Amy Stone begins downtown retail recruitment
Star Profile
Story and Photo by John Temple Ligon

Amy Stone

In downtown Columbia, there is no Belk's at the corner of Hampton and Main, and nearby Penney's left decades ago. Nothing replaced Elizabeth Wolfe while Lourie's closed its women's shop on its second floor. Britton's on Devine happened when Britton's on Main left about the time Macy's shuttered after Mayor Bob Coble and Jim Leventis went to NYC to talk Macy's into staying put.

Sylvan's stayed, and Proctor's Shoes became Main & Taylor Shoes. Lourie's is pledged to Main Street, and Granger Owings has built a loyal following, but there is still very little for the men and practically nothing for the women.

That's Amy Stone's problem to analyze and her job to solve. She works for the City Center Partnership as their vice president for retail recruitment.

Stone's father worked at Robins Air Force Base when she was born in Hawkinsville, Ga. Her mother helped produce sheets for Sears in nearby Perry, Ga.

Stone attended public schools in Hawkinsville through high school graduation. Among her 69 classmates, she was an active student in her senior year: student body officer, actor, cheerleader, and other titles besides maintaining a high academic standing.

Stone started college at Middle College in Cochran, Ga., just 10 miles from Hawkinsville. She planned to enter the theater program at the Athens campus of the University of Georgia; however her plans changed when her future husband showed up as a Gamecock player in the 1969 Peach Bowl in Atlanta. She was there competing for Peach Bowl Queen. She transferred to USC's Columbia campus in her junior year. She graduated and married in 1972. She has been with Greenwood- born Mack Stone ever since.

Almost immediately after graduation, Stone began teaching at Irmo Middle School and taking graduate courses at USC. When her husband transferred to Greenwood to manage its new civic center, she commuted to Columbia to finish graduate school. She also supervised the S.C. Vocational Rehabilitation Greenwood office.

After several years in Greenwood, the Stones moved to Myrtle Beach, where her husband took over their convention center, and she continued with S.C. Vocational Rehabilitation in Conway.

Stone became the director for alumni affairs at Baylor School, Chattanooga, Tenn., and her husband managed the first five years of the Chattanooga convention center. She was Baylor's first female administrator. Baylor School, founded in 1893 as a military academy, went co- ed in 1986.

Stone annually raised up to $725,000 for Baylor School and directed $30,000,000 for its capital improvements.

The Stones moved to Phoenix, Ariz., where she became director of development for the Arizona Museum of Science and Technology, and he became the boss for the civic compound, including the symphony hall and baseball stadium.

In 1991, the Stones returned to Columbia. He produced trade shows, to include associating with the Bobbin Show. He then became general manager of the Columbia Metropolitan Convention Center. Amy Stone worked as Hammond School's first full- time director of development, raising enough funds to erase $3.2 million in debt and to build a new library, dining hall, gym, and arts center.

Amy Stone sees downtown Columbia becoming a retail destination anchored by more restaurants on the order of Hampton Street Vineyards. With 60,000 people within a five- minute drive of downtown, it's a short trip for the critical mass necessary to make downtown work as a retail center.