Country Stores

Until the late 1960s trips to town, Miller, were rare. When we lived on the Trautman place prior to 1961, I think we only went to town about once per month. It was 20 miles, the roads weren’t that good in the ‘50s and it cost too much in time and money to go. But there were country stores to rely on between trips to town.

Burdette

The Burdette Store was five miles from home. On that plot of at least five acres was the store itself, and two homes. One of the homes was owned and occupied by the proprietor, but I don’t remember his name. Just a half mile from there was the Burdette one room schoolhouse. To me, with my 3-8 year old eyes, and minimal experience with “town”, Burdette was rather metropolitan. I had never seen people living so close together. How did they manage when they could actually see the neighbors from their own home?

The store was two full storeys tall, with a footprint that was approximately 50 by 30 feet. As with many country stores, the top floor was a gathering space used for neighborhood dances and other social gatherings. Local bands playing waltzes, polkas, and the ubiquitous 2-step, were the norm.

The floors on both levels of the building were composed of narrow boards, well-worn and warped by moisture. The door into the store was centered in the front of the building, which was painted white. There were large windows made up of many small panes, on either side of the door. In central South Dakota, with very few exceptions, barns, sheds, granaries and other farm outbuildings were red while others were white.

There was a space toward the back with an old kitchen table and some chairs. Men sat back there, talking, smoking, chewing, spitting, scratching and playing cards. Women and children avoided that part of the store. To me it was mysterious and a little scary.

Common stock in the store consisted of a large variety of  foods sealed in tin cans, in addition to bread, milk, and non-perishables like pasta and dried beans. First aid items like band-aids, wraps, and aspirin were shelved. There were household items such as sewing goods, dish towels and cloths, dish and laundry detergent, and other routine goods. Hand tools that farmers needed were available: Hammers, saws, fencing tools, wrenches. There was a soda pop machine, lots of penny candy and candy bars. Plentiful penny candy was made up of jawbreakers, small chocolates, bubble gum, and other small sweets. Full-sized candy bars were a nickel.

Choice among groups of items was minimal. There may have been two brands of most foods. For pain it was aspirin or nothing because acetominiphen had yet to be developed. The soda pop machine held Coca-Cola products. In the 1950s, that meant perhaps three choices.

The soda pop machine was chest-type. It operated via an interesting mechanism. There were horizontal rails running from one end almost to the other end of the machine. Pop bottles hung by the neck between the rails, caught from falling through by the bulge in the bottle just below the cap.  The thick glass was contoured so that the bottle's diameter increased, hence trapping it out of the customer’s grasp. When the customer put a nickel in the machine, one bottle was loosened and the buyer slid it along the rails until reaching the end of rail, where the bottle was freed. On the side of the machine was an opener so the customer could pop the tin cap off the bottle.

There were a few frozen meats, but not many. Refrigerators of the 1950s and 60s were small, electricity to run them was uncertain, and freezers inside them were tiny and inefficient. If the housewife was lucky, it would freeze ice cubes.

Fresh fruits or vegetables were only available in the summertime. There were no hybrids grown in Florida or California that would withstand shipping to the High Plains. The roads were questionable, trucks unreliable, and refrigerated transport was too slow, inefficient, cumbersome and expensive.

Mom gave Kay, Jimmy, and I a quarter apiece for candy on the weekly Burdette excursions. For me, picking the right candy was an excruciating experience. A quarter was a lot of money! Even more, I had to get the best candy. While Mom shopped, I looked longingly at the candy, trying to get the best bang for my quarter.

There were jawbreakers for a penny, and they lasted quite a while, so that was good. Sugar Daddy candy bars cost a nickel and were also a good choice because they took a long time to eat. But Butter Brickle candy bars were so good!They were a nickel and smaller than a Sugar Daddy. One could spend a lot of time blowing bubbles with penny bubble gum too. What to do? What to do?!

When we got home, the three of us compare our little brown paper sacks to see who did the best. Whatever I chose, it always seemed that Kay and Jimmy had done better. It was so frustrating!

The store had shopping carts, about half the size of  early 21st century carts. When Mom was finished with the narrow aisles, she rolled the cart up to the well-worn wooden counter and placed her items there. Each item carried a sticker with the price listed, or that number was written in grease pencil on top of the can. The shopkeeper had marked each item by hand prior to shelving it.

The cash register was  large, heavy and entirely mechanical. It looked similar to, but not exactly like the one below. The shopkeeper picked up an item, looked at the price sticker, and punched the correct numbers into the register.  Numbers popped up in the window with the zeros, visible below, corresponding to the prices he entered.  There was a "clunk, clunk" sound with each key pressed, then he turned the crank at the side to add to the total. When he hit the "Total" button, a bell in the machine tinkled, the total amount showed up in the window, and the cash drawer popped open.

Similar to the Burdette cash register.

Mom nearly always paid with a check. The only other option available at that time was cash. Everyone paid with checks. That was the most efficient and effective means of paying for things. No identification was needed. It would have been silly in that circumstance.

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As of 2000, the Burdette Store still stood, though time had ravaged it. I believe it closed about 1970. It had endured other uses since then, and little care. It may not be standing now. It was a grand old building in its time, and a community hub.

Vayland Store, about 1990.

Vayland

We didn’t begin to make use of the Vayland Store until some time in the 1970s. It was located in the incorporated town of Vayland, south of the Heinzerling place ten miles. There were some homes, the store, and perhaps one or two more businesses still there when we were using the store. The train tracks sided at Vayland, next to two tall wooden grain elevators.

In appearance, function and use, the Vayland Store was very similar to Burdette. It was not as tall, though it did have a second storey and a large front window. By the 70s, trips to Miller happened about once per week, so we went to Vayland less frequently than we had to Burdette, and it doesn't have the same fond memories. Usually it was when there were a just a few basics needed and, since it was ten miles closer than Miller, it was a quick trip.

One noticeable difference was that the Vayland Store did not have a cash register quite like Burdette did.
One by one, the shopkeeper went through each item, using a stub of pencil to write its name and price on a slip of paper.

“Peas - 15c
Beans - 18c
Elbow macaroni - 5c”

Although it was time-consuming, it was how he kept inventory. When he was finished with the writing, he added up the total with a mechanical adding machine, and wrote it at the bottom of the slip.

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The town of Vayland is still there, though it doesn’t show up on most electronic maps. It is littered with dead vehicles of various kinds and conditions. The grain elevators are gone, either torn down or collapsed. I don’t believe anyone lives there now. Like the Burdette Store, the Vayland Store is much the worse for wear. I’m not sure when it closed, though I’m guessing before 1980. It too went through several transformations, the most debilitating of which was cutting a big hole in the front for cars to enter so it could serve as a garage. And like Burdette, it was still standing in 2000.

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For some time in the 60s, Mom’s little brother Wes Wade, owned and operated a country store south of Miller on highway 45. It was called the Ames Store and it was similar to Burdette and Vayland in all ways. Such stores  were common on the landscape of South Dakota and many other rural states. They had an important place, socially and economically, in the lives of their communities and in the life of the Heinzerlings.