MPW.66 / 2014 A Place Where Everybody Knows Your Name by Kathy Jamison
Photographer
Kathy Jamison Springfield, Ill.

Team Lee

Story Summary

The Pool Hall on Main Street sits in the old downtown away from the faster-paced commercial area of Platte City. It’s at The Pool Hall where life slows down. Manager of the family-owned business, Sarah Williams, thinks of it as a quiet, little space that’s “homey” and neither she nor her mother, Sherry Hunt, like anyone to feel out of place when they come in. The morning regulars who refer to themselves as “the old timers” if they’ve grown up in Platte City, sit and talk, joke, laugh, and tell tall tales. They know the history of the town. They know who grew up here. “Everybody’s got a nickname,” said Keith “Jumbo” Porter, if they are indeed from around here.