Riding To Get The Scoop...
Took off for downtown Branson. My mission was to stop at Dick's 5 & 10 Store to get the scoop on a legend.
It seems that Dick Hartley spent most of his life going in the wrong direction. Coming of age at the end of WWII, Dick joined the Army and went to Japan just as most of the soldiers were coming home. He came home to start work for S.S. Kresge CO. Later he accepted a management position with TG&Y which took him to OK. However, this was about the time everyone was falling in love with the big high dollar retail stores. Dick and his wife nevertheless started their own little store in the late 50's in a sleepy little town of Branson. For a long time Dick was the only employee. He built of the displays himself. Then in the 70's his competitor went out of business and he seized the opportunity to move into the store on main street. Some thought he was making a move again in the wrong direction. Good news was that the little store with some 50k items struck a cord with visitors as their own hometown little store that carried everything you needed in their own youth years. Dick also displayed his other passions of aviation artwork some signed by pilots and their crews, signed baseball posters. Also a collections of arrowheads, trains and a working Wurlitzer Jukebox. One night in 2006 Dick locked up his store late, as his usual habit and went home where he died quietly in his sleep, slightly less than fifty years after founding his business. Dick's 5&10 continues to operate with his loyal staff, his wife, son and son in-law. The Old Fashioned Dime Store miracle is still alive and well in Branson, MO.
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