BillLindau

Coming back home

Former resident brings his family back to Southern Pines
Lawyer turned toy store owner: ‘You can go home again’
With photos of Bobby Levy with some of his toys.
By Bill Lindau
Special to The Pilot
For most of his first 21 years, Robert M. “Bobby” Levy called Southern Pines home. Then he went to California and became a lawyer. He also ran for Congress on the Republican ticket.
For the past 31 years, however, Levy has missed Southern Pines. The friendly, laid-back people, the absence of smog and ever-congested freeways
So he came back.
Living here with his wife Linda, and their daughter Rachel, 9, Levy has walked away from a lucrative legal career, to devote all his time to their small business in the Sandhills.
The Little Toy Shop was the Levys’ ticket back.
The plan to come home to the small Southern town where he grew up was a long time in the making, Bobby Levy says.
“We started the toy store about 10 years ago with the idea of coming back here to retire,” Bobby Levy said. “The more interesting thing was owning a piece of Jack’s Grill.”
The Levys’ business is located between the local American Red Cross headquarters and Bozick’s Leather Shoppe, on 230 SW Broad St., Southern Pines.
The couple purchased the lot and had the store constructed while Bobby practiced family and criminal law in West Hills, Calif. Bob and Barbara Hamilton, old friends of his late parents, have managed the business since it opened.
“They treat it like their own,” Levy says. “They’re good people.”
As a teenager, Levy heard his schoolmates swear they would blow this boring town, go to the big cities and never come back.
Many of those young malcontents ended up coming back.
“I’ve been in a lot of big cities and a lot of small towns,” Levy said, “but I’ve never seen a place as beautiful as Southern Pines.
“When you come back home after 30 years, you can still call it home.
“Thomas Wolfe was wrong; you can go home again.”
The population has doubled, if not tripled, since Levy graduated from Pinecrest High School in 1970 and enrolled in the University of North Carolina, Still, Southern Pines has many of the same qualities that people find idyllic, Levy says.
It certainly attracted Albert and Miriam Levy of Far Rockaway, N.Y. They came here in the winter of 1953 with the 2-month-old Bobby and Bobby’s brother Jeffrey.
“The more you look at it, it’s more similar than different,” Bobby said. “Downtown is still a place to stroll around in. It still has some nice stores. The golf courses are just as beautiful, only there are a few more of them.”
Compared to large cities, Southern Pines town may not have much for younger residents, but Levy says that’s really what people like. “You don’t want as many things going on.”
Best of all: People are still as friendly as ever, Levy says.
“It’s still a place where everyone wants to know their neighbors. Not like Los Angeles, where nobody wants to know their neighbors.”
Today, Southern Pines is “a town of 15,000 people with everything you could possibly need,” Levy says. “You can’t buy that in Los Angeles.”.
Years ago, Levy walked to school. His parents had a 10-minute drive to work.
Now, “I live three and a half blocks from my child’s school. And I work two and a half blocks from my child’s school.”
Bobby attended the old East Southern Pines schools, where Southern Pines Elementary School now stands. He was in Pinecrest High’s first graduating class.
He majored in history at UNC, graduating with honors. He received his Lld. Degree from the University of San Fernando Valley in 1978.
Rachel’s school is in the same place her dad learned most of his ABCs.
As for entertainment, “I would rather come and see the Southern Pines Elementary orchestra than the L.A. Philharmonic. They’re happy to see me.”
The Levys still have ties to California. Their oldest daughter, Carrie, is an assistant to a talent agent in L.A. The second daughter, Aaryn, attends Santa Barbara City College. Bobby also has a few more legal cases to wrap up.
Then, the Levys can devote their time to making Rachel and her friends happy. Happy to be living in The Pines.
This story appeared in the Dec. 14,2005 edition of The Pilot.

More about Bobby Levy
By Bill Lindau
Bobby Levy was one of the first people I met when my family moved from Winston-Salem to Southern Pines in August 1966. We were starting eighth grade together at East Southern Pines Junior High School.
The Levys at the time were the only Jewish family living in Moore County. They lived around the corner from us, in fact, on East Connecticut Avenue.
One day in study hall another boy who had just moved to Southern Pines from the North Carolina Piedmont tried to talk Bobby into lending him a quarter. When Bobby kept saying no, "Phil" absent-mindedly said, "C'mon, Levy, don't be a Jew."
Next thing I knew, I heard some chairs moving around and Phil sitting on his can, with Bobby standing over him. "Don't you ever say that to me again!" he said.
Phil didn't. Not to anybody.
When I was almost 47 I embraced the Jewish faith myself. I never really converted, but I have joined the area congregation. It really shocked Bobby to run into me during some of the services. "I didn't know you were Jewish," he said.
I explained I was one-quarter, with a Jewish grandfather. "That's a start," I said.

posted by Bill Lindau @ 2:36 PM