New Neck City store offers ‘little bit of everything’

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May 6, 2009

Anonymous The Joplin Globe Wed May 06, 2009, 08:21 PM CDT

By Susan Redden

sredden@joplinglobe.com

NECK CITY, Mo. — For at least 40 years, residents of the Neck City area who needed groceries had to plan a trip to Joplin or Webb City.

No more. On April 27, the Neck City General Store opened for business, offering groceries, produce, some hardware and even ammunition.

“We want it to be a real general store, with a little bit of everything,” owner Mike Haase said of the store at Second and St. Louis streets.

The two-story block structure that houses the store was built in 1915, said Haase, who lives in nearby Alba. The former owners said a store operated there until the early 1960s.

Mayor Pat Gooch said he hopes the store will add to growth already under way in the small community in central Jasper County.

Excitement

“We’re really excited about it,” Gooch said. “We think it will help people in the city and the whole area.”

Gooch said he dropped by the store Wednesday and talked with other customers who said they like the store, especially Haase’s plans to offer fresh produce each Wednesday.

Haase said he sold out of fruit and tomatoes by noon Wednesday, but he still had some broccoli, squash, potatoes and onions.

“One woman told me it was a godsend, just to have something closer,” Haase said. “I’m going to try to help by keeping prices down. We want it to be a small-town store.”

He said he decided to open the business in Neck City “because I could get the building at a really good price, and I love small towns.”

Haase, who was born and raised in Joplin, said he hadn’t been to Neck City much before, but he likes “the town and the people” he has met so far.

“They like to stop in and talk; I like that,” he said.

Though he is the only full-time worker, Haase said his wife, Hoi, and stepson, Jordan Plemmons, also are involved in the operation. The store occupies less than half of the main floor, but he said they hope to expand to the entire downstairs and build living quarters upstairs.

“I’ve seen pictures, and that’s how it was when it was first built,” he said.

Town growing

Janice Lashmet said she has lived in Neck City “off and on my whole life” and before retiring was the town’s postmaster. She said she remembers when the city had a general store more than 40 years ago, and she hopes the new operation will be a success.

“I think it will help the town grow; it’s already grown some,” she said.

The only other business building in Neck City is the post office, which is a block to the east. The city at one time had a bank. That long-empty structure was one of 11 buildings that have been demolished in the past two years, Gooch said, as part of a city project to clear away dangerous and dilapidated buildings.

He said the city worked with the Harry S. Truman Coordinating Council to obtain an $87,000 grant for the work to tear down the old buildings, and clear and level the properties. Landowners cooperated, he said, and several tracts have been sold as building sites.

“We’ve already had four new houses built,” Gooch said. “It will help the tax base.”

The 2000 census put the Neck City population at 125, and Gooch said he believes it has grown “quite a bit” since then.

Accomplishments

Gooch moved to Neck City in 2000 after retiring from Fleming Foods in Lincoln, Neb. He was elected mayor in 2002. He said the community has installed street signs and traffic-control signs, with the help of officials from Jasper County and the Jasper County Emergency Services Board.

“The Board of Aldermen have been a big help,” he said. “We’re trying to get some things done.”

He said the city in recent years has organized a Christmas tree lighting and community caroling event, and activities including a cookout, a bike parade and a fireworks display at the Fourth of July.

The city also has obtained a grant that Gooch said will help fund a three-city recycling center to be operated on property near City Hall. The site will give area residents a place to drop off recycling materials such as paper, plastic and cardboard.

“We decided to do it because I’ve heard from several people who want to recycle but don’t want to have to drive all the way to Joplin,” Gooch said. “It will be for people in Alba and Purcell too, and we’ll be doing a mailing when we get it ready.”

City name

Neck City was first named Hell’s Neck, for its rough reputation as an early mining town. It became Neck City, Mayor Pat Gooch said, at the insistence of the U.S. Postal Service when the town got a post office and a postmark.