I gave him a hard time about it you can be sure!!
Back then it was no secret that the bootleggers in the county and the beer store owners in New Hope as well as those in Etowah county just across the county line from Boaz were padding the church's preachers pockets to preach against alcohol especially before a wet/dry referendum vote!
When I would say something about it to one of them they would just remind me that they weren't making much for the convenience of me not having to drive off the mountain and they were always open, Sunday's and even late at night!! I agreed they were doing a great service for the community!!
Of course a trip to New Hope and the first and last chance beer store owned at that time by Johnny Cobb, was one of my regular, pretty much everyday routine trips, and stops if I happened to be working in Huntsville as I usually was. I am a 3rd generation stone mason and Johnny knew pretty much all the men in my family including me very well!!
Something about masonry work and beer drinking go hand in hand!
Anyway, I was laying stone on Johnny's mothers house in New Hope on January 26th, 1983, listening to the radio when the news that coach Bryant had died broke. I wasn't able to work after that, dumped the mud I had made up and to the beer store I went!!
Tears me up still to recall that moment in time...