Local Hardware Store Supplies Sense of Community

In what we could now call  the "old days" there were three tiny markets and a Safeway within easy walking distance of Plaza Park. There were drugstores, a library, bars and restaurants. There was also , where the screws, saws and other goods came with helpful instructions and advice from the people who worked there.  The majority of these shops are gone. But Oaks remains much as it was then. It's a relic.

In a Home Depot world, where massive big box stores compete with the small retailer on price and convenience, a place like Oaks Hardware needs to offer the kind of personal service that keeps customers loyal.

Sandra Morrison, who comes from Placerville to shop at Oaks for obscure items, said the store succeeds. "It's such a friendly place and I can always find what I'm looking for," she said.

Patrons like Morrison come to Oaks looking for tools and sound advice, but there was a time when people came to Oaks Hardware seeking community and news about Fair Oaks. For years, the store functioned as a social hub for a clique of regulars, who might have been old enough to remember when the hardware store bore a different name.  

According to the Fair Oaks Historical Society, the store existed in the 1930s as Kellam's Hardware, Appliances & Ladies Fashions, just around the corner facing the plaza. The Kellams built a new store at the current location and held a grand opening in the mid 1940s. In the 1960s we knew the store as Nardinelli's.

The Nardinelli sign remains, although the store has officially been Oaks Hardware since Dick and Jeanne Hill purchased it in 1983.

Dick's years of experience in sales along with his outgoing personality quickly led to him becoming a fixture in Fair Oaks.. He was active in the Fair Oaks Rotary Club, the local chamber of commerce, the Boy Scouts and the PTA. Jeanne  was a  champion of the local chickens, she provided food and water and was known to chase down and chastise any who dared to harass her favored fowl.

During the Hill's tenure the hardware store continued to function as "social central" for a cluster of old-timers.

"There were distinct groups," their son Dave recalls.

Dave inherited the business in 2000 when his parents both died within months of each other. Dave has enhanced the inventory with some personal interests, stocking essential cookware, with an emphasis on preserving and BBQ.

While the store may not be the social hub it once was, it's still a homey place. "The old-timers were a generation ahead of me," Dave said. "My friends can't come and hang out like that. They have jobs they have to go to."