Perhaps there was no need for pastors to deliver eulogies about the life of Stewart Bell.
Bell wrote his eulogy all of the days of his life.
“The truth is we preach our own funerals by the way we live,” Rev. John Cook told those Thursday attending a Celebration of Life at First Baptist Church on Anderson Street downtown for the longtime owner of Bell’s Seed Store on nearby Russell Street. “Stewart Bell preached a phenomenal funeral by the way he lived.”
Bell didn’t need to write a script about how he should live. He found his template in his Bible scriptures.
“His parents taught him about his Lord and Savior,” said Cook, the former pastor at Snyder Memorial Baptist Church.
Bell followed in his father’s footsteps in the lawn and garden business (circa 1919), just as his father followed his father’s footsteps.
“His father taught him business,” Cook said.
As a third-generation owner, Stewart Bell was dedicated to carrying on the family business name in this community.
“He was there nine hours on workdays for over 40 years,” the preacher said. “Sunday was a day for worship and rest.”
Otherwise, the store with its colorful seasonal plants, rose bushes, azaleas, fall mums, lawn seeds, centipedes, fertilizers, yard benches, wind chimes, birdhouses, and garden tools was home.
“He loved the daily contact with customers and contractors,” Cook said. “His employees witnessed his work ethic. Stewart treated everyone equally. He had a special place in his heart for people who worked with their hands. And if he got a deal, he passed it on to his customers.”
Bell’s Seed Store wasn’t just a business.
“Stewart made Bell’s Seed Store a pleasant place,” Cook said. “And people loved talking to Stewart Bell.”
He could put you at ease.
He had a receptive ear when it came to you or your family.
“He was a great listener, and people felt heard,” Cook said. “You genuinely knew he cared about you.”
Stewart Bell was born January 15, 1962, the youngest of three children to the late William M. Bell Jr. and Bobbie L. Bell. He grew up along Ramsey Street, where his Christian faith evolved at this downtown church, and where he was baptized in 1976.
He met Gwen Poole, who would become the love of his life, in 1983.
She swept him off his proverbial feet.
“He proposed to her at the New China Restaurant,” son Andrew Bell said. He slipped his own message into a fortune cookie. “It said, ‘Will you marry me?’”
The couple married at Snyder Memorial Baptist Church on November 1, 1986.
“This Sunday would have been their 40th wedding anniversary,” he said.
He took a moment of pause.
A Father Remembered
“They don’t let you pick your dad,” Andrew Bell said, “but I couldn’t have had a better one.”
Brother Hunter Bell said as much.
“How blessed to say Stewart Bell was my dad, and what a tremendous dad he was,” he said. “He loved us and liked being with us. He just wanted to be around us, including his grandchildren.”
He remembered a father’s love for the mountains, family trips to Myrtle Beach, and watching his father delivering holiday meals for underprivileged families and Christmas gifts to those in need.
“He did it often and quietly,” he said. “I was blessed to come from a family with a wonderful father.”
The preacher reminded us of the pride Stewart and Gwen Bell took in watching their children grow into adults.
“He and Gwen were diligent in raising their children in the Christian faith,” Cook said. “And he once wrote to his daughter [Mary Stewart Sullivan) “how proud he was to see the Christian woman she had become.”
He was a proud Christian, a proud husband, a proud parent, and a proud grandfather.
‘He Was Just Kind’
Stewart Maxwell Bell suffered a brain aneurysm in early October.
He died October 20 at Duke Medical Center.
He was 64.
“Stewart was raised here,” said the Rev. Mari Wiles, pastor at the old brick church. “He was baptized here, and we are grateful to honor him today. We mourn his earthly passing but celebrate his eternal life.”
The Rev. Blake Benge is senior pastor at Snyder Memorial Baptist Church, where Stewart Bell was devout in his faith and served multiple terms as a deacon.
“If I were to describe Stewart in one word, it would be ‘kind,’” he said. “He was just kind. He was always kind.”
Epilogue
Bell’s Seed Store was silent Thursday afternoon.
The marquee out front said it all: In Memory of Stewart Maxwell Bell 1962-2026.
Just blocks away on Anderson Street, John Cook left us with a prayer.
“We are so grateful for the life of Stewart Bell,” Cook prayed. “He is absent from our presence, but safe, Lord, in yours.”
Bill Kirby Jr. can be reached at billkirby49@gmail.com or 910-624-1961.
