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furniture + home goods by Chase Tipps 704.779.0000 prairieschool.craft@gmail.com facebook: Praire School Design instagram: prairieschool as the Assistant Store Manager, but I was trained as a Plant Pathologist at ABAC. It was a two-year program, but I stayed four before my parents figured it out. I’m a certified plant pathologist with a minor in agronomy. I went to work with the US Department of Agriculture in the plant pathology laboratory in Tifton for 18 months.” Hardy got a call from Uncle Sam in 1956. “I got stationed in Thule, Greenland. They told me, ‘You’re going to love this because there’s a woman behind every tree. Well, there ain’t no trees in Thule, Greenland. I was there 371 days and a few hours. When I left on January 17, 1958, it was 65 degrees below zero.” When Hardy returned home again, he went to work at Piggly Wiggly in McRae. “Back in those days, people had to work. You didn’t wait until something came along. I kind of enjoyed it, but I was trained in agriculture. I wasn’t going to stay there.” Hardy was sent to Waynesboro, Georgia, where he met his wife, Mamie. “She was a Registered Nurse in the Burke County Hospital. She was quick to chase me down.” I laughed. It was easy to see why Hardy has held the position of Tail Twister in the Lyons Lions Club for so many years. Hardy returned to military service during the Berlin Crisis in 1961. “President Kennedy decided he needed my help. I jumped out of a few airplanes and went to OCS (Officers Candidate School). That was the biggest mistake I made. I couldn’t get out.” He gave me a smile. “I went to Fort Benning, and I was in the Signal Core, which required me to have a ‘Top Secret’ security clearance. They’re the people who handle communications. When I came back home, I was offered a job with Southern Nitrogen Company right here in Lyons. “When the Cuban Missile Crisis came along in 1962,” Hardy said, “I had two weeks to get all my stuff in order. They said, ‘Don’t tell your wife, your sweetheart, or anybody else where you’re going,’ which was easy since they hadn’t yet told me.” Hardy was sent to a Federal Security Office in Fort Meade, Maryland. “They locked us up in a building. There were six of us and a supervisor. I’ll never forget when the orders came through our office that President Kennedy said that there were three ships going into Cuba. The orders were to board them, search them, or sink them, more or less.” A three-month term of duty turned into eleven months. When Hardy returned home to Lyons this time, he went to work with Kaiser Agricultural Chemical Company. In 1970, he and Arthur Lee Meadows bought out Stanley and Pughsley’s Gin company. “I did that for 22 years. Pineland Paper Company came along, and they wanted it worse than I did, so I sold them everything I had on the #1 Hwy.” For the next 20 years, he worked with the state as a Farm Manager. It’s hard not to become cynical about patriotism these days. But while everyone else is debating politics, people like Hardy and the members of the Lyons Lions Club continue to give honor and respect to those who serve and protect our nation. They model honor, and honor always protects freedom. ��TCM *Lions100.lionsclub.org For more information, visit the Lyons Lions Club on Facebook. 112 Toombs County Magazine


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