Archie Harrell of A. A. Harrell Jewelers

Archie Harrell enjoys the holiday season at his store in Five Points, A.A. Harrell Jewelers.

This past December 5 was Archie Harrell’s 89th birthday, and he is still on the job in Five Points. He and Mrs. Harrell have been working in Five Points for more than 50 years.

Born in Savannah, Harrell finished Savannah High School and soon went to work for Friedman’s Jewelers, also in Savannah. In the spring of 1936, Friedman’s asked Harrell to move to Columbia to work at 1428 Main Street which is on the street level below today’s SCANA headquarters. At the time Miot’s Drugs was next door, and the Imperial Hotel was on the corner. Mayo’s Men’s Shop was also in the same block.

After a year or so in Columbia, Harrell was asked by Friedman’s to move, this time to Macon, Georgia; however, the U.S. Army came calling in early 1942, and Harrell joined the war effort for the next three–and–a–half years. With his store management background, the military made a medical records staff sergeant out of Harrell and kept him in Camp McCall, North Carolina, just outside Hamlet on U.S. 1, for the duration of the war.

After the war, Harrell returned to Friedman’s, this time in Atlanta’s Five Points near the original Rich’s, still run by Mr. Rich. The big deal in Atlanta in those days was the night club in the Henry Grady Hotel, where Portman’s Hyatt was built in the mid–60s. Also, movies at the Fox Theater were a real treat, to include the stars in the ceiling that came on while the organ player on a hydraulic platform rose from the lower level before each movie began.

Mr. and Mrs. Harrell in their 1947 Oldsmobile Series 76 tooled around town in style, mostly between their Decatur home near Emory University and downtown Atlanta. Movies at the Fox rated a once–a–week schedule.

In 1954 and with another Oldsmobile, the Harrells moved back to Columbia, built a house on Pine Branch Road, and started A. A. Harrell Jewelers in Five Points. The first store was behind Economy Drugs, about where the bar in Yesterday’s is located today. They operated there for 28 years and moved to their present location at 729 Saluda Avenue in 1982.

Like most of the buildings on both sides of Saluda Avenue, A. A. Harrell Jewelers pays rent to the Dehon estate. There has never been an opportunity to buy.

A. A. Harrell Jewelers sees third–generation customers while it shifts and responds to retail turmoil brought on by huge wholesale operations like Wal Mart, mail–order operations, and the Internet.

Mr. and Mrs. Harrell are successful business people because they are willing to change with the times but keep that personal relationship with their customers who obviously keep coming back.

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