Tag: Other Stories

Coyote Drive-In

Coming attractions: Drive-in, miniature golf heading to Leeds area

Story by Graham Hadley and Carol Pappas
Photos by Wallace Bromberg Jr.
Artwork from Coyote Drive-In

If you’re old enough to remember movie nights under the stars with plenty of popcorn devoured in the backseat of your parents’ car, prepare to reimagine those times as the Shops of Grand River in Leeds recreates the classic drive-in with plenty of new twists.

The four-screen theater complex aims its sights on being a recreational experience the entire family can enjoy — from the moment the gates open to the end credits of the last double-feature movie.

“We have been working with Christine Szalay, general manager for the Shops of Grand River, for about a year and a half — all the stars aligned and we are going to make it happen,” said Steve Wynn, chief operating officer for Coyote Drive-Ins. Wynn notes the company already has a successful, five-screen version in Forth Worth, Texas, which has been in operation since 2013.

The Leeds edition will have a restaurant with a full kitchen, a pizza bar where patrons can watch the pizza-making process from beginning to end, and a bar that serves beer, wine and margaritas. The restaurant will have air-conditioned indoor and outdoor seating and sits next to a controlled-entry, fenced playground. Parents can keep an eye on kids playing while dining with family and friends.

The restaurant’s pavilion will occupy about a 10,000 square-foot building that was part of the original Shops of Grand River complex but had never been occupied.

“It will be directly adjacent to the north end of the Shops,” Szalay said.

Along with the restaurant and playground, there will also be an 18-hole miniature golf course in the theater area.

As for the drive-in, there are four screens, with movies shown in high definition from top-of-the-line special projectors that are brighter and designed to throw high-quality images farther onto bigger screens. And, Coyote Drive-In shows are double features.

“There is a 30 minute intermission, then you can watch a second movie,” Wynn said.

Directly in front of the screens is a no-car, grassy park-like green space where families can have picnics, play football with friends or even walk with their dog. The drive-in is a pet-friendly theater. There is also outdoor seating for those who want to sit outside their cars and enjoy the movies out in the open.

“A lot of it is about the freedom. You can walk your dog, throw a Frisbee, and nobody is going to tell you to turn off your smart phone,” Wynn said.

Also planned on Fridays and Saturdays are musicians performing live music.

In Fort Worth, “people are coming about 90 minutes before the shows start,” Wynn said. “You can sit out in a lawn chair and watch the movie on a giant screen. It feels like an event – like movies in the park.

“I think it is a social element. This is what we see in Ft. Worth: People are reaching out on social media, saying, ‘We are all going out to a movie at Coyote.’ They come in large groups, bring the dog, move some picnic tables together, run and play, eat, then watch the movies. People like the social aspect,” Wynn said.

“The family crowd is our biggest pizza business. When a family film opens, it always outperforms our other genres, like more adult action-themed movies,” Wynn said. The drive-in is more open than a multiplex theater, but screens are set up to prevent line of sight from one viewing area to another. Even so, some movies will not be shown or will be shown later in the night.

“Some of the movies that are too risqué we will not play because a 5-year-old watching movies on one screen might see a movie on another screen. … In Ft. Worth, we did not play 50 Shades of Grey. It was a very popular movie, but the family-friendly environment is paramount,” Wynn said.

The theater will have room for a total of 1,100 cars.

The $6 million-plus project is expected to draw people to the Leeds area from possibly as far away as other states like Georgia and Tennessee, not to mention the surrounding Leeds community, Birmingham, Trussville, Pell City, Talladega, Anniston and the rest of north and central Alabama.

With the Shops of Grand River right next door, with stores generally open until 9 p.m., already drawing large crowds daily, the two ventures expect there to be lots of crossover business.

“Coyote Drive-Ins have thought of everything. It was one of the reasons when the discussions started we were enamored with their plan. It made such good sense for the Shops of Grand River,” Szalay said.

For the region, it means a recreation and tourism destination point, generating 100 new jobs.

