By CAROLINE CARMICHAEL/ Staff Writer

Orell’s Beauty Salon in Jemison is celebrating 50 years of business at its Highway 31 location on Aug. 19 between 8 a.m. and 2 p.m.

The event will supply refreshments and give-aways throughout the day.

“We’re going to have small door prizes every hour,” Owner Sara Ellison Northcutt said. “At 12, we’re going to draw for a big door prize, and at two, we’re going to draw for a $50 certificate.”

Northcutt said that while the hourly door prize winners must be present to receive their prizes, the $50 certificate winner does not have to be present.

Northcutt said door prizes will be “little baggies” containing items, such as lotion, shampoo, conditioner, combs and even candy.

“We have a brush that everybody’s just gone crazy about… but we’re going to do one big door prize [around] 12 p.m., and that brush will be in the bag for that,” Northcutt said.

The hairbrush is called a Wet Brush, which Northcutt said is more expensive than a typical hairbrush.

As part of the celebration, individuals having the number 5 in their ages may receive a majorly discounted haircut and shampooing.

Northcutt said these discounted haircuts will sell for 50 cents, or 75 cents for both a haircut and shampooing.

Northcutt laughed, “We’re not going to make a lot of money that day, but still, we’re just going to have a good time.”

Northcutt said she has been cutting hair for 60 years. She began at age 14, cutting hair in her mother Orell Littleton Ellison’s home shop, which was called Ellison’s Beauty Salon at that time.

Northcutt said the shop officially opened as Orell’s Beauty Salon in 1967 after her mother’s divorce and the shop’s relocation to its own building where it stands today.

“Fifty years ago, there was nothing over here,” Northcutt said.

Northcutt said only the Shell gas station, a service station and a café, which has since closed, stood on the strip of Highway 31 at the time of the salon’s opening.

Northcutt said her mother predicted the Jemison business growth on Highway 31.

“She said, ‘I may not live to see it, but you will. Everything will be on 31,’” Northcutt said. “Smart woman.”

When Orell’s was first opening, Northcutt said her mother phoned her, requesting she leave her job in Chicago to return home to Jemison to work alongside her in the new shop.

That was 50 years ago.

Today, Northcutt owns the shop, having purchased it from her mother with a promise to keep its name as long as she is alive and the business is hers.

Four generations of her family have worked at the salon, serving even more generations of faithful customers.

“It’s been an awesome career, if I had to quit tomorrow, which I hope not,” Northcutt said.

Orell’s Beauty Shop serves all ages and is located at 24603 on Highway 31 in Jemison.