New Habitat Store in North Florence

The old Liberty Super Market at Seven-Points in North Florence sits vacant no more. The Habitat for Humanity Re-Store has moved from its South Royal Avenue location to the intersection of Royal Avenue and Howell Street. This building is roomy and more appealing than the site of the old store, plus it offers an abundance of off-street parking.

Those who grew up in North Florence, once known as Needmore, have fond memories of the old Liberty grocery, where former police chief Rick Thompson once toiled as a bag boy. After Liberty's closure, Martin Industries purchased the building for its engineering department. Perhaps the Habitat managers will find time to remove the unsightly testing tower erected by Martin. It's one of the few unsightly edifices located in the quaint community.

With everyone searching for a bargain, this expanded store should be a first stop for those in the market for home improvement paraphernalia. Plus, when we make a purchase there, we're not lining the pockets of corporate executives, we're helping to build our community.


What's up with this: It seems Florence animal control officers partially blame Tennessee residents for the high number of abandoned animals at the local shelter. Hopefully our friends to the north will be shamed into building their own shelters. It's another sad commentary on how we treat those who can't help themselves.

Unsolved Murders: Christopher Stanback - Part I

Chris Stanback's MySpace profile lists his age as 31, but his photograph is that of a 17 year-old boy, the age at which the Colbert County teenager died. The accompanying short bio prominently features the $20,000.00 reward for information leading to an arrest in the case, evidence of the desperation haunting the Stanback family for the past 14 years.

The summer of 1994, Christopher Stanback, known to his friends as Chris, returned from his home in Idaho to spend the summer with his mother Teresa, brother Harold, and sister Tara. On August 2, 1994, Teresa Stanback reported her son missing. Four days later, two children playing in a wooded area near the Carver Heights housing project found a body.

Speculation that the body was Chris' spread throughout the West Florence neighborhood, and soon a crowd of over one hundred spectators had gathered to watch Florence Police retrieve the remains. Many in the crowd of predominately young males tossed rocks and bottles at the authorities as they tried to move the body without disturbing any forensic evidence. Helicopters hovered overhead, their presence having no discernible effect on the crowd that was rapidly growing into a mob.

It had been less than three months since Florence Police officers had conducted a nighttime raid on the black neighborhood, arresting numerous drug dealers in what then Florence Police Chief Rick Thompson had dubbed Operation Copy Cat. To most of the gathering mob, Chris Stanback's death was just more proof that the police couldn't be trusted. Fortunately, local black leaders managed to control the growing crowd when authorities couldn't. Once the barrage of rock and bottle missiles halted, police retrieved the body and secured the scene.

Those who saw Chris Stanback's body realized that more than four days of summer sun had left an imprint on the murdered youth. What an autopsy later determined to be the results of a combination of beating and mutilation, the police took to be evidence that the body had been burned before it was disposed of. While their initial finding may have been easily explained under the circumstances, it only served to enforce the black community's opinion of the Florence Police Department: Truth was the last thing on their minds.

To be continued...