“This makes the Shops of Grand River and Leeds more of a regional destination. People come from a large distance to shop here, and this works on a number of different levels, Szalay said. “We want that close connection to our customers from within the community, and this adds another reason for people who live farther away to come, shop and stay longer.”

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Alabama Barbecue

When it comes to ‘cue, St. Clair joints are smoking hot

Story by Elaine Hobson Miller
Photos by Wallace Bromberg Jr.

It was the Year of Alabama Barbecue, a year that had the state’s Tourism Department asking, “Whose ‘cue is best?” Its online contest pitted barbecue joints from across the state against each other in five categories. When the smoke finally cleared, two St. Clair-area restaurants were among the victors. Charlie’s BBQ of Odenville won in The Dives division, and Rusty’s Bar-B-Q in Leeds came out on top of The Mom and Pops category.

Alabama has more barbecue joints per capita than any other state, according to the tourism department’s web site. Everyone has his favorite, and the contest proved to be a competition between the fans of each hickory-sweet restaurant.

“Three years ago, we invited barbecue fans to post on our website their favorite barbecue place,” says Lee Sentell, director of the Alabama Department of Tourism, explaining how they came up with the contest and categories. “We got about 300 suggestions. This past year, we decided to level the playing field between the different types of places so as not to have the single locations at a disadvantage versus the ones with multiple locations. We came up with five categories that ranged from Mom-and-Pops to the big boys, like Full Moon and Jim ’n Nick’s, and encouraged people to vote in each division. We were blown away with the number of fans who became engaged in the voting.”

Sentell says the competition demonstrated the depth of loyalty that each restaurant has. “Customers are so proud of their favorites and voted as often as allowed to show their support.”

Charlie’s a fan favorite

Scott Holmes didn’t even know Charlie’s was in the contest for several days. “We have a big Facebook and Twitter following,” he says. “The fans stepped up.” Charlie’s beat out nine other barbecue joints with 12,867 votes. The second-place winner had 9,644 votes, and the remaining eight garnered less than 4,500 each.

Holmes thinks his location at the corner of US 411 and Alabama 174 South, in front of the Piggly Wiggly grocery store and adjacent to a service station, probably placed him in the right category. “If you’re a barbecue place in Alabama attached to a service station, you’re probably a dive,” he says.

Charlie’s opened in November of 2008. Scott ate there twice a week, and tried to talk the original owner, Charlie Wiles, into teaming up for a barbecue venture in Moody. But Charlie was ready to retire. Both parties prayed about the situation, then Holmes bought the place and switched from painting buildings to cooking ‘cue.

“I like food,” he says, explaining why he made the move. “I was a commercial painting contractor, but when the economy tanked a few years ago, I wanted to open a barbecue joint.” Although Charlie taught him how to smoke ribs, he’s mostly a trial-and-error, self-taught chef who says he was fortunate to find an established restaurant with recipes, personnel and products already in place. The secret to his success, he says, is in the way he prepares his ‘cue. “We smoke our meats. Not everyone does. Others grill them. We don’t use rubs or injections on our pork butts.”

His biggest seller is the pork sandwich combo, which features meat, bread and two sides. Chicken tenders are a big deal, too. “Odenville is not big enough to support a barbecue restaurant,” he says. “So we also do ‘burgers and tenders. Thirty percent of our sales are in chicken tenders. We also do hamburger steaks and fried catfish. We have something for everybody, but we pour our heart and soul into barbecue.”

He features off-the-menu specials, too, such as briskets on Wednesdays and Saturdays, and the Saint Burger, a nine-ounce, hand-formed, greasy ground beef patty named for the county’s high school football team, on Thursdays. “Briskets are our signature dish,” he says. “We smoke six a week. A brisket is the chest muscle of a cow, and it’s hard to do. We cook them up to 16 hours to get them tender.” There’s a different special every Monday, such as the popular Soul Bowl, consisting of a bed of garlic cheese grits layered with turnip greens, pork and a cornbread muffin on top.

Part of his chef’s education was a trip to Texas he took four years ago, when he tasted at least a dozen different briskets from Houston to San Antonio. “We’re unique at Charlie’s, because we have a little bit of every style of barbecue,” he says. “We have Texas brisket, Kansas City burnt ends (from a brisket) and Memphis-style barbecue, which uses a dry rub and no sauce.”

