Meyers receives award from Stephen Lee, President of First Financial bank
First Financial Bank, N.A., presented this year’s 2016 Athena award to Elaine Meyers during a breakfast held in her honor at the Brown Estate on Thursday May 12th at 7:30am. She is best known in the area as the owner of The Horseman Store, a western wear retail fixture in Orange since 1969. In 1992 she expanded her retail presence to three stores by opening stores in Slidell and Gonzalez, La. In 1997, Elaine started Safety Wear Ltd and began marketing custom fit safety boots in Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi from a fleet of mobile units as well as two Houston locations and one in Port Arthur. The company has enjoyed incredible success and now boasts over 600 accounts including customers like Exxon, Motiva, Shell and International Paper. In addition to surviving and thriving through many economic cycles, she is also a mom, grandmother, industry leader and two time cancer survivor.
Over the last 47 years Ms Meyers has hired and trained hundreds of high school and college students where she proudly instilled the work ethic taught to her by her mom on a small farm in Louisiana. Taking great pride in mentoring these young students, she has also developed a scholarship program granting four scholarships annually. She is an active member of Trinity Baptist Church, serving on the finance, building and personnel committees. She was first diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer in 1989 and after successfully defeating the disease she was informed in the past year cancer had returned. After a grueling surgery and several rounds of aggressive chemotherapy we are pleased to announce she has once again been declared cancer free. Most recently, Ms Meyers finds herself recovering from tragedy once again as both her businesses suffered severe damage from Sabine River flooding. Unfazed by the adversity, she is now open and operating from a temporary location at the Northway Shopping Center.
Past winners
1993-Pam Crew-Honeycutt
1994-Gisela Houseman
1995-Anna Jean Caffey
1996-Marcelle Adams
1997-Louise Maberry
1998-Alexine Adams
1999-Jane Whitfield
2000-Cecily Varner
2001-Eula Hoffpauer
2002-Mary McKenna
2003-Vivian Kelly
2004-Pauline Hargrove
2005-Debbie Hughes
2006-Betty Harmon
2007-Beth Rach
2008-Katherine Frey
2009-Ruby Wimberly*
2009-Theresa Beauchamp*
2010-Nancy Vincent
2011-Nancy Vincent
2012-Mary Behnke
2013-Beverly Perry
2014-No Winner
2015-Judge Courtney Arkeen
2016-Elaine Meyers
Two awards given in 2009
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