to become interested in knife making. “About 12 years ago, I was attending a gun show and bought a handmade knife from a blade master named Chuck Patrick,” he said. “There was just something about that creation that captured my interest. I think it was the simplicity, the creativity, the idea that something so simple, yet so special, could be made by hand.”

He then started buying knife parts and assembling them. Not long after, his brother Jack and his son, Jon, also became interested in his newfound project. While assembling knives was fun, the more involved they became, the desire to create their own knives grew. As a result, all three enrolled in classes at Texarkana College in Texarkana, Arkansas, to study and begin their certification in The American Bladesmith Society, which is the national organization for bladesmiths.

Certification is a multi-level process that begins with apprenticeship, progresses through a journeyman program and ends with the title of Master Bladesmith. Jon and Jack say they are not into their craft for the certification, just the pure enjoyment of creating one-of-a-kind knives from beginning to end. Ray is more active in it and has the goal of attaining journeyman status.

Jon, who was only 15 when he began, had to have permission from his principal to be absent from high school while attending the two-week classes in Texarkana. Swapping one type of education for another, he quickly fell in love with his newfound hobby. His first class, blacksmithing, culminated with the making of his first test knife. The test knife was required as one of the steps in completing his apprenticeship.

“It was fun; it allowed for individual creativity and it was also physical,” Jon explained. “There’s just something exciting about taking a flat piece of steel, heating it and then pounding on it until you’ve made your very own creation. It is very physical and very challenging. I loved it from the beginning, and I probably always will.”

Jon, a Marine who is in school at the University of South Alabama, makes a bee-line to the forge anytime he returns to St. Clair County. When observed as he works and explains the importance of each step, his passion for his art is clearly apparent.

Jack, Jon’s dad, enjoyed the knife assembly portion. But when the forging began, both father and son were truly hooked. “Jack, who earned his engineering degree from Auburn University, is both a seasoned professional with a great mind for detail and an eye for craftsmanship,” Ray explained. “He was immediately interested in knife making, but when Jon fell hard for it, that further cemented Jack’s passion. Anything Jon loves, Jack loves, so it was a match made in heaven for father and son — actually for all of us. Our mother instilled in us the importance of family togetherness, and she would be proud to know that we have carried that with us in all of our endeavors.”

Describing himself as a problem child who definitely marched to the beat of a different drummer, Ray was sent to Riverside Military Academy in Gainesville, Georgia, during the regular school year. His summers were spent at another military school in Hollywood, Florida, where his love for deep-water diving was born. During his high-school years, he worked in a pipe shop. After graduating high school, he worked as a pipe fitter before joining the U.S. Marine Corps. After his time of service, he worked as a field pipe worker.

Following in the footsteps of his father, and having had the opportunity to become experienced in every aspect of pipe fitting, fabrication and design, he decided to embark on running his own business. “I had a pick-up truck, a barrel of tools, very little money but lots of desire, tenacity and determination,” he remembers. As his business, Fincher Fire Protection Systems, began to grow, family once again became intertwined when Jack, with his education, expertise and strong work ethic, went to work with Ray. Years later, after building the business, Ray decided it was time to retire and participate in his many other interests and his new love of bladesmithing.

Today, Ray, Jack and Jon all work out of the shop that Ray has built on his St. Clair County property that he shares with his wife, Nancy, and their Tennessee Walking Horses. Simply put, Ray loves knives, and Nancy loves horses. From the road, the property doesn’t speak of or give hints related to the diversity that exists within the confines of the fences that enclose the beautiful pastureland, barns and horses.

However, after driving through the property to the back shops, Jack, Jon and Ray’s world most certainly exists in tandem with Nancy’s. The huge shop, filled with high-priced and fine equipment doesn’t look like a hobby shop. It has all the accoutrements of a serious business: a forge, kiln, presses, lathes, table saws, trim saws, finishing equipment and multitudinous other high-tech tools.

