| Early on the morning of August 23, a small crowd gathered tightly in the reception area of Eagle Granite. There were several State Troopers, a newspaper reporter, a camera crew from the local CBS affiliate, a handful of serious-looking security personnel, and the excited Eagle Staff. Aside from the security team and the busy Eagle staff, everyone was checking their watches and exchanging business cards, waiting. However, Eagle’s Elliott and Bob Paul, James Walters, and Nick Fleischer were busily trying to get some real work done, answering phone calls and questions (admittedly some of those questions were about monuments for inclusion in the Graniteer), and taking care of other routine Wednesday-morning details – all while making sure that the plant was ready for Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue to walk through and see what he would later laud as the sort of “small, family business that supports the economy” of Georgia.
Remarkably punctual, the Governor entered with bluster of hellos and handshaking, introducing his wife Mary, and putting everyone at ease and displaying a genuine interest in the Pauls’ family –owned business and its operations. Soon enough, the tour was on and the tightly packed crowd was guided into the manufacturing plant and channeled through rows of slabs waiting to be processed.
Eagle’s clean and modern facilities were accommodating to the crowd, most of whom were in shiny dress shoes, tall heels, or gubernatorially suitable cowboy boots. The Governor was shown every facet of monument production, nodding and smiling above the din of saws and polishers, pausing to joke with stone cutters and sandblast operators, asking thoughtful questions, and considering the answers.
In his remarks for the media, Governor Perdue insisted that this was not a campaign stop; rather, it was a welcome chance for him to get out and meet the real, hard-working family businesses, the sort of “hidden industry”, that he doesn’t get to visit with as often as he’d like.
“People in the city don’t understand that people in the small communities are just as smart, just as industrious, just as hard-working as people elsewhere”, he said. He complimented the Elberton industry, saying, “They’re taking the things that God has blessed us with – that is granite here in Elberton - and creating a value-added product that creates jobs (and) a good economy”.
He focused on creating a tax and regulatory environment that works for small business, and citied this sort of visit as a great opportunity to find out what small businesses need.
Then, after Governor Perdue participated in some friendly political jokes and the obligatory discussion of the upcoming UGA football season, the sedans, SUVs, and police cruisers sped off to visit with other local businesses. Before the last vehicle left the parking lot, most of the Eagle staff was back inside, back at work, on another not-so-routine Wednesday.
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