
{"id":9156,"date":"2010-02-25T11:22:39","date_gmt":"2010-02-25T19:22:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/?p=9156"},"modified":"2010-03-18T09:34:09","modified_gmt":"2010-03-18T17:34:09","slug":"community-mourns-the-loss-of-tom-robinson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2010\/02\/25\/community-mourns-the-loss-of-tom-robinson\/","title":{"rendered":"Community mourns the loss of Tom Robinson"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Kirk Ross<\/strong><br \/>\n<em>Staff Writer<br \/>\n<\/em><br \/>\nCARRBORO  \u00e2\u20ac\u201d  For four decades, Tom Robinson sold seafood, much of that time out of a little white concrete block shop in downtown Carrboro. While he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s sure to be remembered for that, mostly he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll be remembered for being Tom Robinson \u00e2\u20ac\u201d a sharp-witted, sometimes-acerbic, honest and forthright individual. He was his own man until the end.<\/p>\n<p>Robinson died Friday at UNC Hospitals from pneumonia, which resulted from H1N1. He was 58 years old.<\/p>\n<p>Anyone who knew Tom will tell you that he ran at a slightly higher RPM than the rest of us. Anyone who worked for him can relate how particular he was about the way things should be done.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>He was, maybe, a little eccentric. He collected things. He raced pigeons. You read that right.<\/p>\n<p>Many of his customers became friends.<\/p>\n<p>Kay Lund and her husband, Mark Price, were in that group. The couple began buying their fish from Robinson in 1982 when he operated out of an outdoor market on the corner of Church and Rosemary streets in Chapel Hill.<\/p>\n<p>Lund said the visit to the seafood shop to provision the family oyster roasts became a tradition, and after Tom moved to Carrboro he became a regular at their Christmas Eve socials.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153He\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d be the first person to show up, coming over right after closing up in the afternoon for a single-malt,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Christmas Eve won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t be the same without him. I just want to say to him, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcThanks for all the oysters.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<br \/>\nThe Lantern restaurant\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Andrea Reusing said Robinson was a straight-shooter with a reputation for fairness with both fishermen and the people who bought his wares. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153In the seafood business, you don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t always get that,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153He was very honest about what his stake was in something, both with his customers and the people he bought fish from.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Reusing said that over the years, as she got to know him, she saw that same, sometimes-blunt honesty many times.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153You would never not know where Tom stood on something,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said.<\/p>\n<p>Like a lot of his customers, Reusing hopes to see the business continue, and not just because of the seafood it supplies.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s one of those rare places where you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll see an African-American grandmother, a woman from Japan and a man from Spain all in the same room at once,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We know we live in a diverse community, but you don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t see it in many places like that. The shop is a huge gift to the community, and I hope we can hold onto it.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Robinson\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s longtime companion Kay Hamrick said that thought has been in her heart as well. She\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s talked it over with the shop\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s employees and the many friends, personal and professional, who have offered condolences.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153The shop is still in operation, although with a lot less selection right now,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said.<\/p>\n<p>Robinson is gone, but keeping the network of fishermen and suppliers connected to the legion of loyal customers seems the only right thing to do.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re going to try to keep it open,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Hamrick said.<\/p>\n<p>A memorial service for Tom Robinson has been scheduled for Sunday, March 7 at Walkers Funeral Home.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>CARRBORO  \u00e2\u20ac\u201d  For four decades, Tom Robinson sold seafood, much of that time out of a little white concrete block shop in downtown Carrboro. While he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s sure to be remembered for that, mostly he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll be remembered for being Tom Robinson \u00e2\u20ac\u201d a sharp-witted, sometimes-acerbic, honest and forthright individual. He was his own man until the end.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,30],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-top-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9156"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9156\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9321,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9156\/revisions\/9321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}