Another specialty is the St. Clair Cyclone, a soft-serve ice cream treat with chopped Reese’s Cup, Oreos or Butterfinger candies. “Our Otis Burger has a huge following, too,” he says. It’s a double cheeseburger with sautéed onions and Otis Sauce, the latter being a gravy sauce.

A person’s taste preference for barbecue styles and sauce flavors depends on what he grew up eating, Holmes believes. He makes five different sauces: hot, medium, sweet, vinegar-based and a white sauce. His primary barbecue sauce is made with both vinegar and ketchup. He makes all sauces in-house. He does his major smoking during the night, removing the pork butts and briskets each morning and throwing on chicken and ribs.

Charlie’s is open Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. until 8 p.m., and does catering as far away as Pelham to the south and Anniston to the north. Originally open weekdays only, he added Saturdays about three months after he took over, and now that’s his biggest day. “Iron Bowl Saturday we sold 120 pounds of chicken wings, which we marinate, smoke, then fry to order,” he says. “They were mostly to go.”

Rusty’s builds barbecue following

Rusty’s Bar-B-Q gathered 28,637 votes to second-place’s 21,369 votes to win The Mom and Pops category in the Alabama Barbecue Battle. The remaining eight contestants had less than 3,000 votes each.

Rusty Tucker started his restaurant seven years ago in a 1970s Jack’s Hamburgers location on US 78 in Leeds. His decor, which could best be described as “continuing customer donations” because that’s what they are, includes concert posters for Hank Williams and the Drifting Cowboys, the Blues Brothers, Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, Elvis and the Allman Brothers Band. Vintage metal signs proclaim, “Fresh Eggs 10 cents” and “El Rancho Motel,” while others display a pin-up girl beside a bottle of Pepsi or advertise Mobilgas. Thermometers take their places on Barq’s Root Beer, Royal Crown Cola and Buffalo Rock signs, and an American League World Series poster from October 1903 has a place of prominence.

An autographed photo of professional race car driver Ryan Hunter-Reay, whom Rusty calls a good friend, and his pit crew, dominates one wall, while other walls display road signs advertising 7-Up, Nichol Kola and Uncle Sam. A trombone and trumpet flank the top of the doorway leading to a hallway and restrooms, while his most recent “gifts,” Honda, Suzuki and Kawasaki motorcycle gas cans, take up a countertop next to that doorway. “People bring them to me,” he says of all the vintage finds. He feels obliged to display them.

Tucker grew up cooking barbecue with his dad. He went to Johnson & Wales University’s College of Culinary Arts at its former Charleston, SC, campus, and gravitated toward fine dining in places like the Charleston Grill. Working his way back to down-home cooking, he was at Satterfield’s in Cahaba Heights before returning to his roots. “I love it,” he says of running his own business. He’s open from 10:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sundays through Thursdays,10:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, serving lunch and dinner only. He does lots of catering as well, particularly for nearby Barber Motorsports Park events, UAB basketball and Regions Bank’s Traditions golf tournaments.

His most popular menu item, and his signature dish, is his ribs. He also does a lot of pulled pork and hamburgers, plus smoked chicken, turkey, briskets and sausage. “We do a more traditional style barbecue — open-brick pit instead of a smoker. We make four kinds of sauces, including a tangy vinegar that’s a variation of my granddad’s recipe, a sweet barbecue sauce, spicy and white barbecue sauces.” The white sauce is a mayonnaise and vinegar mixture that goes well with the turkey and chicken. “It’s a North Alabama specialty,” he says.

He also does chicken tenders, hamburger steaks and barbecue-topped baked potatoes.

“People come in and say they found us due to publicity from the tourism department contest,” Rusty says. “We were featured in its Delicious Road Trips documentary, and we’ve participated in events like the Atlanta Food & Wine Festival that promote Alabama tourism.”

