"This is Dr. John for Grace, and you won't believe what Grace is doing now."

That is how John Reynolds began radio advertisements for Reynolds Lamp and Repair. For years, prior to his death in 2003, the familiar refrain shocked listeners and ultimately reached customers.

Now, after 40 years in business, Grace Reynolds, 75, is doing the unbelievable again -- she is retiring and closing her Southern Pines store today.

"It is breaking my heart to have to close this store," Reynolds said. "I feel so responsible for the need that is here."

Grace and her husband opened an antiques store in Sanford in 1968. The couple opened a second store in Southern Pines in 1982. In 1986, the Reynoldses closed their Sanford store, and relocated the other store to its current location on Turner Street in Southern Pines.

The business began because of the couple's love of collecting antiques and unique items. They went all over the country and eventually the world searching for the perfect antiques.

The business evolved over the years thanks to Grace's hard work, dedication and uncanny ability to see the next "it" items before they happened, said her daughter, Jhane Mecimore.

"She has always been ahead of her time," Mecimore said of her mother. "Mom was the lady with the glass ball who could predict the future. She always knew what the next big thing was."

The first big evolution of the business came in the early 1980s when Sanford got a bowling alley, which was located near the Reynolds' business.

The bowling alley drew a steady stream of customers who inevitably stopped into the antiques store.

Many came in searching for lamp shades and new lamps, or brought in lamps in need of repairs. It was then, Reynolds said, that the light bulb went on in her head.

"I was running a museum, and you can't make a living running a museum," Reynolds said.

She moved away from antiques and centered the business around lamps, lamp shades and lamp repair.

"I didn't know what to start with," Reynolds said. "So I called some lamp shade (sales) representatives and bought four of everything they had."

Then she called around and bought all the parts she could to do repairs. Reynolds Lamps & Restoration was born.

Over the years, Reynolds has dabbled in other antiques items. Some of the most popular are Asian antiques.

But through the years, the success of the business has been all about lamps.

"Our bread and butter is lampshades, designing the lamps and the repairs we do," Reynolds said. "That is what makes this so hard. There is a real need for this business."

Reynolds said she has tried to sell the businesses for several years. Her daughter, Jhane, even tried to run the store, but quickly found out it wasn't for her.

"She knows so much, I don't have that kind of knowledge," said Mecimore, who remembers sitting around the shop as a small child while her parents created and repaired lamps.

"I decided it was more than I wanted to do," Mecimore said.

The family tried to sell the business, but a deal fell through when the prospective owners asked Reynolds to stay on and run the store.

"At 75 years old, she just wasn't willing to stay," Mecimore said.

Mecimore said many of their customers are devastated that the store is closing.

"They ask, 'Where are we going to go to for this stuff,'" Mecimore said. "We have customers who come in here, and they are shocked. But it's a reality. This time we are not staying open."

"(Closing) is not an easy thing to do, but it has become a necessary thing to do," Reynolds said.

Reynolds, who was born in Sanford and married to her husband for 54 years, lives in Pinehurst. She has two daughters, Teresa Reynolds and Mecimore, and four grandchildren, ages 22, 12, 11 and 7.

Reynolds said that in retirement she will devote more time to gardening and spend more time with her grandchildren.

A few years ago, Reynolds said she had a hard time getting her youngest grandchild to give her a hug, or even talk to her.

"She told me, 'My mother taught me not to speak to strangers,'" Reynolds said. "Now I am not a stranger anymore."

Contact Tom Embrey at 693-2473 or by e-mail at tembrey@thepilot.com.