Page 38 - Senior Link Magazine Spring 2021- Online Magazine

HONORING
SMALL BUSINESSES

Planting for the

Future Tom’s Tree Place

by Jane Bromley

ot long the business gets
after WWII regular requests
Nended, a from people who
young man named want to take
Tom Scarborough family photos on
hitchhiked from the property.
Mississippi to But Tom’s Tree Place is so much
Lubbock. He had A door in the more than the building. Tom
served his country wall separating and Jeanne were true partners,
in the Navy and the home from according to son Alex. “They used
enrolled at Texas the store was to make bets with each other, and
Technological closed every the stakes were always ‘my half
College where he night, and the against your half.’” In the last seven
met a young lady Scarboroughs decades, the family business has
named Jeanne lived there for grown up from the little sapling
Bullard from about two years. Tom and Jeanne planted. It’s
Shamrock, Texas. That all changed multigenerational now. All three
Tom was an enterprising young when a customer came in one day of the Scarborough’s sons, Tom
man and started a tree and yard and told Jeanne her little girl was Mitt, Alex, and Scott, and their
spraying service. He and Jeanne out playing on 34th. It was still a daughter Janoma’s husband, Dale
married, and a customer sold them dirt road then, but the family soon Rowin, work at the nursery. The
some land on the far west end of moved to a more conventional Scarborough boys all received
34th St. near Slide Road. It was just house. Enough evidence still exists Landscape Architect degrees from
a cotton field, but Tom had a plan. on the home side to send visitors Texas Tech. Alex’s wife Shellie
In 1950, he built a building that on a nostalgic trip back in time. took over the bookkeeping from
housed his brand-new nursery,
Tom’s Tree Place, and a home for
his young family – all under one
roof.
Tom was not only an entrepreneur;
he was also creative and clever.
His new building featured clean
lines, with one-of-a-kind wrought
iron fixtures reminiscent of the
Jetsons. A unique round door
connecting two of the outdoor
spaces is a visual image that
every customer remembers. In
fact, Abbie Scarborough Jones,
Tom’s granddaughter says that

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