He gets a lot of repeat customers, many of them in town for the annual Barber’s Vintage Festival, plus Indy car drivers. He has developed relationships with people from coast to coast, keeping up with them on social media. “There’s a group of about 10 guys from Japan that comes into town for Barber motorsports events,” he says. “I can’t talk to them, but they’re nice guys.” When he first opened seven years ago, he had a group of 25 guys from France, all Mustang enthusiasts.

What’s Rusty’s secret to attracting a following from across the globe to just around the corner? “We try to treat everyone like family.”

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Always There

Recognized as one of the top female-owned businesses

Story by Graham Hadley

For the past several years, one Pell City business that prides itself in making life easier for its clients has consistently received top marks in the Alabama business world.

Always There In-Home Care, which specializes in providing medical care and assistance to people in the comfort of their own homes, has been ranked either No. 1 or in the top 10 female-owned businesses in the state.

Dee Harrell, the registered nurse who is the owner and founder of Always There, said she was surprised and “shocked might be the word” when she found out about the rankings.

Harrell said someone else had helped get them the recognition — she did not even know it was happening. Her focus is on the day-to-day operation of the business she built from the ground up.

“My husband said I should be proud, but it almost embarrasses me. I am proud, though. I give all the praise to God because I believe God has stood behind me all these years. I believe I had God’s graces behind me when I started the company,” Harrell said.

That’s not hard to believe given that Always There was born out of personal loss, the need to take care of her family and a strong desire to help others.

“We opened in 1999, just at the end of that year, December, and have been in business over 15 years now,” Harrell said.

“I worked in an adult day center for seniors in Birmingham. There was another company that provided private care and nursing services. I thought I could do a better job. I started doing research on what it would take to start a company. I was a nurse, and everything I read said do what you do best. I loved working with and taking care of seniors, talking with them,” she said.

“I took the plunge and started my company. I had recently lost my husband and had three small children. I thought, naively, that it would be simpler working for myself. I had no idea the commitment I would make. It ended up being twice the time.”

Though Always There may employ more than a thousand people in a year, with a steady payroll of around 300, in those early days, it was just Harrell.

“We were a hit from the beginning. I developed all our forms and procedures from the school of hard knocks. I really wanted to take care of a senior or family member (she stresses many of their patients are young, even children) when someone called — wanted to find the best way to get that done.

“I was the office manager, nurse. I did everything that first year. Then I hired one employee at a time until I was not the only one going out to make all the calls.”

As her business continued to grow, so did its reach. She opened another office in Tuscaloosa, which she later sold. Offices in Pell City and Huntsville soon followed.

After three years, Always There was so successful, she had the option to sell franchises in cities not in direct competition with her existing coverage area. Harrell said she has not really pushed that part of her business, but the option is always there.

“I have not pursued that because I enjoy running all the parts of the business in this area, but someone could buy one and open Always There in another city I am not in,” Harrell said.

And she remains a very hands-on owner involved in the day-to-day operations of her business.

“Most of the employees don’t know I am the owner. I am out there working with them,” Harrell said.

Currently, Always There serves right at 200 families in the Birmingham and Pell City areas and another 50 in Huntsville.

The services range from basic caregivers who do things like help with basic household tasks to skilled nurses who have the ability to go and administer medications, with many of their clients just needing a little extra help.

“Most people age pretty gracefully,” Harrell said. “The majority of people live to a ripe old age peacefully. To stay in their homes, they only need a little help. They can’t bend over to scrub the bathtub, or to go to the store, they may not be driving any more.

“Most of our clients are pretty sharp, pretty independent. They only need that little bit of help once a week or so.”

Other patients need more care, whether it is a child on a ventilator or someone who needs medications administered.

And that care extends not just to the patients, but to their families as well.

“We are there for the whole family. A caregiver can get physically sick if they are not getting sleep and rest, getting out of the house,” she said.

Equally important, Always There knows where to send families and patients to find any additional resources they may need. “When you need help, knowing where to turn for the best help is very important,” Harrell said.

One of the keys to the long-term success of Always There is that it is truly a family affair.

“All of my children are involved,” Harrell said. One son, who is a web and graphic designer has built their website and designed some of their brochures. Another son who is an attorney provides advice and counseling.

