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WBM july 2011
“Oh my gosh, you talk about one
fine-looking fella: he had on black
pants, a black golf shirt and he was
smoking a cigarette. He was so nice.
We went to the Pure Oil station,” a
local hang out where her crowd gathered
to drink beer and listen to the juke
box. Three nights later Johnnie Baker
told Estelle he was going to marry her.
Estelle says, “I was head over heels and
I still am. We’ve had our moments but
what a ride it’s been.”
Estelle explains how they came to
open a restaurant in a state government
surplus facility and save the
Crest Movie Theater from demolition
or other high profile enterprises.
“We’ve been given these opportunities,”
she says. “We make decisions
pretty quickly. I don’t think we ever
set out to do this,” she describes the
spirit of entrepreneurship that has
infused their marriage, and a shared
hard work ethic born from different
backgrounds — Johnnie’s from farming
with his father, Estelle’s somewhat
more urbane experiences working
in her father’s general store, as an
employee of Mount Olive’s parks and
recreation department and later as a
pickle counter at the Mount Olive
Pickle Factory.
Her family home is located across
the railroad tracks from the pickle factory.
Her great grandfather settled there
because of the transportation the railroad
provided.