Around the time Carl Jennings was born in
July of 1939, his father Howard was approached by missionaries
who were seeking donations for the building of a Central
Baptist Hospital in Lexington, Kentucky.
The harsh effects of the Great Depression
loomed heavily in everybody’s minds (and wallets) at the
time — especially for a farming family who struggled to
make ends meet. Yet, that didn’t stop the elder Jennings
from making a generous contribution.
“My dad took $20 out of his billfold
— he had it hidden in there because money was kind of
scarce,” Carl explained. “He gave it to these
Baptist missionaries. Little did he know that when he gave that
$20, three of his grandkids — my kids —
would be born in that hospital someday.
There’s always somebody who knows more than we
know.”
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These days, Carl’s three children
are all grown up and have kids of their own, prompting him to
carry on his father’s tradition. After all, he has
enjoyed over 43 years of success as the owner of Winchester
Cleaners and he felt it was time to give back.
After researching several worthy causes in
Clark County, Kentucky, Carl decided that Lexington Community
College was a good choice. He recently pledged $10,000 to help
fund the building of a local campus classroom building.
Perhaps someday his grandchildren will
attend the college, but that wasn’t Carl’s only
motivation. “When I came here in the early 1960s, there
were only 160-some kids at Southeastern Christian
College,” he recalled. “It was very small and they
closed their doors. It has been a long time since we had a
local college.”
For Carl, his own college experience was
something that lasted exactly four days. That’s how long
it took for him to opt to drop out and pursue drycleaning as a
full-time career. One reason he became interested in the
industry so much is that it was simply an alternative to
farming.
“Growing up, we did farming the
old-fashioned way,” he said. “Me and my brother
milked cows for our spending money. In one summer, we had a
tenant quit. He was milking 21. So, we had our eight plus 21
more. That’s a long summer. That particular year, we also
had eight acres of tobacco, plus a hundred acres of corn. It
was sunup to sundown all summer.”
Fortunately, the work got a little easier
by the time he was a young teenager. “I came in from
school one day,” he said. “I walked about a quarter
of a mile from the school bus down to where the farm was and
there sat this little tractor with two 14" turning plows
and cultivators. I think it had a mowing machine, too. When I
saw that — wow. We were about the last ones in that part
of the country to get a tractor.”
It wasn’t all work and no play,
however. Carl often enjoyed riding horses and spending his
modest earnings at a local nine-hole golf course. Though golf
was his favorite sport, he also played basketball, baseball and
football during high school.
“We only played eight-man football
because we didn’t have enough people,” he said.
“There were less than 100 in the whole high school. There
were 18 in my senior class. If you went out, you were on the
team.”
Following high school graduation, Carl had
an opportunity the ensuing summer to help his father’s
sister and her husband at their Martinizing drycleaning store
in Murfreesboro, Tennessee.
“My uncle put me in a white shirt
and tie and put me in the front and said that’s where you
need to start,” he remembered. “That’s when
pants were a quarter.”
When he had toiled away on the farm, Carl
spent most of his time talking to horses, so the front counter
at a drycleaning plant was quite a change in pace.
“Everybody that came in had a different personality and I
really enjoy talking to people,” he said.
For the next couple of years, he trained
in all aspects of the plant, traveling to Georgia and
Tennessee, where he met his wife of 38 years, Dora Lynn.
In 1961, Carl branched out on his own with
Winchester Cleaners. Starting off in a small town was made more
difficult by the fact that there were eight other drycleaners
competing in the area. One of his company’s saving graces
was its weekly S.O.S. (Save On Specials) offers.
“On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday,
we didn’t run any trucks, but we would discount the
drycleaning a percentage and have the customer bring the
cleaning to us,” he explained. “As a matter of
fact, I still do that since it’s worked for 50
years.”
Carl’s store eventually expanded to
include services such as draperies and alterations, but
it’s been his creative promotions that draw the most
business.
“We advertise what we call Bachelor
Bundles,” he said. “If a guy lives by himself, he
can throw all of his stuff in the middle of his sheet. Then, he
can get all four corners and bring it up and tie it in a knot,
then he brings it in. It’s amazing how much of that stuff
you get... his socks, shorts, shirts.”