“My youngest daughter graduated from Alabama with an advertising degree. She is coming on board to do our marketing and advertising. She was at al.com and has grown up in the business and understands what I do,” Harrell said.

“My husband came to work for me about five years ago, he handles the billing, IT. I am the dreamer; he is the one who keeps it grounded.”

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Marcus H. Pearson

Tales of a Springville inventor, entrepreneur

Story by Leigh Pritchett
Photos by Wallace Bromberg Jr.
Submitted photos courtesy Carol Waid

Marcus H. Pearson was a small, quiet, humble man, with big ideas that made an impact on farmers, herdsmen and churchgoers.

Those big ideas netted two patents (one when he was just 26), made putting up wire fences a little easier and aided congregations with their building projects.

Oh … and his chicken house once held Auburn University’s live War Eagle mascot.

According to granddaughter Carol Pearson Waid of Springville, Pearson was quite the entrepreneur. “Granddaddy had several different businesses.” Among them were Pearson Lumber Co. and Sawmill, a grocery store and a gristmill.

All were on property situated at US 11 and Cross Street. Also on the site were Pearson’s home, workshop that was full of punches and patterns, and, of course, the famous chicken house.

“All of this was Pearson property,” Mrs. Waid said about the expanse that surrounds Pearson’s home, where she and husband Frank Waid now live. “This is the house Grandma and Granddaddy built.”

The 1931 home features original wood floors and cabinetry, four fireplaces, a telephone directory from 1956, Pearson’s accordion and a bed that belonged to his grandmother.

The yellow building at the corner of US 11 and Cross Street that currently houses Louise’s Style Shop and C.E. Floral Gifts and Novelties was the grocery store.

Mrs. Waid worked at the grocery store as a girl. “I worked there for a nickel a day,” she said.

The lumberyard was behind Pearson’s house, as is the current home of grandson Tommy Burttram.

As for the gristmill, Burttram’s parents – Ed and Willie Pearl Pearson Burttram – remodeled it for their home as newlyweds. When they decided to build another dwelling, they relocated the gristmill and incorporated it into the architecture.

Being enterprising seemed to be a family trait as Pearson’s father, W.R. Pearson, was also a business owner. He operated a blacksmith shop just across US 11 from where the Waids live. Working in the blacksmith shop, Marcus Pearson learned smithing, buggy repairing and woodworking.

Kathy Burttram, Tommy’s wife, has a ledger from the blacksmith shop chronicling the work done there daily.

Close to the blacksmith shop was the home of Pearson’s parents. They had the first telephone, first radio and first bathtub in Springville. Mrs. Waid said neighbors came to see the bathtub with their towels in hand.

Born in 1879, Marcus Pearson received from his mother, Frances Amelia Truss Pearson, the lineage of the Truss family for whom Trussville is named, Mrs. Waid said.

As a child, Pearson watched the creation of what became a tourist attraction in Springville until the 1960s. Mrs. Waid explained that Springville gets its name from a spring, which later was transformed into a lake. “Granddaddy saw them dig (the lake) with oxen,” she said.

In 1909, Marcus Pearson’s red, Pope-Hartford Model B became the first automobile recorded in Springville. His was only the fourth vehicle to be registered in all of St. Clair County.

He married at age 41, played the accordion and harmonica, and did not believe in working on Sunday.

“He thought Sunday ought to be kept holy,” Mrs. Burttram said.

He was a disciplinarian, lived 95 years and enjoyed hearing Mrs. Waid play What a Friend We Have in Jesus on piano.

“Granddaddy was on the building committee of the ‘Rock School,’” Mrs. Waid said, referring to Springville’s historic hillside school constructed of rocks. “He wanted to build it on the level ground. But he was outvoted because people wanted it built on the hill so people from the train could see it.”

Mrs. Waid said one of Pearson’s friends was James Alexander Bryan, who was a noted minister and humanitarian in Birmingham. In fact, “Brother Bryan,” as he was called, officiated when Pearson married Opal Jones.

The Pearsons had three children, one of whom was Marcus M. Pearson. Son Marcus — Mrs. Waid’s father — assumed the lumber business in 1950, served on the board of education and was mayor of Springville in the 1960s, Mrs. Waid said.

