THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, December 24, 1995 TAG: 9512210048
SECTION: REAL LIFE PAGE: K2 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: By KATE HUNGER, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 104 lines
WHEN Barbara Rountree and Beverly Woodard took over the Cornland Grocery in March, they agreed to more than running what they say is the only store between Deep Creek and Great Bridge.
In their contract was a condition: allow Robin Woods, daughter of one of the store's longtime neighbors, to hold her wedding in the Chesapeake grocery.
The groom?
The Pepsi man.
That's what Rountree calls Robert Woods, the Pepsi delivery man who met Robin in the store three years ago. Robin said the store was her first choice for the April wedding, not only because she met her husband there, but also because it was part of her childhood ``stomping grounds.''
So the wedding was held in the grocery. Rountree and Woodard kept the store open, stationing someone outside to fetch orders.
Rountree and Beverly Woodard have known each other for more than 25 years. They said they and their husbands bought the business last spring because it sounded like fun. But they've learned it's also a lot of hard work. Rountree has lost 40 pounds.
The women spend six days a week bustling about the one-room store, which is open until 9 p.m. They often cook their families' meals in the back instead of at home.
``This is probably the first year in 25 we haven't seen the ocean,'' Rountree said. ``There are times we have a good time in here, and there are times when we don't.''
``We have no life,'' Beverly Woodard said.
What they do have is a place that charms its visitors with little touches. Like the small triangles of linoleum stapled to the wood floor in front of the register and believed to date back to the beginning of the grocery nearly a century ago. Or the pocket-sized cans of Society Sweet snuff tucked among the cigars and tobacco pouches, including a small stock of peach-flavored snuff for a ``little old lady who comes in once a week.''
A special case on the left wall is reserved for beer, one of the store's top items.
Another customer favorite: chicken eggs from a North Carolina farm. They're reputed to have two yolks apiece.
Gone, Barbara said, are the days when you could buy barbecue in the store. It's been replaced by fresh chicken and tuna salad, and soup.
``Nothing's made wrapped for lunch here,'' Rountree said. ``You figure if a working man is out working, and he's hungry, he doesn't want a little sandwich like this,'' she said, squeezing her thumb and index finger together and wrinkling her nose disdainfully.
The floor is left scuffed and rough, says Rountree, so customers won't feel they have to wipe their feet.
A hand-lettered cardboard sign on the wall behind the counter clearly spells out the single house rule: ``No profanity please!''
Public notices and advertisements plaster the double door in the front, and a solitarygas pump sits next to the porch.
And just off the corner of the snack racks hangs an odd assortment of used clothing for sale, all from the closets of the Woodards and Rountrees.
The store's kept them too busy to hold a garage sale of their own, so they brought their clothes to work to sell.
Lisa Hollingsworth ran the store with her husband for about six years before selling the business to the Rountrees and Woodards.
In choosing her successors, Hollingsworth looked for owners willing to continue its down-home atmosphere.
The Rountrees and Woodards have carried on some of Hollingsworth's practices - such as extending credit to regular customers, check cashing and ordering anything more than one person has requested. And they sell the lottery.
Some of the traditional services took a little getting used to for Rountree and Beverly Woodard - like checking game for hunters. Both admitted to crying when they saw the first deer carcass brought to the store.
Leon Spence, a 62-year-old produce farmer, lives half a mile down the road from the grocery. Spence is also the father of Robin Woods, the woman who married in the store.
As he sat in the shade of his packing shed recently, he reflected on the changes he has witnessed in the store.
No one knows exactly when the store opened, but he estimates it was about 100 years ago.
Spence said the McCoy family started the store. Spence can recall one of the family, Charlie McCoy, who operated the grocery until his death in the early '70s. Back then, Spence said, the store served as more of a community center than it does now. Just after World War II, the store was what Spence called ``the gathering place and the place for news.''
McCoy's wife ran the store for a short period after her husband died, followed by a succession of owners before the Hollingsworths bought Cornland.
Although Rountree and Woodard are unsure how long their stint as operators of the grocery will last, they recognize their place in the store's tradition.
Joshua Woodard, Beverly's husband, pointed to a bird nest in a corner of the covered front porch and noted it had lasted through two owners. And Beverly Woodard described the role the store plays in the community.
``It's like a city within itself,'' she said.
``It's `The store,' '' Rountree finished. ILLUSTRATION: Photo
MORT FRYMAN/The Virginian-Pilot
Barbara Rountree, left, and Beverly Woodard spend six days a week
bustling about the one-room Cornland Grocery, which they and their
husbands bought in March.
by CNB