It also houses a large supply of exotic materials, worthy of being used to make the handles for the finest of their creations. The supply is seemingly limitless. Tiger maple; desert iron wood; mesquite; giraffe bones (harvested from the carcasses of giraffes that have been killed by lions); Zircoti, a fine wood from Central America; and even petrified wooly mammoth tusk or walrus oossic are just a few of the exotic materials they use to create the beautiful handles for their metal masterpieces.

The Fincher guys love their hobby and have plenty to show for it. Ray said that, even though they sell their creations, it is still a hobby and not a business. “We turn everything we make back into our tools, our equipment, the stock we need, and our training,” he said. “Quite often, we travel to other parts of the country to attend schools, seminars and work with other bladesmiths to learn more about our trade. In conjunction with the Alabama Forging Council, we also travel around the country and help in the presentation and teaching the youths of today about the practices of another era.”

One of their greatest goals is learning how to produce Damascus Steel. A tedious and multi-stepped process, it is pattern welded and created by the layering of steel. The bladesmith starts with alternating layers of steel, forges, draws out and folds it over and over to create unique patterns.

Finally, as the blade is etched with acid, beautiful patterns can be seen within the layers of the Damascus Steel blade. As Jack pointed out, “There are no limits here. An infinite number of variations are possible. It’s incredible. They even have ways of putting your name or image in the steel. It’s called Mosaic Damascus. The possibilities are endless.”

The Finchers are getting ready for the Batson Blade Symposium, which will be held April 14, at Tannehill State Park, just south of Bessemer. In June, Atlanta will host the Atlanta Blade Masters Show, where literally thousands of people from all over the world are expected to attend.

They hope others share their enthusiasm. Forging opportunities are available for newcomers, and youths are particularly encouraged to get involved. The State Blacksmith Association and the Alabama Forge Council maintain top-notch forging facilities within the park. It hosts the Batson Symposium and an annual conference in September promoting smithing, in general.

At the present, the Finchers’ passion is still considered a hobby that will hopefully be passed to other generations. Ray best sums it up when he say he loves achieving in a field where learning is constant. “It slows us down, it makes us think, it gives us time to appreciate the intricacies of life, and it gives our family time and opportunity to dream, to create and enjoy the meaningful time that we are able to spend together because of our shared interests.”

Ray has one final dream. “Jon is so very talented. He loves this (and so does his dad). Given his foresight, his drive, his desire, his commitment to being a bladesmith, I think it will be quite sad if he doesn’t take the step to move from the arena of an enjoyable hobby to creating a viable business doing what he loves and what he is best at. Currently, he is the Fincher legacy, and I hope he will make the most out of his talent and the passion he possesses and that he will not only share it with our younger family members, but with the world as well.”

Shoal Creek A Year Later

Tragedy, triumphs mark life in the valley

Story by Carol Pappas
Photos by Jerry Martin

Folks around Shoal Creek Valley have said it often enough over the past 12 months — “getting back to normal.”

But in this St. Clair County valley, normal has a new meaning since a tornado’s fury swept all the way through it, shattering homes and destroying lives in its path.

Tears find their own trail down Buford Sanders’ weathered face. With a determined gaze, he raises a single finger and vows this will be the last time he tells his own story of loss. “It’s time to look forward, not back.”

As he recounts the details of April 27, 2011, it is with the freshness of a memory made — not a year — but a moment ago. “It was 6:30 p.m. We saw it was coming. We lived at the top of the hill. My wife and I had no place safe to go, so we simply hunkered down in the middle of the house.”

The storm first hit the west end of his house overlooking Shoal Creek Road, blowing away a room, a porch and the roof. “It came back and blew off the east end,” he said. All that was left was a sturdy piece of wall where the couple crouched.

“We were thinking everything was OK,” Sanders said. The house had been lost, but they were safe. Just then, two of their grandchildren were “coming up the hill, hollering and crying that they needed help.”

The flow of tears comes in waves from this point as he tells what happened next. His son and daughter-in-law and one of their daughters had been blown 75 yards from their home into a blueberry patch.