When another son, Frank, decided to play baseball for Springville, the automobile that father Marcus H. Pearson had at that time served as the team “bus.” It was spacious enough to transport the whole team to the games, Burttram said.

Marcus H. Pearson actually held patents on two different plow designs. The 1907 patent was for improvements to make the wooden plow more durable and easier to manufacture, according to his application to the U.S. Patent Office. This farm implement also had adjustable handles and a design that would “take the ground better and … not choke up as rapidly as the ordinary plow.”

That plow and his Pearson Fence Stretcher — to keep wire fencing from tangling during installation – received a blue ribbon at the 1907 Alabama State Fair.

In 1951, he received his second patent, this time for a “regulator for flow of material from a hopper” affixed to a plow.

The hopper, explained Burttram, distributed guano (fertilizer) simultaneously with tilling.

The patent application states that the design offered “lever control without stopping use of the hopper, adjustment without a ratchet or wrench, (and) locking in a fixed position without a tool.”

Burttram quite literally had a hand in the manufacture of this model when he was but a lad of 10 years old.

“Tommy’s first job was working for Granddaddy Pearson,” said Mrs. Burttram.

With a chuckle, Burttram recalled that his grandfather did not ask Burttram if he would like a paying job. Instead, Pearson asked the boy if he would like to have a Social Security number.

Having a Social Security number was something to be envied, so Burttram naturally wanted one. When he received it, his grandfather put him to work painting distributor boxes on plows.

Burttram said he was paid 10 cents for each box he painted.

“I thought I was really something,” Burttram said with a grin.

Mrs. Waid warmly recounts going with Pearson to sell and deliver his plows. Traveling to Oneonta or Blountsville or wherever made the preteen girl feel pretty special.

She and Burttram said Pearson’s blue Studebaker pickup served as the delivery truck. All these years later, Mrs. Waid parks her automobile under the same carport where Pearson kept his Studebaker.

Also, one of the 1951 plows has a place of prominence on Mrs. Waid’s front porch.

At one point, Sears & Roebuck asked Pearson to put a gasoline engine on his plow as a prototype. It also had additional wheels for stability, Mrs. Waid said.

Through his lumberyard, Pearson established a legacy in several churches in the area, Mrs. Waid said.

For example, Pearson assisted in 1926 with the manse of Springville Presbyterian Church, which is noted by an historical marker, Mrs. Burttram said. (Incidentally, Mrs. Waid is secretary at that church.)

For Burttram and Mrs. Waid, the lumberyard was not a place of business, but rather a land of adventure.

They explained that the freshly milled lumber was placed in triangular stacks to allow the wood to dry.

“They made great, little playhouses,” Mrs. Waid said of the triangles. She and playmates also would get into them to picnic.

The imaginations of Burttram and his friends transformed the stacks into army bunkers.

And finally, we come to the story of how Pearson’s chicken house entered the annals of collegiate trivia.

In the mid-1960s, when Mr. and Mrs. Waid were married students attending Auburn University, Waid was a volunteer trainer and handler for the live War Eagle mascot. After a game in Birmingham between Auburn and its in-state rival, the University of Alabama, the couple spent the night with Mrs. Waid’s parents, who lived next door to the Pearsons.

Because the cage used for transporting the eagle was a little tight for an overnight stay, Waid decided to give the bird a place to spread its wings, so to speak. Thus, the little fowl guest was given accommodations out back in Pearson’s chicken house … minus the chickens, of course.

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Christmas People

Tragedy leads couple on magical journey

Story by Leigh Pritchett
Photos by Wallace Bromberg Jr.

Carl and Rexanne Brownfield do not mind being known as “the crazy, Christmas people.”

“Christmas is probably my favorite holiday,” said Mrs. Brownfield, who naturally was wearing red.

Year around, the décor in their home includes two Christmas trees. One is always adorned in Christmas finery.

The buffet in their hallway displays a collection of their favorite Christmas books, among them, Operation Christmas Child by Franklin Graham and Donna Lee Toney.

