Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, February 2, 1995 TAG: 9502030036
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: SALLY HARRIS CORRESPONDENT
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Long
"We had to put 2x4s on bricks to walk around in the water," she said. "We'd pick up sopping-wet clothes and hang them outside to dry."
Stuart looked back on the Y's growth as the thrift shop made its sixth move last weekend - this time to the old Wade's location in Gables Shopping Center. Because of the recent snowstorm, the thrift shop will reopen today, a day later than planned.
With the addition of Harris Teeter and Advance Auto Parts, each scheduled to open during the next year, Gables is nearly full. Bob Pack of CP Partnership, Gables' owners, said it's been nearly a decade since the center was 90 percent leased.
Stuart "gave birth" to the thrift shop in the early 1970s and watched it grow beyond its original goal of helping international students and low-income people.
"We had international students come here from warm countries and have no warm clothes and no furniture," she said.
The shop started in a little space in back of the Student Co-op and then moved into the basement of the Wesley Foundation where volunteers made sales tables from furniture left over from an unsuccessful coffee house. Next, it moved to a basement room in the Heavener's Hardware building and eventually expanded into all three basement rooms. Volunteers made clothes racks from pipes pulled out of a decaying house and used other odds and ends to set up shop.
The shop moved twice more before the recent move to Gables from its position across Main Street near Southern Discount Furniture.
All along, the shop has depended on the help of a great many people, among them: the Arndt family and the late Thelma Roper, who helped get the business running; Cornella Dyck, who was there through the shop's water-wading episodes; student Wayne Bradford, who ran the shop one summer and helped move it; Katie Hackett, who also ran the shop, and her husband, Jim, who hauled donations in his truck; Don Fessler, who gave many hours of volunteer time; and Hugo Neuburg, who fixed up the old van the shop finally purchased.
These days, along with its volunteer help, the shop employs workers.
"It's now a triple service," Stuart said. "It employs people, helps people who need its services, and helps support programs of the YMCA."
The new location in Gables is ideal for the growing shop because it has ample parking and lots of space on one floor, said Barbara Michelsen, Y director. The Corps of Cadets, Y students, the Rugby Club and others helped with Saturday's move.
Terry Cobb, an associate professor of management at Tech, and his son, Shawn, dismantled the bookshelves they built for the store seven years ago and reassembled them in the new space, which includes a children's corner. Helping the Y Thrift Shop is a way of giving back, Terry Cobb said. His classes have helped design the layout of merchandise and determine potential donors.
Wes Judkins, 83, has been a volunteer since retiring in 1976 from Virginia Tech's horticulture department. Until a recent illness, he spent half his time in his basement workshop sanding and finishing scratched pieces of furniture, fixing loose parts, making wooden legs for formica kitchen table tops, and building furniture for the shop.
The store will carry the same types of items as before - furniture, clothing for the whole family, household items, books, vintage clothing, collectibles. Recycling is its lifeblood. Personnel bought clothes racks when Roses, Heironimus and a Roanoke store moved. And, to fill those racks, donations have been pouring in.
"We'll start out well-stocked," said store manager Janice Sherman. "And then we'll go to the community for more donations. We haven't had the space to ask people to recycle with us as much as we would like. People are interested in recycling now. It's very important, and I think we'll get good results." Items donated need to be clean and in good condition, she said, and should be brought to the loading dock in back.
Who buys Y Thrift Shop items?
"Everyone," Sherman said. Collectors. Students. Workers. People looking for books or records. People needing costumes. "At Halloween, it's really energized because of all the students shopping for costumes. It's really in demand if it's polyester or has the Brady Bunch look."
George McNeill, director of the Virginia Tech Highty Tighties, gets out-dated method books to use in his teaching and give to cadets interested in learning more about their musical instruments. He was particularly glad to find a copy of Axell Christensen's "Instruction Book for Modern Swing Music," copyright 1937, because it's hard to find information about the harmonic study of music during the 1920s and 1930s.
Another frequent shopper, Freyja Bergthorson, says she buys "pretty much everything there," from children's clothes to household items and furniture. "The price is right," she said. "We shop there and then donate back things we no longer need."
She also has seen the value of the Y's international women's programs. "So I know when I buy things at the Y, not only am I recycling. I'm helping the programs of the Y."
Though the shop opens today, the ribbon-cutting ceremony will be held Feb. 17. A grand opening will be held Feb. 18, at 3 p.m., complete with a fashion show of shop clothing (worn by celebrity models from the town and campus), music and refreshments. Shopping hours are 10 a.m. to 4:50 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. Donation hours are 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday.
by CNB