Page 7 - Robeson Living Spring 2021

Evelyn Price at The Fashion Bar

She told her boss her plans and gave him a six week notice to second year we hired Annie Lee McDaniel as salesperson.
allow time to find and train her replacement. He was surprised In the early years if we needed cash to meet our obligations
and disappointed and asking her to stay with the offer of a nice mostly for merchandise coming in daily, Mr. John P. Stedman
raise. “In those days, CEOs in corporate America thought fe- at The Scottish Bank would allow us to make a 90-day loan.
males could not earn what males were making even though This worked out well for us and for the bank. I realized the
they were doing the same job with equal responsibility. I felt it importance of paying all bills when due in order to maintain a
was time for me to pursue my dream of owning my own busi- good credit rating.
ness”.
During this time, I enrolled Donna in a private boarding school
“My aunt and I went to our first market in Charlotte in August in Salemburg. It was a great school and Donna received excel-
1951. Mrs. Powers, the owner of The Fashion Shop in St. Pauls lent elementary schooling and training. She was with me dur-
at that time, introduced us to the Charlotte market. Back then, ing the summers and most weekends.”
Charlotte had a great apparel market. That same year we went
to New York to buy goods to stock our new store the following While going through old newspaper articles I found that the
spring. We opened February 2, 1952. The first year we were store was in the bowling league with lots of other businesses
able to pay off our loan to my uncle.” including Fleishman’s Dress shop, Beau-Nette, Stone’s Mar-
ket, Goodyear Sausage Plant, Colonial Stores, City Dry Clean-
Downtown Lumberton had a very vibrant business district. ers and Collins Department Store to name a few. The thought
Specialty stores included the Ideal Dress Shop, Fleishman’s, of these elegant ladies out bowling!
The Quality Shop, The Polly Anna Shop, Weinstein’s, Len-
non’s Men’s Store, Sullivan and Peacock shoe store, Schae- New Location
man’s shoe store. There were also drugstores, craft stores, sev- In 1956 the bank told her that they needed the space where she
eral chain department stores and the beautiful Lorraine Hotel. was operating her shop. Fortunately, the St. Albans Masonic
Lodge had recently completed a new three-story building on
“The next four or five years were very busy with lots of chang- Elm Street. The store relocated in the fall of the year. In De-
es. My aunt did all the alterations and I worked on the floor cember they held a men’s only stag night so all the salesladies
during the day and did most of the book work at night. The could work with the men to find the perfect gifts for the women

Robeson Living ~ Spring 2021 Page 7