parts; screws, nuts, bolts, nails, and locally grown produce. You could fill up your gas tank or buy fishing and hunting gear and clothing. Rent a movie. Drop off a UPS package. Refill a propane tank or get a bag of ice. Donate books to the Brown County Literacy Coalition. Drop off a bag of trash for pickup. Sometimes you could buy local artists’ work there, or a walking stick carved by Norma’ s husband Harry.
You could get a cold bottle of pop or a hot cup of coffee. On nice days, you could sit on picnic tables in front of the market and shoot the breeze with your neighbors. Or you could get one of Norma’ s sandwiches and sit in the back room. For a while, you could even get fresh-baked pizza.
Most importantly, however, you could say hello to Norma, interrupt the program she was watching on RFD-TV, and catch up on the latest gossip.
Norma married Harry in 1961, and they opened the store at Bellsville Pike on land they purchased from Harry’ s parents. They built the store only after getting permission from Eleanor Clark, who was closing her general store in the area. Crouch’ s Market started as a pole barn and went through four building expansions over the years. Harry died in 2013.
Crouch’ s Market was a community center for Van Buren Township, and Norma was the unofficial mayor. It seems like she knew
everyone in the area and most of the good and bad things going on. She had a wall of photos in the back room, memorializing new babies, hunting trophies, family moments and community events. That back room also hosted birthday parties, unofficial breakfast clubs and genealogy meetings, along with a pool table and an old-fashioned scale.
Her son Wendell recalls the blizzard of 1978, a time when lots of farmers still lived in the Pikes Peak area and a group of them took it upon themselves to clear snow from the roads. Of course, they congregated at Crouch’ s Market, and Norma mapped out the routes for each to take. Wendell said she would also sometimes give the farmers a sack of groceries to deliver as they plowed, and residents would come to the store and pay for the groceries when they could get out.
Norma didn’ t hesitate to lend a hand, whether it be posting a flyer about a lost pet on her community bulletin board, pitching in on the latest charity effort, passing out maps for the studio tour, or getting behind a petition she thought was worthwhile. She sponsored Little League teams and 4-H projects.
And yes, even in the early 2000s, you could cash a check or run up a tab at Crouch’ s if you happened to be caught short in the wallet.
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