Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, March 7, 1992                   TAG: 9203070006
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV-8   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: By JOE TENNIS CORRESPONDENT
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG                                LENGTH: Medium

HE'S SEEN LEGGETT THROUGH 51 YEARS

"When they gave me that job, I decided never to look for another one," he said. "From the day I went in, there was never any reason to change."

That was 1941. Back then, Akers cleaned the place, burned the store's trash and stoked the furnace.

"We didn't have titles," he said.

Akers, 64, retired Friday as general manager of the Leggett store at the New River Valley Mall in Christiansburg. His position will be filled by Richard Workman of Seaford, Del.

Akers' climb up the Leggett ladder of success has been long but smooth.

He graduated from Christiansburg High School and served two years in the Navy from 1944 to 1946. After coming home, he returned to the downtown Leggett to work as a sales associate.

Six years later, he became the store's shoe department manager. Two more years and he was elevated to assistant manager of the store.

That promotion took him by surprise. "I wasn't expecting it really. . . . I was real delighted when it was offered to me," he said.

Akers has been general manager of the downtown store and, subsequently, the mall store since 1973.

Moving the Leggett store to its mall location "was the biggest move in my life," he said.

He fails to find the words to describe the change. "Could you explain day and night to me?"

After giving the subject more thought, he said the move reflected the overall strategy of the Leggett chain to move outlets from downtown locations to shopping centers.

Aside from Leggett itself, Akers also observed how the retail business has changed.

Sometime in the 1950s, he said, stores like Leggett gradually flip-flopped their sales base from 70 percent basic clothing - white shirts and dark slacks, for example - to what it is today: 70 percent fashion lines. Along the way, "prices quadrupled," Akers added.

The Christiansburg resident's retirement plans are "to play a lot of golf and do a lot of woodworking."

Akers lives with his wife, Louise. The couple has two children, Cindy Porterfield of Christiansburg and Barry Akers of Radford, and two grandchildren, Carrie and Katie Porterfield.

"I have mixed feelings about leaving," Akers said.

"I've been working six days a week all my life. So that will be a big change to wake up Monday morning and not have any place to go."