Sally Smith had the tiger painted on the
side of the building as a birthday present
for her husband, John David Smith.
The tiger painted across the Esso side was
not John’s handy work but a birthday present
from Sally.
“I had to get that tiger painted there,” Sally
said smiling. “My grandfather drove an ESSO
truck all of his life. We have had a great time
decorating this building.”
The huge welcome sign displayed on the
opposite side of “The Shop” was a gift to
Stanfield, not from the town, but from the
Smiths.
“Artist Mike Phifer from Mooresville, he
designed it,” she said. “If you go through town
you will see ‘Holbrooks’. If you look real close
you can tell they had a Sprite sign painted
on their building. Well, our family, we are
horrendous Coke fans, so we were going to
paint a huge Coke sign. We wanted to make it
something community oriented. Mike started
saying how he had an idea— a welcome sign.
We fell in love with that sign. So instead of a
Coke or Pennzoil, I said, ‘John, you’re going to
get more mileage out of the Welcome sign.’ It
is beautiful and we get so many compliments
on it. We are proud of Stanfield. He was raised
here, and I was raised here.”
Even with its new roof, minus a porch,
plus a bathroom and some cement floors, the
garage still holds a special place in the heart of
every long-time Stanfield resident. No one can
tell if it is the freshly painted green and gold
welcome banner or the rusted gas pumps and
antique Sinclair sign hanging over the garage
that slows down the average passerby, but it is
obvious the garage is not just loved by locals.
The Shop has been featured in Carolina
Country Magazine, on the television program
“Our Towns”, and even in an Allstate Kasey
Kahne Commercial.
“It was in 2007. They first come and my
son saw them walking around. They had some
nice shirts on and were drinking some wine
coolers. He pulled in on the tractor asking
what they wanted. They wanted to rent out the
building, they wanted to film a commercial,”
John said. “He didn’t believe them, so he run
them off. I called those men and sure enough
they were from California and did want to
shoot a commercial. They came out here and
rented it for a couple of days and filmed. We
saw the commercial race day on Sunday. They
put in a pole and Kasey Kahne ran into it
blowing up a staged firework stand. They are
the ones who painted the 24-hour sign in red
on the building, they painted the office and
the garage signs in black too.”
Now days, John and Sally, as well as their
two children Axle and Josh, pass time in “The
Shop” laughing about past experiences as well
as creating new ones. John claims, “Me and
Sally have spent a many of nights with a cold
beer and some wine just listening to the juke
box play.”
Sally laughs reminiscing of a time not so
long ago.
“One Fourth of July it got freezing cold
out. We just started serving free hot dogs right
out of the garage. It was so unreal it was like
paranormal. Life gets in the way of having fun.
But we still manage to have a lot of fun here
and the community enjoys it.”
The Stanfield couple is also accustomed
4 WEST STANLY – THE MAGAZINE | WINTER 2020
to people using the old country garage as a
photo-op. John claims, “Senior pictures, kids’
Christmas pictures, I have even seen a girl in
a wedding dress out here. Easily, 50 to a 100
people come make pictures here.”