As Johnson City, Tennessee, looks back on its 150-year history, a storied business reaches a landmark anniversary of its own.
The Shamrock Beverage and Tobacco Shop is one of Northeast Tennessee’s oldest food and beverage operations. It opened at a shaky time, on St. Patrick’s Day in 1929, just seven months before the stock market crash. Two years later, as the Great Depression was gripping the country, Lafe Cox bought the business, and it’s still in the same family today. His son Jack Cox runs it, along with Jack’s wife Sheila.
Lafe had worked for Liggett’s, a drugstore on the corner of Main and Roan in Johnson City. Like a lot of businesses at that time, The Shamrock had fallen into debt. Jack says his father talked to the creditors and assumed the debt, which Lafe and his wife Ethelyn soon paid off.
“It was a Rexall store back then, a typical drugstore,” Jack tells us. “I’m sure they had ice cream and sandwiches, like hot dogs and pimento cheese. They made their own syrups for fountain drinks, and they had curb service, with curb hops.”
The Shamrock survives in that very same location, at the corner of West Walnut Street and Buffalo. Curb service is gone. Most customers walk inside to order or drive up to the window. New sandwiches have been added, but the menu remains largely unchanged.
It’s the only place we know where you can buy chicken salad sandwiches and slaw dogs alongside Golden Virginia Burley pipe tobacco and Arturo Fuente cigars.
In 1971, when Jack remodeled the business, he began selling house-made lemonade. He intended it to be a warm weather offering, but when cold weather hit, customers still demanded the drink. Although Jack introduced lemonade some 40 years after his family acquired the business, it turns out that he was not new to lemonade sales.
“Tom McKee (a former Johnson City mayor) and I, when we were kids, had a lemonade stand in Gilmer Park,” Jack remembers. “And The Shamrock is nothing but an expanded, glorified lemonade stand.”
Jack can squeeze about 165 lemons in an hour. He says it keeps his arm strong for trout fishing. Jack and his employees make a game out of squeezing lemons, seeing who can squeeze the most in a minute.
Over the years, Jack has become an expert on lemons. He points out that their acidity can vary by the season. Once he detected a latent orange flavor in some juice, and it gave him an idea. He added some freshly squeezed orange juice to his lemonade and offered that as an option for customers. It took off.
“Tart lemon, sweet orange,” says Jack. “And it was delicious. I think it’s one of the best drinks there is.”
Jack takes us through a labyrinth of hallways, stairs, and doors to what has become known as The Back Room, where lemon squeezing machines from the past 47 years are on display.
As that 1971 remodeling was taking place, Jack bought an adjoining laundry building, thinking he could use the additional space for an employee break room. Instead, it became a gathering place for the city’s politicos, professors, and professional loafers. Football and basketball coaches from nearby East Tennessee State University hold forth there. Former Senator Bill Frist has been a guest. Although the space feels like a 1960s fallout shelter, it has become an obligatory stop for anyone in the area who is running for office.
Chess matches take place in The Back Room. Family birthday parties are held there. A belly dancer once entertained the clientele. Near a fairly modern copy machine sits a donated television with rabbit ear antennae, covered with aluminum foil. “We can pick up a few ballgames on it and some news,” Jack says.
Two of the driving forces behind the longevity of The Shamrock are the work ethic and the wisdom of Jack Cox. He says he owes his work ethic to his wife, his parents, grandparents, employees, teachers, football coaches, Munsey Memorial United Methodist Church, and his children, Elizabeth, Caroline, Jackson, and Morgan. “It’s a team effort,” he says.
Johnson City is marking its sesquicentennial this year. As part of the celebration, we raise a glass of orange-infused lemonade and say “Happy 90th Birthday” to the little shop on the corner.
Fred and Jill Sauceman are the authors of the new book “Chased by the Wolf: A Life with Lupus and the Kidney Transplant That Saved It.”
Want More?
The article above appears in our May/June 2019 issue.