Overlooking the buffet are many family photos of their four children, 12 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

“So we have a huge Christmas,” Mrs. Brownfield said.

Four years ago, however, Christmas took on an even greater meaning for the couple and has grown to be part of who they are throughout the year.

Like so many defining moments, this one resulted from heartache.

On April 27, 2011, an EF-4 tornado churned through Shoal Creek Valley, leaving death, devastation and despair in its path.

Thirteen people, including a preborn baby, perished.

Brownfield found several fatalities as he cut through debris trying to reach rescuers working to get into the valley. Some of the injured were taken to what was left of the Brownfields’ home, where Mrs. Brownfield and others cared for them until help arrived.

In the weeks and months that followed, life for Shoal Creek residents seemed to be on hold as they worked to clean up and rebuild.

Later that year, Mrs. Brownfield — who adores all things Christmas — took her husband to Bronner’s Christmas Wonderland in Frankenmuth, Mich.

While his wife was shopping, Brownfield spotted an advertisement that actor John Wayne had once purchased a Santa suit from Bronner’s.

Brownfield thought about how the people of Shoal Creek Valley needed something to “build up beat down spirits.” They needed some joy and cheer.

He thought about how he had wanted to be Santa since he was 20 years old.

And here he was, in a massive Christmas store where he could get what he needed to be Santa.

Eight hundred dollars later, Brownfield had his first Santa suit.

Even more so, he became Santa, going to great lengths to find the right accessories for his suit and props for the stories he would tell children during his visits.

That first year as the Jolly Old Elf, Brownfield made appearances at three churches in the Shoal Creek area and one in Moody, at a Pell City day care and at a photo session at Shoal Creek Volunteer Fire Department.

The next year, the demand for the couple grew exponentially. Not only were they engaged for the same events as the first year, but also for a hospital, a children’s cancer group and others.

This year, their schedule contains all sorts of events, such as “breakfast with Santa,” private and company parties, a hunting club, parade, bank and even a hair salon in Georgia.

The Brownfields get bookings a year in advance.

All year long, the Brownfields are in Christmas mode. They are either thinking about, preparing for or actually being Mr. and Mrs. Claus.

Mrs. Brownfield, in fact, can often be found purchasing Christian coloring books, word-search books and plenty of colors at Dollar Generals. These go in gift bags for children who visit Santa.

Their appearances and the goody bags are the Brownfields’ gifts to all they see. They never charge for appearances.

When they are given donations, the Brownfields give them to Toys for Tots or to an entity that assists needy families in St. Clair County.

Being Santa and Mrs. Claus creates opportunities for them to tell children the real reason for Christmas, Brownfield said.

“(Rexanne) reads one of the Jesus stories” at events, Brownfield said. “Some people we visit, we are the only exposure to Jesus they get.”

Billy Wakefield, a friend of the couple as well as pastor of Bethany Baptist Church in Shoal Creek Valley, is “just proud of the fact they have used it like a ministry. They use it to share the message of Christ and bring joy to kids’ hearts, too. They have a tremendous passion for it. They take it to another level. It’s really who they are. It’s a calling.”

Once Brownfield became Santa, it was not long before he and his wife were asked to visit children with significant life circumstances. Some had experienced abuse or abandonment.

For some of these children, talking with Santa is therapeutic. They tell him things that they might not disclose to anyone else.

Visiting with Santa gives them a reprieve that brings a little laughter. Seeing those joyous faces blesses the Brownfields.

When a child smiles, “it’s just worth it,” Brownfield said.

The couple have no idea how much they spend each year preparing for and being Mr. and Mrs. Claus. Actually, Mrs. Brownfield said she is a little bit afraid to add it up.

She prefers to calculate it in different terms. If they are able to make one child smile or turn one person to Jesus … that’s priceless.

For the story from Santa and Mrs. Claus’ point of view, read the December 2015 and January 2016 print or full digital edition of Discover The Essence of St. Clair

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Ultimate Tailgating

Auburn Style and on TV

Story by Carol Pappas
Photos by Mike Feline, CNN HLN
and Carol Pappas

When Pell City’s Sandra Murray talks about how an Auburn game day tailgate party turns into a CNN event, she laughs and says, “When you’re not there, you get nominated.”

