PICAYUNE — At 78, Dub Herring still shows up for work every morning at Paw Paw’s Campers-N-Cars on Memorial Boulevard. He took his first job as a car salesman at Estabrook Ford in Pascagoula under Jim Estabrook on Feb. 15, 1963. Before that he had worked for six years as a Pascagoula postman. He hit a ceiling in the postal service job and began looking for a profession in which there were no limits on how much he could earn and where there were more challenges. “As of February, 2013, I’ve been in the car business for 50 years,” he said in an interview at his Campers’ office. He founded Paw Paw’s Camper City in Picayune, at one time having six locations in Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama. “I have had my ups and downs, but I have always had faith in God and confidence in my abilities, which makes for a good salesman. You must believe in yourself, be enthusiastic and love what you do, before experiencing success,” said Herring. Herring has been active for years in a lay renewal movement, founded and helped found ministries to the homeless, addicted and abused women and children. “My mother was an abused woman,” he says. Herring traces his success to his younger days of having to help support his mother and siblings through shining shoes and selling newspapers in Grenada where he was born and reared. “I have always had to hustle and had street smarts,” he said. At 17 he joined the Navy because the Korean War was going on “because I didn’t want to be in the infantry.” At boot camp he was pulled out and told he was going to be a medic, and that was okay, until he learned Navy medics, called “corpsmen,” were assigned to Marine Corps line units and only a few months later he found himself going on combat patrols with Marine infantry units in Korea. “I guess I saved some lives. All you could do was to stop the bleeding, stabilize the wounded and ship them back to the rear for more extensive medical attention,” said Herring. While in the Navy half his check went to his mother to help her raise his siblings. After the war, he attended Holmes Junior College where he played half-back and met his first wife, Elaine Weeks, who was a cheerleader. After school, he moved to Pascagoula at the urging of an uncle to work as a postman. Elaine died in 2004, and Herring married Donna Wilson in 2006. They reside in Hide-A-Way. His business philosophy: “At some time every small businessman will come to a point where he will have to lay it all on the line. I did that. I laid all I had on the line. But I believed in Dub Herring. Everybody has a niche in life, and I found mine.” Says Herring: “I’m having fun selling fun, and I’ve been making happy campers for a long time.”
Local News
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Ex-Picayune bank teller gets prison time for fraud
Former Picayune bank teller Vonetta Jordan has been sentenced to 17 months in prison for bank fraud and ordered to repay over $117,000.
On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Sul Ozerden also ordered two years of probation after her release from prison. -
Hurricane preparedness necessary down here
Hurricane season begins June 1, and the forecast provided by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) predicts an active season for storms to originate in the Atlantic basin, with a 70 percent chance of having 13 to 20 named storms.
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Who’s ready for The Big One on New Madrid fault?
It’s a bleak scenario. A massive earthquake along the New Madrid fault kills or injures 60,000 people in Tennessee. A quarter of a million people are homeless. The Memphis airport — the country’s biggest air terminal for packages — goes off-line. Major oil and gas pipelines across Tennessee rupture, causing shortages in the Northeast. In Missouri, another 15,000 people are hurt or dead. Cities and towns throughout the central United States lose power and water for months. Losses stack up to hundreds of billions of dollars.
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PICAYUNE VALEDICTORIAN, SALUTATORIAN
Chad Porter, the valedictorian for Picayune Memorial High School, and Tiffany DeVore, the salutatorian, addressed their fellow graduates at Thursday’s graduation exercises.
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POPLARVILLE VALEDICTORIAN, SALUTATORIAN
Valedictorian Samantha Gentry and salutatorian Brent Breland agave the Poplarville High School class of 2013s final farewells before the class of 139 graduating Seniors received their diplomas Friday evening. (Photos by Butch Weir)
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Fugitives captured: team effort
Several law enforcement agencies teamed up to capture two fugitives fleeing from Tennessee that were wanted on charges of aggravated burglary and resisting arrest, Assistant to the Chief of Police Jeremy Magri said.
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Hurricane forecast: Another busy Atlantic season
Get ready for another busy hurricane season, maybe unusually wild, federal forecasters say.
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PMHS SALUTATORIAN
Picayune Memorial High School salutatorian Tiffany DeVore will speak at the school's graduation exercises at 7 p.m. Thursday at the high school stadium.
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PRC VALEDICTORIAN
Pearl River Central High School valedictorian Baylee Brooklyn Owens will speak at the school's graduation exercises at 7 p.m. Friday at the high school stadium.
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PMHS VALEDICTORIAN
Picayune Memorial High School valedictorian Chad Porter will speak at the school's graduation exercises at 7 p.m. Thursday at the high school auditorium.
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