Will Cothern's Grocery Store
Picture provided by my two aunts, (nieces of Will) Helen Cothern Graybill and Estelle Cothern Rush.
Left to right: George Allen Cothern, William (Will) F. Cothern, Unknown, Lucy and Ruby.
William F. Cothern was born Feb. 20, 1875. He died July 4, 1949. Will was the first child of Thomas
Allen Cothern and Elizabeth Frances Piper. He married Elizabeth (Bettie) M. Angell on March 17, 1907.
They had three daughters, the first being Irene who married James Walter Merryman, second child
Lucy Alma married Willard F. Norris and their third daughter Ruby married Frazier (Dick) Armistead.
Will Cothern was in the grocery business for several years in Carthage. The picture above is of a
store located on Main Street, and I believe, 4th Street in Carthage. It was taken sometime between
1925 and 1930. At the bottom of the picture on the floor in front of the pan you can see a live
chicken with its feet tied. Also in the glass case you can make out boxes of Cracker Jacks and dates.
My grandfather, George Cothern, the man in the back to the left worked as the butcher for Will Cothern.
On the Smith County site there is a picture of Will as one of the members of the Men’s Bible
Class (1928) of the First Baptist Church of Carthage.
After Will’s oldest daughter Irene got married in 1927, her husband, James Walter Merryman,
went into the grocery business with Will. The picture below was taken in the early 1930s.
It is of my uncle (Will’s nephew), Robert Cecil Cothern, who drove a delivery truck for them.
Robert Cecil Cothern