The death of his daughter-in-law, Angie, came quickly. His son, Albert, lasted three or four hours. “He told me he thought he was going to die. I told him, ‘No, son, I love you too much.’

“ ‘I love you, too, Daddy,’ he told me, and those were his last words. It was just a matter of time, and he was gone.”

During Albert’s final hours, all Sanders could do was keep his son comfortable. No medical help was able to get there because the tornado so devastated the valley that it was virtually blocked from one end to the other. “We could hear the chainsaws running in both directions,” he said.

The Sanders family were like many in Shoal Creek Valley. They lived near one another; their generational ties strong. “We worked on things together,” he said of his son, Albert. “He was my buddy. It was sad his life came to an end.”

Buford Sanders and his sons raised their families on the same property, a single driveway leading to all three homes. In an instant, all three homes were swept away.

His other son had been thrown from his home by the winds, but he recovered and is doing well, his father said. His granddaughter, Cassie, spent five weeks in the hospital undergoing 12 to 15 surgeries and has little memory of what happened in the hours and weeks that followed the storm.

She used to be a runner. “She loved to run,” Sanders said. “She ran track. We had a track for her around the hay field.” Her recovery since April 27 has been painful and slow, but she is beginning to run again, entering 5K races, a proud grandfather noted, underscoring her resiliency.

He, too, is beginning to return to some semblance of routine. He and his wife have been back in their new home for about six months, he said. “If I just lost the house, I could feel good.

“But every step I take, I see the tragedy.” Just outside his back door still lay hundreds of acres of downed trees across the mountainside, a constant reminder of a storm so mighty and strong it could wipe out a forest and kill a dozen people in a matter of moments. “If it had just left all my family intact, I’d be the happiest man on earth.”

Just before the storm hit, he said he called both of his sons and told them to go to their safe places. “They did what I asked them to, but it wasn’t good enough.”

Sanders’ conversation vacillates between past and future. “The hurt of losing some of your blood is bad,” he said. “But the community and I are looking forward and looking ahead, not back. You have to suck it up and say this is the way it is. Keep going,” he said.

“So many people befriended us. They helped cleaning up. It was dangerous even to walk around. You lean on one another in times like that. So many people were so good to us.

“A fella I had never known built those kitchen cabinets,” he said, pointing across the room to what could only be described as the intricate work of a master craftsman. “When I went to pay him, he didn’t charge me. Things like that. A lot of people I had never seen before came and helped. I made lifelong friends. I’m grateful for that.”

Looking to the future, he said, “I guess from now on it will get somewhat better. It will be a long time. I have a strong little wife. We’re Christian people. We believe the Lord will take care of us through the battle and there will be a reward at the end.”

He shares a special kinship with the community that has suffered so much. The community came together “in mind and spirit” through the storm and the months of a painful aftermath, he said.

But the lesson from all of this, he said, lies not in the homes destroyed nor does it dwell in the material possessions snatched away by a greedy gust of wind. “The tragedy of all this is the lives that were lost in the twinkling of an eye.

“I would have loved to have swapped places.” Albert was 44. Angie was 43, and they had three daughters. “They had a lot to look forward to.”

Now it is up to Sanders to look forward, he said. “The important thing is the lives that were lost in this valley. The devastation of property is bad, but the other things are a lot worse.

“We have to look forward. You know, onward, Christian soldiers.”

• For more on Shoal Creek, read Building for the future amid remembrances of past and Pell City engineering firm rebuilds after direct hit in this month’s edition of Discover, The Essence of St. Clair Magazine.

The Flying Pig

[Show as slideshow]

Grapes, grains and gifts make
patrons flock to Springville shop

Story by Elaine Hobson Miller
Photos by Jerry Martin

Dené Huff loves drinking good wine and craft beers, and smoking a good cigar. By opening The Flying Pig in Springville, she was able to bring all her vices together under one roof. “I got tired of driving to Atlanta for good beer, good wine and my wine kits,” she says.

