By Pat Jenkins The Dispatch "For sale: Elbe Grocery Real Estate & Business. $295,000.GÇ¥ Care to own a piece of local history? Shelley Smith is selling one. An advertisement in The Dispatch has been seeking possible buyers for the mom-and-popish grocery store that's been part of the Elbe community as long as anyone can remember. It's also one of the iconic landmarks for people driving through on State Route 7 on their way to Mount Rainier and other destinations. Customers who stop out of curiosity or to buy food, beverages and supplies for camping or fishing might feel like they've stepped back in time when they walk through the door. The place has the old-fashioned look and feel of rural, smalltown stores that are increasingly few and far between. Smith is the store's latest owner. The former logger bought it about 26 years ago from the previous owners, Gene and Patsy Snodgrass, who he said were "good friends. Patsy wanted me to stop working in the woods and hoped I'd buy the store some day." Now Smith is 66, tired of running the store seven days a week, and wants to enjoy his nine grandchildren and do other things "while I can.GÇ¥ "It's time,GÇ¥ he said. "I don't want to do this any more. I never was that crazy about the idea of having a business. I just saw it as an investment. But here I am." Being a store owner was nowhere in Smith's plans for the future when he was younger. He was drafted into the military during the Vietnam War and served two years with the Army's 1st Cavalry. Later, he worked with timber companies as an independent contractor for 25 years. The year Mount St. Helens erupted, he said, he'd been working in the steaming volcano's red zone GÇô the area considered most dangerous in an eruption - and took a morning off to stay home and mow his lawn. It was the morning the mountain blew. Mineral was Smith's home for 40 years. Now he lives in the apartment that's at the back of Elbe Grocery and is part of the asking price for the store that includes the business, the building and the land. The building GÇô which once was on the opposite street corner before it was moved to where it sits now, facing the highway - originally was a hall for the International Order of Odd Fellows. IOOF, the initials of the fraternal organization that was founded in North America in 1819, are still prominent on the front of the store above the porch. Smith said the store's next owner will find that tourists are the biggest part of business during summer months. Considerable foot traffic comes from the steam train rides offered by Mount Rainer Scenic Railway from the depot across the highway. He said people visiting the store buy a lot of water and juice and often are just "curious. They come in to see what it's like."
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