Saturday, May 09, 2009
He paved the way for Sunday shopping
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In 1986, the commonwealth still restricted shopping on Sundays in observance of the Christian day of rest. There was a gray area in the "blue law" (flea markets and drug stores could open on Sundays), and when Doug Carr opened his Melrose Avenue store on Sundays, he got caught in that haziness.
It was two years later, thanks to a case involving the Roanoke businessman, that the state Supreme Court found the law unconstitutional. But the competition spurred by the law's elimination drove Carr out of business as owner of Valley Liquidators.
"It killed me," Carr told a reporter in 1990.
Carr, 69, died April 16 of complications related to cancer, his daughter Traci Doss said.
The store he adamantly kept open on Sundays sold a variety of items ranging from stuffed animals to car wax and answering machines.
"He just didn't think that it was fair that some stores could be open selling the same products he was selling," said his son, Jimmy Carr, 43. "He would go to the grocery store and buy the same things, like hardware items or spray paint, that he was selling."
When malls began opening on Sundays, after the blue laws were repealed, Doug Carr was forced to close Valley Liquidators and eventually started a wholesale business called Valley Sales Inc. He worked there until a few months before he died, Jimmy Carr said.
But even though his battle against the blue laws received heavy publicity and reached the commonwealth's highest court, he used to say he never really lobbied for the invalidation of blue laws.
What he told a reporter in 1990 summed it up best: "I just opened up on Sundays and they came and summoned me to court."
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It's common practice for many religious groups, when they want to raise money, to send their young people to walk hundreds of laps around a track.
A tiny Christian school in Bedford recently twisted that concept, and got its 30-some elementary-to-high school students to spread mulch and plant flowers at the National D-Day Memorial.
"Looking around, we saw that the men who died on D-Day gave their lives not only for their brothers, but for the cause of liberty and freedom," said Russ Alden, lead teacher of the Bedford Christian Academy. "I think the students got satisfaction in helping the memorial, and they also learned about service."
The academy, which was founded in 1966, is housed at Liberty Baptist Church on Big Island Highway but is not affiliated with a particular church, Alden said. It prepares students with a Christ-centered, classical approach.
Students raised more than $19,000 at the "Serve-a-Thon" on April 24, Alden said
"Rather than just walking around a track in a walk-a-thon, we decided it would be better to do service," Alden said.
"It's part of the Christian ideal."