She opened October 28, 2011, in the little house behind and between PNC (formerly RBC) Bank and the Springville Antique Mall. She specializes in imported and domestic craft beers and wine from small, family-owned wineries, has on-premise and off-premise licenses, and sells wine openers and aerators, Red Neck wine glasses (small mason jars on stems), and other adult-beverage-related gifts. Upstairs, she has grains, yeast, hops, wine kits and equipment for hobbyists to make their own wine. Hence her shop description, “grapes, grains and gifts.”

The name for her business came from her frustration in dealing with the Alabama Beverage Control Board. She couldn’t get them to return her phone calls, they messed up her paperwork five times, had her driving back and forth between Ashville, Pell City and Lincoln to get a good set of fingerprints. “I must have logged 1,500 miles trying to get everything resolved,” she says. “One day I announced, ‘We’ll get this resolved when pigs fly. …’ My kids heard, ‘when pigs fly,’” and said that’s what I should name my shop.”

Originally from Texas, Dené’s military background (she was a Marine corpsman) and her husband’s job have taken them all over the United States. “Just throw a dart at a map, and I’ve lived there,” she says. She and husband, Joe, and daughters Lily, 13, and Aria,11, came to Springville two and a half years ago when Valspar made Joe manager of its Birmingham plant. While in Trussville looking at houses, the family took a wrong turn, found the Drive-In at Argo, and fell in love. They stumbled onto Springville right after Memorial Day, when the flags were still up. “I knew it was home,” she says.

She doesn’t carry “grocery-store beer” brands, seeking more imagination in the line she sells. Craft beers, on the other hand, have hundreds of years of thought, ingenuity and, well, craftsmanship behind them. They aren’t mass produced, and some have six or seven hops in them. “I get women in here saying, ‘I hate beer,’ but before they leave here, I’ve usually found a beer they like,” Dené claims.

Within three months of opening, she had a regular clientele. Friday and Saturday nights seem to be their favorite times to meet, but you’ll run into at least one of them almost any night.

“We’ve been friends with the Davises for 20 years,” says Laura Sparks, as she sips her favorite Banana Nut Bread Beer. “We used to meet at each others’ houses, now we come here. We like the hospitality, and that our favorite beers are kept cold. A lot of beer here you won’t find at local bars, convenience stores or Walmart.”

The atmosphere at The Flying Pig is such that even her 15-year-old daughter feels comfortable. “She can’t drink the alcohol, but she’s looking forward to the designer sodas that are coming,” Laura says.

“You can sample several beers and wine from all over the world,” says her husband, Ray. “You can’t sit here and drink to oblivion, though. This is not a bar.”

Rob Brantley drops by two to four times per week for the beer and cigars he can’t find anywhere else. “You can have a good meal at a local restaurant and top it off here with a good wine or beer. And it’s walking distance from my house,” he says.

Gary Davis is a local blacksmith who, along with wife, Susan, frequents The Flying Pig for two reasons: Dené and the beer. “We like the atmosphere,” Susan says. “It’s not a smoky bar. There are no obnoxious people. You could bring your family. Dené knows her customers, knows when to cut off their beer.”

Dené is experimenting with live bands on weekends, and has decided acoustic instruments work best in such a small setting, so people can talk over them. A self-described foodie, she loves to experiment with recipes and has made friends with customers who share her interests. Describing herself and her girlfriends as “adventuresome,” she has been known to have buffalo or elk flown in for a dinner party. “My girlfriends will try anything,” she says.

One such gal pal is KoKo McTyeire, who subscribes to Cook’s Illustrated, and tries many of the upscale food publication’s recipes. The two frequently gather at one or the other’s house to experiment with food, and have been known to invite whoever is in the shop at closing time.

Asked to come up with a scrumptious menu and to pair it with good wines, Dené and KoKo prepared a meal for two Discover contributors that nearly knocked them off their bar stools. The menu started with an appetizer of Roasted Red Peppers and garlic hummus topped with chopped tomatoes and served with torn pieces of naan, a Middle Eastern flat bread. She also had a tray of Kalamata olives and bleu cheese-stuffed olives. The entrée was pot-roasted pork loin with blueberry and Marsala wine reduction sauce, and dessert was fresh berry gratins with Zabaglione topping.

