Aptly-named store in Greenfield closing this Saturday

One chapter of the Greenfield square that dates back to August 2011 is coming to an end as J’s Variety will close its doors Saturday, July 13.

For the past 13 years, the store, owned by Jenice Wallace and Jane Ahnen, has lived up to its name as a place where lovers of gifts and antiques can be sure to strike gold on a variety of items.

Ahnen has been a lifelong lover of antiques. She was one of the original co-owners of 1st Street Antiques with her sister-in-law Pasty Ahnen, Wallace Dwinnell and Esther Ramsey. She also owned The Jewel Box for decades.

Wallace worked for a cookie company most recently, but she is also a retired Adair County Auditor.

Wallace and Ahnen were at the same auction one time and the encounter led them to open a store together. Ahnen had the building available, which most notably was the home of Crook’s Clothing. Crook’s was cited in the 1999 Adair County History Book as unofficially being the oldest men’s clothing store in Iowa.

Though their vision may have been a little different from the start, it morphed into what it is today, the owners said.

When J’s opened, Wayne’s Gift Shop was closing in town, so they tried to carry those types of items, along with antiques.

When accounting offices next door vacated that space, J’s was able to also utilize that building for merchandise.

Some of the most memorable treasures people have found at J’s Variety are retired street signs from Greenfield. When the city replaced theirs, J’s submitted the winning bid for over 600 of the retired signs to become theirs. Jenice’s husband Doug, who is always willing to help, transported the signs from a storage unit where they were stored. He organized them into various streets and transported them to the store on the square. There is now only one left.

“People who were wanting to downsize brought us things. A box of this and a box of that,” Wallace remembers. “The one big one was when we cleared out an old farmhouse. That was fun.”

“We found a bunch of things that people luckily had not gotten rid of,” Ahnen said.

“The lady kept everything, and it was so awesome,” Wallace added. “The gentleman lived away. He told us where the key was and we’d go in and sort things. We’d make a pile and give him an offer. The next time he’d come he’d say yay or nay and pull things out.”

The owners say picking various homes is how they obtained such a variety of merchandise. In some cases, vendors rented space at J’s and sold their own items in the store.

“When you go to an auction you buy items one at a time instead of maybe [all items in] the back of a pickup,” Ahnen said. Picking antiques has taken them to hot attics, small crawlspaces and basements with big spiders.

“We don’t know what we’d do without Doug,” Ahnen said. “He carried things and carried more things.”

Having J’s Variety has been a good experience that was well worth it, the owners say.

“For the fun and the people we’ve met, it’s been incredible,” Wallace said. “We’ve met people from Finland, Australia and all over the United States, and we’ve had some good employees through the years too.”