Another factor that has contributed to
Carl’s success is his education. He is a graduate of the
14-week general course and two-week management course from the
National Institute of Drycleaning (now IFI). He is also a
Certified Master Drycleaner. The learning process seems to have
paid off. About 15 years after he initially came to town, Carl
was the only one left.
“Lo and behold, I ran every one of
them out of town,” he said. “I’ll tell you
what, when it came down to the last two cleaners — he and
I were the only ones who had been to NID and taken their
course. You can say what you want to about education...
it’s not everything, but it is something.”
Carl hopes more cleaners will start making
the effort to step up and acquire more knowledge of their
trade.
“That’s what’s killing
the drycleaning industry today,” he said. “You walk
into these stores and many of these people don’t know
beans. I go in and they got a wet spotter who only has three or
four bottles sitting there when I’ve got 25 on my
spotting board. They have no idea. None.”
Winchester Cleaners has expanded to three
times the size of its original building, and, at one point, the
company employed 25 staff members. That number has been reduced
to about half, but it doesn’t bother Carl. Now, he has
enough time to take care of the farm he bought over a dozen
years ago.
He has 100 acres of his own, which is
connected to the parent’s farm — the same one he
grew up on. Both farms also join the farms that belong to
Carl’s brother and grandfather.
“We’ve got about a square mile
over there in Gerrard County,” he noted. “I
didn’t know it, but farming was still my first love.
It’s just in my blood. Hard work is like anything else.
Once you look back, you wouldn’t take anything for that
experience.”
Of course, the farming experience itself
has changed a lot for Carl.
“Now you have automatic conveyors
and roll bailers that roll up the hay and you stick a hydraulic
fork in that. You do all that from the seat of your tractor. I
have my own cab tractor with air conditioning and heat, an
AM/FM cassette radio and a sunroof. See, I can do now on the
farm what it took six of us to do in the early 1950s. I climb
up in that big horsepower tractor and have a good time.
It’s kind of like sitting in a big, easy chair, except
you’re five- or six-feet off of the ground. It’s
just heaven. That’s the only way I can describe
it.”
Carl takes care of 36 head of cattle, but
he expects that number to double now that it’s
“calving” time. He also keeps two horses on the
farm.
“The horses we’ve had I have
just loved to death,” he said. “One’s named
Topper. Hopalong Cassidy’s horse was named Topper. The
other one’s named Silver — the same name as the
Lone Ranger’s horse. I ride them every chance I get.
It’s the best therapy in the world.”
Carl has another hobby that brings him
peace of mind quite often: golf. In fact, fans of the sport may
have caught a glimpse of him on their television screens if
they tuned in to see the Master’s tournament in Augusta,
Georgia, in April.
For 17 years, he has worked with the
tournament. This year, he served as the marshall for the 18th
tee, helping usher about 35,000 people through the play on the
final hole.
“I’m one of those guys who
wear the white suits,” he said. “You can’t
tell me from one of those guys who carry the golf bags —
the caddies. I close the ropes and lead everybody from the 17th
green to the 18th tee. I initiate the applause.”
Not only does he get an ideal position on
the course to view hundreds of the best professional golfers in
action, Carl also has the opportunity to meet them, as well.
His two favorite players are Freddie “The Shark”
Norman and Freddie Couples.
“When you do something for them,
they say, ‘Thank you,’ and I appreciate that.
Tiger’s got his warm side, too. I’ve shook hands
with probably most of them.”
His personal golf game has had its share
of highlights — including a hole-in-one on a 166-yard,
par three at the Winchester Country Club — but Carl
values his affiliation with the Master’s tournament above
his other memories on the green.
“I’m paid handsomely, and yet
I don’t get a dime for it, you know,” he said.
“We volunteer our time. We do play the course after the
tournament is over. That’s part of our compensation.
I’ve been offered all sorts of money for that position.
Other people have tried to pay me and I just say to them,
‘You don’t have enough money’.”
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