The year 1954 was a big one for the O’Shields family. I recall Daddy, my brother, Bobby, and a couple others gathering some tools from the old garage and heading across the field toward the west side of the house.

When I asked what they were going to do, Bobby replied “we’re gonna build a store.” Then the excitement began for me. A store. I could not believe it.

All the good things Uncle Grover had in his store would be close by in our own store. I don’t recall it taking that long to build. A few hundred concrete blocks, several shelves, mostly stocked with candy, I envisioned.

And so it was … O’Shields Grocery, a northern Pickens institution. We were on the map. We even had had rabies inoculation clinics there. It was a neighborhood meeting place

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