Foxes leave their imprint on Tecumseh

Jan and Gary Fox inside of Grey Fox Floral/Tecumseh Coins.

By Jackie Koch

If you mention Jan and Gary Fox in Tecumseh, the odds are good that either flowers, coins, downtown or Appleumpkin will be part of the conversation. The two have been steady fixtures in the community for more than 50 years and have left an indelible imprint. Now the couple has plans to retire and move to central Florida, a place where there’s no need for snow shovels, at the end of October. 

Jan operates Grey Fox Floral and Gary’s business is Tecumseh Coins. “Grey Fox Floral will still be here — I will still own it and my staff is going to take over running it,” she said. Gary said Tecumseh Coins inside the Grey Fox building at 116 S. Evans St. will be closed for possibly a few years until some people who are interested in buying it can take over the operation. 

Gary is originally from south of Adrian and attended Madison High School, while Jan grew up in eastern Ohio. The two met when Jan, who was attending the floriculture program at Michigan State University, chose to come to Adrian for her placement training at Vine Street Flower Shop, owned by the Kackstetters at the time. “Gary happened to be working there while he was going to Adrian College, so that’s where we met, was at a flower shop,” she said. That was in 1970.

After they married, they were looking for a flower shop to buy and heard that Edward’s Floral at 130 W. Chicago Blvd. in Tecumseh was for sale. They looked at the shop in August 1972 when Jan was eight months pregnant with their son, Ben, but she said they wouldn’t make any commitments until after the baby was born and both mother and child were deemed healthy.

“Our son was born on September 5; I was healthy, he was healthy,” she said. “It also coincided with Gary’s first day of teaching ever and so he left me at the hospital with his mom. I had the baby and then she called down to the school to tell him at 9:30 in the morning, ‘You have a son.’”

Not long after, on November 1, 1972, they purchased the flower shop and will celebrate 53 years of operation this year. 

Along the way there have been some setbacks. On July 20, 1975, a fire started on the third floor of their building and destroyed Grey Fox Floral. In October of that year they purchased a large house at their current location that formerly held Custom Craft Draperies, and ran the flower shop there until another fire in April 2019 caused severe damage to the building. Despite that roadblock, they continued to run the businesses from an alternate location across the street until their new building could be constructed on the site of the old. 

While Jan was running Grey Fox Floral, Gary was teaching art and history, starting out at Springfield Middle School and moving on to Springfield High School in Holland, Ohio, as well as coaching high school cross country, track, and basketball. He retired in 2009 after 38 years as a teacher there and started Tecumseh Coins at the end of 2009 after looking at his coin collection. “I decided I’d become more of a hoarder than a collector, so all those extras I used as my opening and went from there. … At first, I went to work for my son in construction and decided I was way too old for that,” he said, laughing. 

Jan said she started getting involved in the community soon after they opened Grey Fox Floral. She met up with Nadine Seitz, who worked for Ken-Ray Drugs, and Betty Flanders of Flanders Music Store. “They kind of took me under their wing and got me involved right away in the chamber and Tecumseh Business and Professional Women, and that kind of started my involvement. And truthfully, Emily Kackstetter, when I worked at Vine Street, was a wonderful mentor to me and they were active in community activities and kind of instilled how important it was to be involved, and how it affected your business in being known to people, earning their trust, building relationships, that type of thing,” she said. 

Gary got more involved in the Tecumseh community after he retired from teaching and opened the coin shop, and with Jan was involved in the former Raisin Valley Civitan Club and the Tecumseh Lions Club. He also served two terms on Tecumseh City Council and has been a major sponsor of the sand sculptures for Tecumseh’s Sun & Sand Festival.  

Jan has been a board member for the former Tecumseh Chamber of Commerce, the Downtown Development Authority, the Central Business Association (now Tecumseh Events, Activities and Marketing — TEAM), and her biggest undertaking of all, Tecumseh’s Appleumpkin Festival, which she had a hand in creating. The festival will celebrate its 30th year on October 11 and 12. 

“There were four of us that started that — it was Rochelle Bird, Barb McCann, Julie Rohrer and myself,” said Jan. “We took a lot of flak in the beginning, like, ‘What a stupid name,’ but we just didn’t want to be called a fall festival, there’s a dime a dozen around of those. So we came up with Appleumpkin.” She said Barb McCann even made a costume that was a pumpkin with an apple on top of it, which is still used in a display.

“People remember it, and that’s what we wanted, was to become memorable, not just a fall festival… then we were partnered with Kapnick Orchards, so that’s how we came up with the apples and the pumpkins both being fall related,” she said.

Jan said the benefits of being so involved in her community include the “warm, fuzzy feeling” of getting to know people on a personal level. From a business viewpoint she’s had a goal to serve the people that utilize the flower shop, especially for funerals, by being empathetic, caring, learning about the family member who has passed, and working to make the process easier for families. 

In addition, they help people celebrate births, weddings, anniversaries and “all the occasions that carry emotions with them — that’s what we do, is help deal with emotions at the flower shop,” Jan said. “It’s the personal touch.”

She and Gary will be moving to a smaller town near Ocala, Fla., which she said feels somewhat like Tecumseh and is surrounded by a rural area. 

What will they miss about Tecumseh? “I won’t miss shoveling show,” said Gary. “I think the people,” said Jan. “We’ve gotten so many strong friendships. So many people have been in, both into the coin shop and in our shop. We’re going to miss you.”

Jan said she is a volunteer at heart, so Gary might have to rein her in when they get settled into their new home so she can enjoy her retirement and not sign up for too many things. 

“I’m proud to say I’m part of Tecumseh and what Tecumseh has become — a destination as well as a friendly town,” she said. What we’ve done, we’ve done out of love for what we want to do and do for the community, and not necessarily for any recognition or anything like that. It’s just because it’s what we need to do and want to do.”