She and her husband, Dr. Ed Murray, have been hosting home-game weekend parties at their “Auburn House” for years. The house itself attracts plenty of attention. After all, it is appropriately painted orange and blue and sits conspicuously on a knoll overlooking campus and Jordan Hare Stadium.

In October, Ed’s aunt had passed away, and for only the second home game in 20 years, they were going to miss the party. So Sandra traveled to Auburn on Wednesday, set up everything for game day and asked friend Cindy Goodgame to host.

That weekend, she got a text from Cindy simply saying, “Call me when you can.” When she did, Cindy told her that someone from CNN tapped on the window and asked if they could film from the parking area of the house with the stadium for the backdrop. Oh, and they might film in the house.

Sandra said OK. Then another “oh” moment followed with Cindy adding, “And they need a woman to barbecue and compete in a cookoff, and I told him you would.”

“I said, What!,” And the rest, they say, is history.

Turns out CNN produces the HLN Tums Tailgate cookoff, which is set at various campuses across the nation during football season. The man at the window was producer Mike Phelan.

CNN Crews, as part of the cookoff series, have been at the Clemson-Notre Dame and Ohio State-Michigan State games. On this particular weekend, they came for Auburn-Ole Miss. The semi-finals will be in Atlanta for the SEC Championship game and the finals, in Glendale, Ariz., for the National Championship game.

Being a good sport, a good cook and enjoying the fanfare of a good tailgate party, Sandra obliged, cooking her original recipe, Cajun-fried chicken drumsticks with a Bulleit Bourbon sauce, for the competition. “It was only the second time I had cooked it,” she said. And it was only later that she learned famed chef Chris Hastings and Auburn’s Acre Restaurant use the same high-rye, award-winning whiskey in their own recipes.

At 5 a.m. on Friday and 4:30 a.m. on Saturday of the game weekend, a CNN satellite truck and other vehicles pulled up to the house and started unloading – lights, cameras, monitors. “Watching them set up was a lot of fun,” she said.

CNN and HLN sports anchor and correspondent Coy Wire, a former Stanford and NFL player, went over his lines. Cheerleaders from Auburn and Ole Miss arrived. Auburn Tiger mascot, Aubie, joined the fun. So did the Auburn Band. A crowd gathered. Lights, camera, action. “The whole progression was phenomenal,” Sandra said. “It was fun to work with them.”

She competed with Jeff and Jeremy Alexander of Athens, Ala., whom the Murrays have known for years. They own a game-day condominium behind their Auburn House. Coincidentally, they are professional barbeque cookoff competitors. They won the Sloss Furnace competition in recent months.

While Sandra’s drumsticks came in second, she wasn’t disappointed at all. “It was a lot of fun,” she said. “I’m tickled for them. It was good promotion for them.” The Alexanders’ winning dish cooked to order was a brisket. They also made a “Fatty” – Italian sausage taken out of the casing, flattened and topped with a mixture of peppers and onions, rolled up and wrapped in a bacon weave. It is smoked and then sliced into pinwheels. Hence, the perfect moniker.

“They’re serious,” Sandra said. For her, it was simply part of being a gracious hostess, even if her nomination came in absentia. The Murrays love to entertain, and the house they bought in 2004 underscores that notion.

It is the perfect game-day house. They completely redid the interior in 2005 – orange and blue motif and Auburn themed throughout. Mounted televisions are found in almost every room.

“When we found out Pella did navy-blue windows, we said, ‘Here we go!,’” she said, relating the story behind an orange and blue house. “When the crew was painting the house, people would pass by, blow their horn and yell, ‘War Eagle!’”

The house is comfortable and inviting – just like the Murrays. They have used the house for fundraisers and awards. The Pell City Cheerleaders were there for the Idaho game as part of an auction-winner event. “It’s for fun. That’s what it’s all about,” Sandra said.

And in typical, welcoming Murray fashion, she adds, “You know what we say: ‘One invitation lasts a lifetime.’”

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