Roger Butler got the surprise of a lifetime recently when he heard his name called as the recipient of the Lifetime Membership Award from the Alabama Jewelers Association earlier this month.

Butler said it meant a great deal to receive the award, and he was shocked to be honored.

“It meant a great deal to me,” Butler said. “Around 1990, they gave these awards to people that I look up to [David Ginn and Jim Ingram]. Twenty years later, they gave it to me. It was a great surprise.”

Butler started his career in the jewelry business in a nontraditional way. He graduated from the University of Alabama with a degree in communications with every intention of working in that field, but things changed when he started a new job.

“I went to work for Mr. [Julius] Talton [at WHBB, a radio station] and … three of his biggest customers thought they needed to buy a jewelry story that belonged to Mr. I.J. Hicks,” Butler said. “Mr. Talton was asked to buy a fourth of the I.J. Jewelry store because they thought Selma needed it.”

That’s when it was suggested that Butler run the store.

“Mr. Talton said ‘I know just the person to run it.’ He said I had just the personality to be a jeweler. I did not know what that meant, I may have figured it out 50 years later,” Butler said laughing.

“Apparently, he was right. I had a really good time running my jewelry store.”

Butler eventually bought out the other investors, and the store became Roger Butler Jewelers  in 1965. In 2002, the store became Butler Truax Jewelers

At the banquet at Callaway Gardens, they began introducing the winner of the award, and that was Butlers first indication that he was the recipient.

“They started announcing who it was, and they said all these things that were nice that could fit most anybody, but were nice, maybe too nice. Then they said he was president in 1972, and I kind of teared up,” Butler said as he teared up again.

“I really was just absolutely thrilled to death because two people who I looked up to who were my age and we all three did the same things for the association, they received the award in the early 90s, and I’d like to be like them.”

Butler has been a member of the association since 1964, the year he started working in the business.

“In that period of time, it was difficult to travel and difficult to communicate. Traveling was slow and expensive and long distance calls were very expensive,” Butler said.

“The state associations were very important because they kept us informed of what was going on in our industry.”

Butler said he is just happy to have been in the business from 1964 until he retired in 2002, as well as helping out in later years, and to have been a part of the association.

“I look back on it and it was wonderful luck,” Butler said. “I have thoroughly enjoyed being in it.”

Butler was accompanied to the banquet by his wife, Dolly, daughter, Doris and grandson Andrew Truax.