Mayor Pro-Tem Don Callihan will lead city through election year
Mack West, who served as mayor of East Ellijay the past 50 years, has died.
West passed away at age 88 Saturday, Feb. 11, after recently being diagnosed with advanced pancreatic cancer.
As East Ellijay’s mayor, he followed his dad, Newman “N.A.” West, who’d served as mayor from 1950-1972.
N.A. West did not seek re-election in ‘72, which led to Mack first running for and winning the mayoral seat. He was often re-elected without opposition over the next five decades.
West is believed to have been the longest sitting mayor in Georgia, noted Valerie Crump, of East Ellijay City Hall.
“There was one, I think, in Acworth who’d been mayor for 30-something years. I believe he was the second longest (sitting mayor in Georgia),” she added. “In the country, there was a mayor in New York who was mayor for 51 years, but our mayor was the longest sitting one in Georgia.”
‘Was his backyard’
West had worked in the insurance business when he and wife, Ann, lived in Atlanta for a time after he got out the Air Force, remembered Mack Wood, East Ellijay City Planner.
The two Macks had known each other growing up, and their lives paralleled in that both East Ellijay natives sought to come back home and settle down after living and working in the big city. After moving back home, the Wests ran a local Sears Catalog store for several years.
“He worked downtown and went to Georgia Tech at night and took classes. I worked at General Motors and went to Kennesaw Jr. College. But we both came back,” said Wood. “He was working in downtown Atlanta, and told his wife one day, ‘If we’re ever going to grow old together, we’re going to have to move back home. I can’t handle this traffic!’”
About West rarely being photographed over his 50 years in office, daughter Sherry Crump said, “he was a public servant, not a politician.”
Wood said West kept a tight control of the city’s finances, but was also known for his generosity, including a Christmas program that provided hams or turkeys to East Ellijay senior citizens and those in need.
“He wasn’t only the mayor, but also the financial officer. He spent money wisely and always balanced the budget. He did the books by hand and could wear out an adding machine,” said Wood.
The construction of East Ellijay’s current city hall was one example of West spending and saving money at the same time, noted Wood. The former city hall was in a little old schoolhouse, which had also been the town community center at one point, and the current one was built in pretty much the same location.
“He always wanted to have a nicer city hall, but when they got the bids for a new one, it was more than what he wanted (to spend),” Wood said. “I told him, ‘Mayor, I can build you one for a whole lot less than that.’ That’s how our city hall where we are now got started. I drew the plans up, and we built it and had it paid for in two years because of the (commercial) boom. It was done through his management.”
Larry Callahan, East Ellijay Police Chief, said West treated everybody “like family.”
“It (would be hard) to find a mayor who was as dedicated to his city and making it better for those in it as he was, and for as long as he was,” Callahan said. “He was just a super guy and a great person to work for.”
A longstanding decision not to charge city property taxes and amenities like the city providing free garbage pickup for residents were two constants under West’s leadership.
“East Ellijay was his backyard, or his front yard, however you want to put it,” said Wood. “He made sure every lot was mowed and wasn’t grown up. He asked the street department to mow them and weed eat all the streets to make sure they had a good appearance.”
West, who served in the Air Force from 1954-58, probably could’ve been a doctor if he’d wanted, Wood said.
“He was in Germany and Europe, and he worked in the hospitals. He could spell just about any word in the dictionary and pronounce just about any medical term, which was amazing,” he said.
Time of transformation
West led East Ellijay during a time of heavy transformation, which saw the tiny mountain town quickly become the commercial center of Gilmer County.
The construction of Appalachian Highway 515, which provided a direct route between Pickens County and North Carolina, facilitated that growth. West was a proponent of the highway coming through and the commercial growth that followed.
“It’s grown so much, it’s just unreal. The transition is unbelievable,” said Wood.
As the highway reached East Ellijay, national chain businesses and big-box stores began popping up along the new four-lane. Walmart, Hardee’s, McDonald’s, Ingles and Burger King, all of which still operate there, were among the first chains to build, recalled Wood.
“(The highway) opened it up. Once we started getting growth, everybody started coming,” he added. “(Around Maddox Drive and Yukon Road) became the go-to place.”
Tony Whitaker, whose dad, Ben, was a longtime Gilmer County Commissioner and granddad, Cecil, a past mayor of East Ellijay, remembered how there were few businesses of any kind operating in “East Town” before the highway came through in the mid-1980s.
“There was a little grocery store and the post office setting where the Teague law office is now, but, in the city of Ellijay, there were probably five grocery stores at one time. That’s where all the (business) was,” said Whitaker. “When that growth came, everything went to East Ellijay.”
Despite the influx of retail chains and other businesses, East Ellijay managed to keep a small-town feel under West’s leadership, Wood noted.
“The growth had set in, and we were transitioning. Walmart moved to where it is now, and then Lowe’s came. Then we started getting Longhorn’s and the (other restaurants) out there,” he said. “It was unique that our business section is down there, and we kept the little hamlet up here just like it was. We had the small town effect and the commercial business effect out on 515.”
Election this year
Per East Ellijay’s charter, the city’s mayor pro-tem succeeds a sitting mayor who dies while in office. Mayor Pro-Tem Don Callihan was expected to be sworn in sometime this week.
Callihan will serve as mayor for the remainder of the current term, which runs through 2023. East Ellijay’s mayoral seat and all city council positions are up for election this year.
Just recently, West presided over a city council meeting at which qualifying fees for the election were set. He’d intended to continue his duties as mayor after receiving the cancer diagnosis and also planned to seek re-election, Wood noted.
“The week before he died, he’d been getting ready for the next budget,” Wood added.
The election for East Ellijay Mayor and City Council will be held Tuesday, Nov. 7, according to the Gilmer County Registrar’s Office.