George Lamar Gassett, 91, of Dickson, TN, died at home on August 26, 2025.
Lamar was born at home during the Great Depression on November 2, 1933, in Skipperville, Alabama (two miles north of Ozark), to Marion Grady Gassett and Elberta Dykes Gassett.
The second of eight children, his siblings later began calling him “Dr. Jenkins” or “Doc” because--in imitation of the town doctor--he had the habit as a young boy of collecting little glass medicine bottles and carrying them in his pockets.
He began work for the V. J. Elmore store as a stock boy at the age of sixteen in Ozark, AL, then Brewton, AL, progressing to assistant manager of the store in Bessemer, AL. (Trivia: Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird had Jem purchase for Scout a much-desired “bedecked baton” from the V. J. Elmore store.)
Blessed with a keen mind, Lamar was employed in military service as a cryptographer (“someone who writes or cracks the code used for data security”) at Ft. Gordon, GA, after the Korean War.
Bessemer, Alabama, was a hotbed of strife during the Civil Rights era, and Lamar was known for his fairness thus demonstrated when he hired a Black stock boy “because he was best for the job,” and allowing Blacks to use the bathroom at his store, his business being, after all, 90% Black. The KKK was watching and placed a burning cross in the front yard of his home.
He became manager of V. J. Elmore at age 23, and managed stores in West Point, GA, Bessemer, AL, Cullman, AL, and Dickson, TN, where he relocated with his family in 1971, when Stewart Culpepper went into another profession. At that time, Dickson’s Elmore was the first 25,000-square-foot store in the chain, a “big deal back then.”
Lamar was a former president of the Lions Club in Cullman, AL, and active in that of Dickson. He was a deacon at First Baptist Church and attended Pomona Baptist. He was a proud member of the Republican party and was once described by Mike Petty as being a Republican “before it was cool.”
Before retirement, Lamar loved bass fishing and detailing neglected bass boats to sell. He loved bluegrass music and the old hymns, especially The Old Rugged Cross, and Squire Parsons’ Beulah Land. He had a bass singing voice and played harmonica.
He founded and managed the Main Variety Store (in the building that formerly housed Kuhn’s) on Main Street, Dickson. The store was reminiscent of days gone by in that it had wood floors and a mechanical horse. Local merchants, including Henry Ragan, would show up at the snack bar for coffee well before dawn.
Lamar had a great sense of humor, and he and the other local merchants of the day would often play practical jokes on each other, such as hanging a black wreath on a store’s front door when a particular college football team lost. He once sent a letter to his dentist as if the current president had written it, enlisting his good friend, Roberta Jackson, to write it by hand. He loved good, clean fun, with a little mischief thrown in.
Although his friends have all “gone down the valley,” he spent many happy moments gathering for coffee at Mrs. Winner’s (the current location of Popeye’s) with special friends, Warren Medley, Donnie Weiss, Sr., Johnny Miller, and Dr. Carter Elmore. If those walls could talk!
He was a fervent reader of newspapers, news magazines, and anything historical, reading newspapers from cover to cover. At age 90, when given the 700-page book of the Memoirs of US Grant, he read it in a matter of days.
His choices of television shows consisted of conservative news stations, TCM, Andy Griffith, and Westerns. It was difficult to stump him on trivia about any old black-and-white movie as he had seen all the very best. A champion of conservative politics, he was always highly informed.
He taught his three daughters to strive for excellence, and that no job was too menial. “If the floor needs sweeping, do it.” He was a man of faith who always took his family to church. And they had better have their Bibles and Sunday school lessons!
He will be remembered for being a very generous, humble man, who modeled the utmost in contentment and frugality, never complaining, or boasting. Singularly, he loved cats and provided a sweet home to numerous strays over many years, indulging them in special treats, and spending more money on them than he ever spent on himself.
Lamar had a particularly memorable laugh in which he would throw back his head and clap his hands.
He is missed every day.
He is survived by his three daughters, Julianne (Will) Robertson, Laura (Roger) Williams, and Ruth Kirkland, grandchildren, Jack (Stacey) Williams, Mark (Whitney) Williams, and James (Candace) Van Allen. The great grandchildren are Michael, Jacob, Kaylie, and Lily Van Allen, Bree Williams, and Eleanor Williams. His two surviving brothers are Edgar Gassett and Carl D. Gassett.
