Old Pioneer Market weathers storm, reopens in new location

The thunder rumbled. The wind whooshed. Then a loud pop and a crack. They thought it was a tornado.

The Old Pioneer Market owners Ashley Foster and her mother, Bobbi Jo Cathcart, were in the store when the storm rushed through. It was March 3.

They quickly assessed the damage. They scurried outside and turned around toward the store. Debris. Roof damage. They went back inside. Water was streaming in. The store was in trouble.

They found tarps and began protecting merchandise. A post on the market's Facebook page said it looked like they were covering up a crime scene. Hundreds, if not thousands of items were suddenly vulnerable, some old, some delicate, exposed to rainwater.

Tarps and buckets. That's what saved the business, at least for a while. Tarps and buckets.

Tarps cover inventory items at The Old Pioneer Market after a March storm damaged the store's roof.Submitted

Tarps cover inventory items at The Old Pioneer Market after a March storm damaged the store's roof.Submitted

It's not a metaphor to say that Foster and Cathcart — along with a host of other family members, workers and vendors who help run the market — went through a stormy period. It is quite literal.

Nearly three months later, the store has just opened for the first time. It's in a new location. Larger than before. More vendors. More booths. More knickknacks. More clothes. More stories to tell.

The weather could not be more perfect. Low 70s. A man sings familiar tunes out in the parking lot, providing an old-timey vibe as part of a grand reopening, strategically set to coincide with the region's annual 100-Mile Yard Sale. Vendors are set up under tents. The parking lot is buzzing. Not a cloud in the sky.

The front door, with the store's logo on the glass, is open, welcoming sunshine across the threshold. The sunshine is reflected in the faces of the store's owners.

Foster and Cathcart opened the store at 9 a.m. Just 15 minutes in, customers are already at the counter. Long-time, familiar customers, Troy and Tammi Roberts from the Crump area, are among the first to check out the place. Foster immediately recognizes them. They exchange knowing smiles. Troy has found what he says to be a good price on a couple of vintage Hot Wheels cars.

Between tending to customers, Foster and Cathcart explain the story of what brought them to this new place on U.S. 61, just north of Jackson Civic Center and just south of the Fruitland exit from Interstate 55.

Foster's children are behind the counter, helping separate newspaper sections into usable packing materials for customers.

Foster explains she and her mother opened up The Old Pioneer Market in November 2021. Those familiar with Jackson know the spot well. It was once a market where people could buy fresh produce. It's a place of fond memories for many in Jackson, a place and business owned by Sam Beggs, who died recently. Cathcart, according to previous reporting, originally decided to open the market after receiving a breast- cancer diagnosis.

"It's always been a dream of mine to own a thrift or antique type of place, but I would just never take the leap to do it," Cathcart said at the time of the opening. "But once I went through breast cancer, it was like, 'It's now or never.'"

After some early success, the mother and daughter expanded into the back part of the building in April 2022. It was a good location, off Highway 72, with a familiar name and close proximity to another antique and craft shop, Heartland Harvest Market. The women were growing the business.

When the storm hit, Foster and Cathcart did the best they could to keep the store open. They had to shut down the front of the store, but reopened temporarily two days after the storm. Their marquee sign, read, in good humor, "Our sales will blow you away like the wind did our roof".

Other area antique shop owners weighed in with their support on the social media page.

Part of their routine those first few days was tossing water from the buckets. But they just couldn't wait out the storm there on Highway 72.

The tarps on the roof weren't doing the job. The rooftop HVAC system complicated the repairs. The timeline for the roof repair wasn't feasible. They needed to get back into business sooner. They made the decision to shut down the store and find another location. They made the right decision. A city inspector told them they wouldn't have been able to continue operations even if they wanted to.

Someone pointed them in the direction of the property on U.S. 61 headed out of town toward Fruitland. The available commercial real estate was originally office spaces. The owner had several vacant adjacent units. A plan was hatched to convert the units into The Old Pioneer Market. This meant stripping the building of its office veneer and exposing its beams and bones, adding new floors and making the facility work for retail. The construction came with some complications and took longer than hoped. Set on opening for the 100-Mile Yard Sale, Foster, Cathcart and other family members joined in on the construction, working 15-hour days to help get the facility ready for opening. That included laying the floors.

The hard work paid off. The Old Pioneer Market (the name kept with permission by Sam Beggs, who told Foster he'd be honored if they kept the name) opened with 12,000 square feet of shopping space, roughly three times larger than the Highway 72 location with about double the number of vendors. The expansive space appears much larger from the inside.

Customers galore

It's customers, not water, now streaming through the store.

Among them is Diana Pink-Breeher from Brentwood, Missouri, in the St. Louis area. She stopped in on her way to find bargains in the 100-Mile Yard Sale.

Another man walks up to the counter. He's found two beer glasses. He places them on the counter, and Foster begins to ring up the items. The man is asking about booth spaces. Foster says they've only got small booths available and starts sharing the monthly prices, depending on their size. The man explains he's got quite a collection of beer-related items, and has been thinking about starting a booth somewhere.

The business isn't just a business to Foster and Cathcart. The new store is awash with sentimentality, originating from their original passion for buying and collecting interesting things, continuing with the cancer diagnosis, evolving into the pride of sharing in Jackson's history with the Beggs' old produce market. Foster said she was deeply saddened to hear of Sam Beggs' recent passing, but thankful for her time starting a new business at the old Beggs place and having had the opportunity to work with the Beggs family.

The new location represents more sentimentality, of a mother and daughter, and family, overcoming the adversity of a storm. She hopes the business becomes something even bigger than a family affair. She said she's inspired by her vendors, who have poured a lot of creativity into their booths and have initiated a diverse and intriguing inventory. She thinks the location close to the interstate and the expanded space will draw more people to her store. She hopes The Old Pioneer Market on U.S. 61 becomes a destination for anyone traveling the I-55 corridor. Someone had mentioned to her in recent weeks the unfortunate demise of St. Mary Antique Mall in Ste. Genevieve County, Missouri. That facility was destroyed by a tornado and never reopened.

If her business captured the same type of attraction of St. Mary Antique Mall, well, that would be the ultimate metaphorical rainbow.