Curtis Pickels is known for many things in Quitman. He is the town’s first official mayor. He was a member of the Brooks County Board of Education for years. But most of all, he is known for being the owner of Lee & Pickels Drug Store for more than 40 years.

Pickels, a native of Colquitt County, graduated from Moultrie High School, but began working in 1959 at 16. He worked at Watson Drug Store in Moultrie, operating the soda fountain.

“Soon after that, I decided I wanted to be a pharmacist. It’s unusual, but I stuck with it,” Pickels said.

He continued to work at Watson Drug Store for three years while in high school and two years while attending Norman Junior College in Norman Park.

“I attended there and got my pre-pharmacy and then I was accepted at the Mercer University of Pharmacy,” he said. “It was called Southern School of Pharmacy and, in 1964, I started there and worked in Atlanta at several places.”

Pickels graduated in June 1968. At the end of the fall quarter, just before the Christmas break in 1967, a man who employed him in Atlanta said he knew someone in Quitman looking for a pharmacist.

“He said there was a guy, Lawton Lee, down in Quitman that wanted to talk to me, who was looking for a pharmacist with the idea of coming back and buying into the business,” Pickels said. “I came down and talked to him at Christmas of 1967 and we agreed I would come work that summer and, if I liked it, he would hold it for me so I could go back and finish my senior year.”

After finishing his senior year, he returned to Quitman.

“I worked for (Lee),” Pickels said. “I wanted to be sure I wanted to stay in Quitman. I thought I still had a little of Atlanta in me but after about three visits is all it took and I was glad to see the Brooks County sign.”

Pickels and his wife, Ola, a school teacher, stayed in Quitman, In 1971, he bought half of the store.

“We were in partnership until May of 1974 when he died,” he said. “The family sold me the other half of the store and we operated as Lee & Pickels Drug Store until January 2011 when I sold it to Casey Knight. We kept the name. It still is going to operate as Lee & Pickels Drugs Store.”

Being in business with Lawton Lee was a great experience because he was such a great person, Pickels said.

“He always had things he would teach you and one of the things he taught me is if you take care of the small things, the big things will take care of themselves,” Pickels said. “I found out that’s true. If you look at the things people consider small in business, usually the big things fall into place. It’s just been a great experience to be in business with him and he always had a lot of great business principles to follow.”

One of those theories that Lee taught Pickels is that if you give people good service, they will return.

“We do a lot of delivery for people who are shut in and don’t have a way to get medicine,” Pickels said. “We have a tremendous delivery business. We’ve always been able to meet the people’s need if they have a child that’s sick in the middle of the night or, if they forgot to get their medicine, we’ll come back for them.”

Pickels said he has seen a huge growth in Lee & Pickels Drug Store, from working with typewriters to working on computers and having a “robot” count the pills that are put in each prescription bottle. One part of that success has been the staff that works at the drug store.

“We’ve had a great staff,” Pickels said. “I’ve had people work for me that have really made my business. We’ve had long-term people. We had a lady that worked at the store for 43 years. She started before I did, in 1955, I think. I think she retired about 1998.”

Pickels himself was the store owner for 42 years and has been with the store 44 years in June.

“Quitman has been very good to me and Ola,” Pickels said. “It’s just been great for us and the people have been good to us. We’ve had a great career here. She taught school here for 32 years.”

That is why Pickels has given back to the community for so many years.

Besides being the owner of Lee & Pickels Drug Store, Pickels got involved in the community. He served nearly 12 years on the Brooks County Board of Education and has served on the city commission board and as mayor for a total 16 years when he finishes his current term.

“We’ve gone from a commission to a council. We now have a city council and council members and we have a mayor council. That’s what all the state has gone to. So most of the stuff we get that we have to sign in, it has mayor on it. So we’ve converted to mayor so we wouldn’t have to change that.”

While he is technically the first mayor of Quitman, according to Pickels, it’s just a change of name.

“We’ve tried to do things to help the community,” Pickels said. “I think Quitman is on the verge. I think in the next few years we’re going to see Quitman grow some. When I came to Quitman, there were big apparel businesses. There was Weeks Textile, the Pajama Plant that was making pajamas and jogging suits and all of that went to South America. You had Beach Island Knitting and it’s gone now and Microcraft. We’re working to get someone to utilize that building.”

One of the things that has helped Quitman grow in the last few years is the new Destination Brooks organization that recently introduced the city’s first Skillet Festival. The group is also trying to bring more businesses into Quitman and Brooks County.

“The Destination Brooks has helped a lot,” Pickels said. “We have a very active Development Authority now. People would be amazed at how much time they put in. They do a great job and, of course, they have to call in the county and the city because they want to know if we can supply them with water or electricity or gas and the city and the county and the development authority are working so closely together. We are there to help each other and we do things together and share in the cost of things and, whenever everybody works together, you can accomplish a lot with everybody doing a little.”

Pickels believes that Quitman will move forward in the next five years.

“I think people have realized that we have to get industry in here to help share the tax burden. The home owners and land owners can’t continue to pay all the taxes to operate a county and the only way to get development in, industry in, you have to make it attractive to them and I think we’ve done that. I think it has taken us, as citizens, a while to realize that we have to give up things to get industry in here. That’s the only way we’re going to get it is to make it attractive to them, get everything we can from the state, all the grants and stuff that is available for them.”

Politics and working with the community wasn’t always an ambition of Pickels, but he took an interest when he ran for the Board of Education in the 1970’s.

“I was just generally concerned about the welfare of our people and I thought we should be able to offer to the young people who come back here anything any other part of the state has to offer,” he said. “It’s important we do that to retain our young people and to keep them coming back and draw others in. It’s better than it was. This Destination Brooks is a great thing. A lot of them are young people and they are trying to do things to attract tourism.

“The main thing is, we all want what’s best for the community. It just doesn’t take care of itself and you’ve got to make an effort.”

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