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Homer L. Potts, 88, died of natural causes July 18, 2016, after a short illness.  His Funeral Service is Saturday, July 23rd, at 11:00 AM in the Rose Room Chapel at Croxford Funeral Home.

Homer was born December 6, 1927, at Sprague, WA, to Jack, an Irish immigrant, and Eva Potts.  He was the eighth of eight children and grew up in Lamont, Sprague, and Cheney, WA during the Great Depression.  He graduated from Cheney High School in 1945.  After playing sports in high school, Homer played football for the Washington State Cougars during the 1945 season.  He gave that up after spending most of the semester on trains to and from games instead of in classes. He transferred to Eastern Washington College of Education and graduated with a business degree in 1950.

Not long after graduation, Homer married Gladys and was drafted to serve in the Army during the Korean War.  After returning from Korea, Homer went to Kellogg, Idaho, worked in a tire business, then moved to Great Falls to start his own business.

Homer could not afford any of the good business locations, so he settled upon a former military barracks located on a gravel road.  Luckily for Homer, the State Highway Department built the Warden Bridge and paved the road.  Homer formed O.K. Rubber Welders and Tenth Ave South became the busiest street in Montana.  Homer and his brother Tommy were partners in the tire business for many years.  Besides selling, repairing and recapping tires, Homer and Tommy could melt white walls onto black walls, paint old tires black again, and scrape rubber off uneven tires to make them rounder.  This endeared them to used car dealers, to say the least.  After Tommy retired, Frank Blaney and Jesse Shaw became partners.  By the end of his 53-year career, Homer was the longest-surviving businessman on Tenth Avenue South.

Along the way, Homer became known as a character.  When winds threatened to blow off the shop’s roof, Homer piled old tires on top.  If a car had a dent and the owner was short on money, Homer would chain the car to the O.K. sign in front and have the owner drive away from the sign.  That would bend the metal right back into shape, albeit with a wrinkle or two.  Homer’s tire shop, with the large O.K. sign and tires piled on the roof, became a landmark and the subject of a painting.  Buying tires from Homer was like going to church.  Somehow it was morally right and made people feel good.  The tires cost money, but the advice was free.

When the 21st Century came, people worried about getting new computers.  Homer didn’t even have one.  He didn’t have a cash register, either.  He still kept his change in a muffin tin in his desk drawer during the day and hid it under a shelf at night.  When Sam’s Club came to town, Homer’s competitors shuddered but Homer saw opportunity.  Wearing his old coveralls and driving his ‘63 Ford pickup, Homer introduced himself to the tire department manager and offered to haul away the old used tires for free.  Sam’s eventually caught on and terminated the relationship, but not before Homer had stuffed his shop full of free inventory. 

Homer quit the tire shop at the end of the last decade to care for Gladys, who was developing multiple health and medical issues.  So when Homer was 80 years old, he learned to cook, can pickles, and clean the house while making it appear to the outside world that Gladys was still doing this.

Homer and Gladys had two sons, Steven and Clark.  Gladys told Homer he had to work less and spend time with the boys.  Homer was a terrible fisherman and had no interest in camping, but he took the boys fishing at White Sulphur Springs every year on Opening Day and became active in Boy Scout Troop 23.  Refusing to sleep in a tent, Homer bought a truck with a camper and rarely missed a scout camp out.  When the troop needed money for camping equipment, Homer chaired the fund drive, which consisted of collecting and crushing beer cans, storing them in his garage in 55-gallon drums, and then selling the cans as scrap.  For several years Homer and the scouts became garbage pickers and Homer’s garage smelled like a stale brewery, but the troop made a fortune and had the best camping equipment in the Montana Council.

Homer was preceded in death by his parents; his wife, Gladys; brothers, William, Leslie, Daniel and Thomas; sisters, Evelyn, Maxine and Louise.  He is survived by his sons, Steven (Karelle) and Clark; and granddaughters, Alexandra and Danielle.

Homer and Gladys’s family thanks their physicians and the staff at Benefis Hospital.  Gladys remarked before entering Benefis for the last time how fortunate our community is to have that facility, and it was still true when Homer was admitted last week.

The family suggests memorials to the Benefis Health System Foundation, P.O. Box 7008, Great Falls, MT  59406.

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