From left, Greene Farmers Cooperative employees Everette Dixon, Kathy Shipley, and Gary Shelton have attained the coveted milestone of 50 years of service, all joining the Co-op in slightly more than a year’s time. Everette was the first hired on September 17, 1973, Kathy on October 1, 1974, and Gary on March 4, 1974,
Power trio
Working together and taking care of area farmers since 1974
Story and photos by Glen Liford
This is the ninth in a series of articles highlighting outstanding Co-op employees throughout the system who live the Co-op brand statement "Driven to Serve" in their day-to-day work and portray the Co-op F.A.I.T.H. values (Focused, Accountable, Integrity, Teamwork, and Honest Communications) in their interactions with their fellow employees, customers, and communities. It’s unusual to find a single employee who has worked for a business for 50 years or more. To have three employees hit that same half-century mark within little more than a year — for the same business — is almost beyond comprehension. But that’s what happened at Greene Farmers Cooperative in 2024. Maintenance Technician Everette Dixon, Assistant Manager Gary Shelton, and Office Manager Kathy Shipley all celebrated the 50-year milestone in slightly more than 12 months: Everette on Sept. 17, 2023, Gary on March 4, 2024, and Kathy on Oct. 1, 2024.
“They’re an anomaly, really,” says Greene Farmers Co-op Manager Matthew Horne. “You just don’t see employees who stick with the same business for that long. Considering all they’ve experienced and all the changes they’ve seen, these three are a wealth of information and a resource for our Co-op and our customers.”
One of the common threads in the tenure of the employees is that they were all hired by Co-op Manager Vernon Glover, who would later become Tennessee Farmers Cooperative chief executive officer in 1997. Everette Dixson Everette was the first of the three to join the Co-op team after he graduated high school in 1973.
“I put in an application, and Mr. Vernon Glover called me a few days later and hired me,” says Everette. “I started working on the dock loading and unloading feed. I later moved to the gas station for a little while, then to the tire shop, and finally to where I work now.”
Everette found his sweet spot in the equipment repair and maintenance area.
“He has a knack for figuring out problems and has a natural mechanical ability,” says Matthew, noting that Everette’s work is critical to keeping the variety of equipment that the Co-op uses in good working condition.
“The thing I like best is that you never know what you’re going to do from one day to the next,” says Everette. “I enjoy getting to know the farmers. With my job, if they have problems with a fertilizer spreader, I may need to visit the farm to fix the problem.”
With his responsibility for maintenance, Everette says “there’s always something to do.”
“You have to keep the fertilizer buggies, the drills, and the trucks going, and even do maintenance on the building,” he explains.
While 50 years may seem like a long time on the job, Everette says it has passed “really fast.”
“It just doesn’t seem that it’s been that long,” he says. “We’re just like a big family here, and I have really enjoyed it.”
Gary Shelton Gary started at the Co-op on March 4, 1974, while he was still a student at East Tennessee State University in Johnson City. He started out pumping gas for customers at the Co-op’s full-service fuel center.
“We had a little cubicle outside where I stayed,” he recalls. “You would freeze to death in the winter and burn up in the summer.”
At the time, there was an oil embargo, and Gary says he remembers going to put a trash can at the end of the line when it was time to close the pumps.
“Customers behind that trash can weren’t happy with me, and they probably had a few choice words for me at times,” he admits.
Over the years, his position switched to working inside in the Co-op’s showroom. Perhaps his most unusual assignment, he says, was when TFC Feed Fieldman Clay Mathews came up with a novel way to demonstrate the effectiveness of Co-op Pig Zipper feed, a popular product when hogs were such a prevalent and formidable portion of the Co-op’s business. The late farmer, Wayne Brown, who would later serve on the TFC board of directors, brought in a litter of pigs and the Co-op displayed them in a wire cage in the showroom so customers could watch the animals grow into full-sized hogs as they thrived on the Co-op feed.
“The pigs had an odor, but we did the best we could,” Gary says with a laugh. “It was my job to take them out on a tow motor behind the building, wash them off, and clean the cage every day. That was a weird job.”
But when asked about the best part of the job, he doesn’t hesitate.
“My favorite thing about Co-op is the work environment,” says Gary. “We all get along and work well together. It’s not really a laid-back job, because in the spring, things get busy. You’re going hard and helping people, but I enjoy it even during those challenging times. It’s really fun.” Kathy Shipley Kathy started her Co-op career as a high school senior. Kline Jones, her teacher and DECA (Distributive Education Clubs of America) advisor, came to her one day at the beginning of her senior year and asked if she would be interested in working at the Co-op. DECA is a high school and college program for students interested in business.
“I had never been to the Co-op and really didn’t know much about it, but I came in, filled out an application, and met with Vernon,” she remembers.
Kathy joined the Co-op team on Oct. 1, 1974, and she worked part time through the rest of the school year, attending classes in the morning, and then coming to work at the Co-op for the remainder of the day.
“After graduation, I continued to work here because I really liked it,” she says. “I couldn’t think of anything else I wanted to do. I didn’t want to work in a factory or in food preparation, and I had grown up on a farm. This was just an extension of that; it fit.”
After 50 years of working together, the trio have developed a cadence that helps keeps the business running smoothly. Over the decades, they have displayed the power of cooperation and value of working together to their customers and their coworkers while fulfilling the Co-op promise of being “Driven to Serve.”
Story by Glen Liford,
Contact gliford@ourcoop.com