Carl Lee Nance Turns 100!

Mr. Carl Lee Nance II, WW2 veteran and proprietor of RL Nance and Co in Ripley, one of the longest running family owned businesses in Mississippi now operated by the 5th generation of Nances, celebrates his 100th birthday today.

Tommy Covington, Tippah County Historian, wrote this about Carl Lee & his family’s hardware store last year: “The R.L. Nance & Co. hardware store has been on the east side of the square in Ripley, Miss., for about 100 years now. For most of those years, Carl Lee Nance Jr. has been in and around that store. He will be 93 this year. Both Carl Lee and his family’s store are Ripley treasures. In the summer of 2009, I recorded several conversations with him at his store in which I asked him to go around the square and talk about the businesses that once filled it. I used the recordings and photographs to make a DVD slideshow. The pictures are repeated many times during the slideshow. Carl Lee can be found in his store during business hours Monday-Saturday.”

You can see a fantastic video about Carl Lee’s life from Jimmie Covington here.

A celebration for Carl Lee will be held on Wednesday