“We selected two quick-and-easy recipes along with two that are a little more involved,” Dené says. “We used ingredients that are readily available, either from local vendors or grocery stores. We bought the pork roast at the Chopping Block in Springville, for example, and KoKo grew the blueberries.”

The hummus is easy, costs about $3 and took Dené five minutes to make. A versatile appetizer, it can be served with pita or tortilla chips. Her recipe serves four to six people, and leftovers will keep several days when stored in a tight container in the refrigerator.

Dené paired the hummus with a $9 bottle of Vista Point Pinot Grigio from California and, for those who prefer grains to grapes, Unibroue La Findu Monde, a French beer from Quebec. She used the Vista Point to show that you don’t have to spend $45 to have a good-tasting wine. “The Pinot Grigio is light and crisp and makes a nice complement for the garlic in the hummus,” she says. “Lots of my customers swear it has a vegetable undertone.”

She chose the beer because she wanted to show that beer can go with everything, from starters through entrées and on to desserts. “I think the undertones of this beer make it a wonderful addition to the flavors of the roasted peppers and garlic,” she adds.

The first time KoKo prepared the roast pork, she couldn’t find the herbes de Provence. So she looked it up online, and found what herbs were in the mix. “I had most of them on my shelves, so I made my own mix,” she says. “Now, you can buy it at Walmart.”

For the entrée, Dené chose a buttery Chardonnay called Creme dy Lis, and a beer called Boulevard Smokestack Series Sixth Glass Quadruple Ale. She picked the buttery (oaked) Chardonnay for the pork “just to add another layer and texture to the tongue,” she says.

“I enjoy the oak flavors of the wine with pork, chicken and delicate fish,” she says. “I didn’t want something to overpower the roasted pork. I believe a red would have done that. I like the quad beer for that exact same reason. It has a gentle flavor of spice that complemented the herbs on the pork, without overpowering the taste.”

The dessert pairings of Pimo Amoré Moscato wine and Lindemans Kriek Lambic beer were no-brainers. She says the Moscato is always a safe bet. The beer is just something fun she thought would complement the berries. “It doesn’t take a sommelier to be able to pair wines and beer with your food,” Dené believes. “It just takes a little understanding of what you are drinking, Google and simply knowing what you like. If you don’t particularly care for a Cab (Cabernet Sauvignon) by itself, pair it with a wonderful steak or roasted lamb. It will change your opinion of that particular grape. You must be willing to be adventurous if you want your pallet to expand.”

The dessert was prepared with KoKo’s homegrown blueberries, and Dené felt that the Kriek Lambic, a Belgium malt beverage with black cherries added, would pair well with it. “I call Lambic the original wine cooler,” she says of the fruity-tasting, sweet beer. “I sell what I like. That way, if I go belly up, all this beer and wine are mine!”

• Check out our recipes in the April 2012 edition of Discover, The Essence of St. Clair Magazine.

Protecting Big Canoe Creek

[Show as slideshow]

Story by Mike Bolton
Photos by Jerry Martin

Anyone who might stumble upon the unobtrusive hogback ridge buried deeply in the woods off Old Springville Road near Clay probably wouldn’t give it a second glance. The ridge’s mundane appearance gives no hint as to its incredibly important role in Alabama’s history and this state’s remarkable topography.

Raindrops that fall a few inches southwest of the raised spot of Alabama earth trickle their way down through the leaves and black dirt and begin an incredible journey. The raindrops eventually gather to become a small stream that passes through Clay, and that stream becomes the Little Cahaba River as it nears Trussville.

It soon becomes the Cahaba River and meanders through several Birmingham suburbs before its 180-mile excursion through the heartland of Alabama. The odyssey finally ends at the community of Old Cahawba, Alabama’s first capital, located at the confluence of the Cahaba and Alabama rivers below Selma.

