News From The Round Table At Pouland's

Jean McCollum was in town visiting with her mom, Bettye Greer. They didn't spend much time in Diboll before traveling to Center to see Bettye's greatgrandbaby, Camille. Her parents are Collin and Courtney Greer and her grandparents are James and Becky Greer also of Center. Collin works in Nacogdoches for Vesco, a poultry chemical company. James is a retired county agent and has a daily morning radio program, runs tennis tournaments for the school, sells Charolais bulls and is active in his church. His wife is Dr. Becky Greer and she teaches in the Human Resources department at SFA.

During Becky Greer's spring break from SFA, she and James planned a vacation to historical Savannah, Ga., which has lots of parks, courtyards and Spanish moss. They also visited the park bench where Forrest Gump sat. They called Bettye from Paula Deen's restaurant while eating fried green tomatoes and later drove over to Hilton Head and enjoyed the scenery there.

Carla (Havard) Waggonner took a couple days off from the newspaper to go mud-hoggin' with her two boys, 12-year-old Hunter and 7-year-old Jake, husband Hank and the two family dogs. The boys really wanted to see their mom get dirty; Carla said she kept the mud out of her hair but not her boots.

Lacy Chandler came in one day during spring break. Her daughter Lindsey wanted to have her new red Honda "detailed." So, the firm of L&L, Lacey and Lindsey, got busy! Karon Lenderman convinced her husband Dennis to go to Shreveport during her spring break. They visited the big sporting goods store and ate at the Saltgrass Steak House; they didn't say what else they did. Bebley Garr was enjoying her spring break from teaching primary students when she came in to buy cattle cubes.

Mary and Woody Ingram drove to Edmond, Okla., outside of Oklahoma City, to help their son Trey and his family get moved into another home. Trey, Clis, Nate, Wood and Ella have built eight snowmen during this winter season. Trey works for Great White Energy Services. Woody says Edmond is about 350 miles from Diboll.

Judge Esther Barger was spending some time with their oldest grandchild, Jacqulyn Richardson, who is on spring break from the first grade in Plano. Her parents are Robin and Mike and she has a younger brother Sam who is 4 and a sister, Lauren, who is 18 months. Jacqulyn has always wanted to ride in a VW bug and she got her wish when Esther borrowed a yellow one. Bob and Esther's son, Christian Barger, and his wife live in Kingwood where he coaches and teaches at Kingwood High School. They have two children, 5-1/2 year-old Bailey and 4 year-old Jack.

Haywood Quarles came in and let us know that his youngest son, Wiley Quarles, had an emergency appendectomy but has already returned to work at Temple-Inland's sawmill. For over 100 years someone in the Quarles family has worked for the Temple family business in Diboll beginning with Haywood's uncle, his father, him and now Wiley. Wiley is married to the former Christi Allbritten and they have two young sons, Reid and Owen. I'm sure Christi has had her hands full taking care of three boys.

Haywood is quite proud of being associated with Temple- Inland. It started after graduating from Diboll High School. With his experience he got a job in Houston working for Lowes Theater running a projector for $1.25 an hour. He came back to Southern Pine Lumber Co. to work for 75 cents an hour. He did return to Houston for three months and worked as a longshoreman, loading and unloading ships, for $2.08 to $3.27 an hour before coming back to work at Temple Associates in January 1953 for 90 cents an hour; that job lasted 31 years. On Jan. 1, 1956 he married the love of his life, Martha Honea, in the home of her brother and sisterin law, George and Faye Honea in Lufkin. That love affair lasted for more than 51 years until her death on March 10, 2007.

Haywood has left his footprint on many construction projects around here. In 1970 he was one of the contractors for Temple Associates when they built the original particleboard plant in Diboll. Bill Oates was the plant manager assisted by Charles Donahoe and Dick Donovan. In the 90s he helped with the renovation of that plant and the particleboard plants in Monroeville, La., and Thompson, Ga., working with John McClain.

Back to the 1960s, Haywood was Temple Associates' contractor at Texas A&M building a nuclear reactor and a science building. In 1963 he was in Waco building a 10-story office building when President Kennedy was assassinated. Later in the decade he worked with Lufkin Industries building the trailer plant, which covered eight acres under roof. That job was interrupted on a cold January day when the Diboll sawmill caught fire and burned. Haywood was responsible for the clean up.

He later built the Temple lab at Memorial Hospital and had crews at both foundries in Lufkin. Haywood and Martha formed Timberline Constructors in the 80s and sold it nine years later. After that, Haywood came back to work for Temple Inland as a construction consultant and has continued in that capacity until now. He is presently working on the completion of the new phase of Deer Trace subdivision. Haywood says it should be ready in about three weeks. An "open house" will be extended to the public when everything is final. Give us a call at 829-4040 if you would like to be notified and/or invited.

Gene Albritton of Gene's Front End came in for his weekly supply of ostrich feed. Robert Mayo bought the last of our seed potatoes. Jay Wyatt was in buying fertilizer for his yard in Deer Trace and Charles Schmidt was buying palletized lime for his and Carolyn's award-winning yard in South Meadows.

Members of the Phipps family, Charles, Charles Jr. and Edward, were all in buying Anasazi beans and catfish food. Thomas Anderson was in buying more disk blades to fabricate butane or charcoal outdoor woks. They are neat cookers for those that like to cook outdoors.

Our thanks to Hugh Robert Lyles for surprising us at lunch one day with fresh hot fried catfish. It was delicious! It made us put our lunch on the back burner. Deanna Lovell came in for five jars of Billie Jean's mayhaw jelly for her two sons, Colby and Colton. David Ward came in and bought a rake, Bermuda grass digger and hoe; he said it was for his wife, Ethel. We'll see.

Don't forget the Angelina County Master Gardeners' annual plant sale, 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, March 29, at the Angelina County Farmers Market. This is one of their biggest fundraisers to provide programs and projects for the community. They will have annuals, perennials, herbs, tropicals, heirlooms and many more. Maybe we will see you there or …'round the table.