Pax Country Cupboard and Hardware continues the legacy of Buck’s Store
Pax, WV — Long before shoppers entered Buck’s Store, they had a hint of its owner’s wry sense of humor. A sign above the crude wooden bench where Bucky Meredith and other men from the community gathered to smoke and talk always brought a chuckle. The familiar spot became known affectionately as the “Liar’s Bench.”
During the winter months, the local crop of “liars” huddled inside around a kerosene stove — the only heat for the small frame building. Reared back in wooden rockers, they swapped stories, argued over politics and rehashed the daily goings-on in their small Fayette County town.
Buck joined them until he needed to slice some bologna or Colby cheese for a customer or fish a giant dill pickle out of a glass jar on the counter.
The store’s inventory included “a little bit of everything,” Buck told customers. Groceries, pocket knives, aspirin and headache pills, hammers, nails, weed killer, roach bait, fishing lures — even night crawlers.
There was also a room with small antiques, primitives and other gift items.
But for the local gentry, Buck’s Store was more than a handy place to pick up something they needed on the spur of the moment. It was a place people could count on for a bit of homegrown humor, a tidbit of local news, a sliver of advice about how to grow tomatoes or use beer to kill garden slugs — or get a piece of Buck’s mind.
Most of the time, the friendly proprietor wore a denim train cap, a white T-shirt and bib overalls. He knew everyone by name and rarely, if ever, let a shopper leave without telling them, “Thank you. I appreciate your business.”