Back in Clay – oddly enough – raindrops that fall just a few inches northeast of the ridge begin an interesting journey of their own in an entirely different direction.

Raindrops there trickle down to eventually form Big Canoe Creek, a beautiful, almost pristine tributary that makes a serpentine run through Springville. From there it meanders for almost 50 miles through rural St. Clair County before finally reaching Lake Neely Henry.

While Big Canoe Creek and the Cahaba River share origination points and numerous similarities, one thing dramatically sets the two apart.

The Cahaba is a river constantly in peril because of the huge population that has grown in its watershed. Big Canoe Creek, meanwhile, sits almost unnoticed by most St. Clair residents, a jewel barely affected by an ever-growing encroachment by man.

Alex Varner, a former Springville resident who often canoes on Big Canoe Creek, says it is a hidden oasis where someone can literally paddle for days and never see another human being.

“People just don’t understand what they have right in their back door,” said Varner who now fights the daily grind of life on U.S. 280. “It is a creek that is full of fish and surrounded by wildlife. A lot of people would die to have a place like that.”

Big Canoe Creek is both blessed and cursed by that remote nature, those who love it claim.

It is protected from much harm by the fact that most St. Clair County residents’ only contact comes as they drive across one of its many bridges during their daily commute. That out-of-sight, out-of-mind existence does have consequences, its proponents say. When the call does come that it needs protection, so very few understand the importance.

Fortunately, there are a number who fathom the creek’s cosmetic, biological and recreational value. The Friends of Big Canoe Creek is an organization not made up of bespectacled tree huggers, as many might suspect, but rather an eclectic group of members who value the waterway for different reasons. The membership of about 50 people ranges from farmers who have lived on the creek all their lives to new residents who escaped Birmingham and fell in love with the creek flowing through their backyards.

Doug Morrison, the group’s president, is one of the latter whose attraction to the creek was by happenstance. Like many hoping to escape the Birmingham suburbs, the Center Point resident was turned off by the heavily congested U.S. 280 corridor and instead looked in the opposite direction to St. Clair County. When he and his wife, Joannie, stumbled upon a home for sale on Oak Grove Road in Springville, they were awestruck in two very different ways.

“My wife loved the house, and I loved the creek behind it,” Morrison says with a laugh.

He was no stranger to creeks. He grew up behind Eastwood Mall and had fond memories of turning over rocks and looking for crawfish in Shades Creek. At first, he was only attracted by having a creek as a neighbor. He said at the time he could have never imagined how a creek could have cast such a spell in his life.

“I began to see people in canoes and kayaks pass by my house, and I was fascinated,” he said. “One neighbor let me try his kayak, and I loved it. He eventually bought another kayak, and we began to go kayaking. Then I saw a neighbor wade fishing and catching fish. I tried that and loved that.”

On his short kayak jaunts, Morrison was astonished to see deer, otters, minks, wood ducks and a seemingly endless list of wildlife. He was equally astounded by the number of fish species in the creek, including 5-pound bass, crappie, bream, alligator gar and redhorse suckers. Only then did he realize what he was becoming a part of.

“I’m thinking what a gem this place is,” he said. “There are so many people here that just don’t seem to know it exists. They drive across it and take it for granted. They just don’t know how lucky they are to have something like this.”

Morrison admits he succumbed to a basic instinct of mankind. If you love something, you want to protect it. You first, however, have to develop that kinship with the creek to really appreciate it and to yearn for its protection.

As his kayaking expeditions increased, he began expanding his trips to differing locations on Big Canoe Creek. His concerns for the creek began to broaden past the litter that was occasionally dumped at the many bridges in St. Clair County that cross the creek. He became thirsty for knowledge of what makes creeks work and what can be found in them.

He was surprised to learn that Big Canoe Creek has more than 50 fish species, including some that can be found few other places in the world. He was shocked to discover that the many mussels he was seeing actually played an important role in filtering the water and keeping it pure. He was surprised to find that some of the mussels were probably of the eight listed federally as threatened. Shoot, he might have even seen the Canoe Creek Club Shell mussel that can be found nowhere else in the world but Big Canoe Creek.

While he didn’t consider himself some nerd that could explain the value of what he was seeing to a panel of scholars, he did have his own take on why he wanted to see them protected: “I do know God put them on this earth,” he says matter-of-factly.

His quest for knowledge continued. He figured the creek didn’t face many pollution threats but found that pollution can be found in many forms. He learned that the runoff from farms often contains animal wastes and fertilizers that increase the nutrient load in creeks.

And there were threats he had never thought of. He learned that pavement and concrete force fast-water runoff into waterways instead of allowing the rains to slowly filter through the earth before being released into creeks. He learned that cigarette butts thumped into some parking lots can eventually wash into storm drains and can be directed to creeks. He learned that those who change their own oil in vehicles and lawnmowers sometimes dump the used oil into storm drains. That oil is directed to creeks and rivers. He learned that buffers are needed to protect creeks from residential and commercial construction.

Because of its mainly rural path, Big Canoe Creek currently doesn’t face many of those issues, but Morrison knows that with St. Clair County’s rapid growth, those problems may be in the creek’s future. He was relieved to find that many of the potential problems can easily be stopped before they begin by simply educating the public.

He knew that a group, the Friends of Big Canoe Creek, had formed about 15 years ago but had become dormant. His next-door-neighbor Vickey Wheeler, had been a founding member, and he urged her to help him revive the group. He had plenty of support along the way from his wife, Joannie, who has worked tirelessly in the effort ever since.

Early on, he began looking for guidance by calling Liz Brooke at the Alabama Rivers Alliance and suddenly found help at every turn. Brooke introduced him to Varner.

Varner, the former Springville resident now on the Alabama Rivers Alliance board, had grown up playing in Big Canoe Creek. He fully understood the creek’s beauty and its importance. “He said to count him in on getting the group started,” Morrison said. “He played an important role in us getting started. He eventually became a board member and is still a board member.”

Varner canoes and fishes all across Alabama but says Big Canoe Creek will always have a special place in his heart. He had gotten away from the creek as he grew older and discovered other locations to play, like the Sipsey River, but when he became involved with Friends of Big Canoe Creek, “I got hooked all over again.”

House painter Robert “Beau” Jordan and wife Trish are both members. They moved to Oak Grove Road from Center Point in 1995 looking for a little acreage and a little solitude. The fact that a creek flowed through it wasn’t that big of a draw at the time, he remembers.

“We just wanted to get out in the country,” he said. “I was surprised when I started paying attention to the creek that it had so many fish in it. I started wade fishing and doing a little kayaking and fell in love with it.

“I’ve caught three species of bream, largemouth bass, spotted bass, rock bass, redeye bass and catfish.

“You really have to spend some time in the creek to appreciate it. I had no idea when I moved here that I would get into it like I have.”

Member Gerald Tucker, a farmer from Springville, has a lot more invested in Big Canoe Creek than most members. In 1873 his great-grandfather settled the land next to the creek near U.S. 11 and farmed there. Today, almost 140 years later, the 76-year-old is still raising cattle there. He says Big Canoe Creek has been a big part of his life and his family’s tradition. He says through the years, he has learned more and more about protecting it.

“A little education goes a long way,” he says with a laugh.

Tucker says he once thought nothing about allowing his cattle to roam and drink from the creek. Once he learned about damage to the creek from sediment washing from the bare banks where livestock trampled, he was quick to react. He erected fencing to keep his cows out of the creek. A seemingly small step, he admits, but the creek needs only a little help to protect it, the group is quick to point out.

“When most people think about problems facing a waterway they immediately think of industry, but the problems are not always from industry,” Morrison said. “You have nutrient loading from livestock and septic tanks and sedimentation from clearing land.

“Many times all that is needed is to leave a little land buffer between whatever you are doing and the creek. People aren’t purposely causing harm. You let them learn about things, and they understand. They want to protect the creek, too.”

Features