Mar. 3—"The Tire Lady " died Wednesday.

Her friends and customers wanted you to know that.

All those people who are volunteer firemen, and small-town cops, and small-town mayors, and organizers of community causes — wanted to make sure you were informed, also.

The Tire Lady: The above-mentioned marketing moniker was how most people knew Christine Croucher, who parlayed the above into the founding of two successful garages of the same name in Masontown and Star City.

Friends discovered the 69-year-old Croucher unresponsive at her home.

Despite efforts there to save her and a HealthNet flight, she was pronounced dead at J.W. Ruby Memorial Hospital.

Funeral arrangements are incomplete for Croucher, whose survivors include a son and her brother.

Meanwhile, for those friends — whom she also considered family — Croucher was known for something else besides her business acumen.

The Tire Lady, they'll tell you, will be remembered for her generous spirit and community altruism, both of which dug in just as deep as the tread on all those tires she sold over the years.

Customers were family, too, her friend and former co-worker Tammy Belldina said.

Even, Belldina said, if didn't realize it, until after the lug nuts were tightened on the wheel.

Belldina was a sales associate at The Tire Lady's Rainbow Tire Masontown location.

As in, Masontown, Preston County — where studded snow tires are often a necessity well into the spring, no matter what a certain groundhog in Pennsylvania might say.

Croucher had one rule concerning sales, Belldina said.

And a big part of it related to the prevailing conditions under which one must often motor in the mountain county.

If a customer came in with children in tow, and said customer might have trouble paying for a purchase, no matter, Belldina remembered.

Roll with it, the boss would decree.

"She'd say, 'Don't you dare let them go out of here with those kids in the car until they have tires. Even used tires. We can always work something out.'"

'I know, honey, but you're doing it anyway'

It was The Tire Lady who literally got Belldina rolling again.

Belldina, who was a jailer with the Monongalia County Sheriff's Department, enjoyed turning a wrench and throttling up her Harley-Davidson motorcycle during her off-hours.

She was also a Preston County kid who over the years had gotten to know Croucher.

The tire entrepreneur was well established there by then, having opened her garage in 1984.

Belldina, as said, was never one to be idle, so she became a part-time employee at Rainbow Tire — six months before everything changed forever.

On June 9, 2002, Belldina was leaning that big bike into a turn, when it got away from her.

When she woke up, she found out she was paralyzed from the waist down.

Croucher came to see her every day in the rehab center.

And when Belldina was released, Croucher came to see her every day at home — with a not-so hidden motivation.

The goal was to get her back to work.

"It would take me two hours to get dressed, so I could go to work for 15 minutes or 20 minutes, " Belldina said.

Croucher, of course, would be cheering and cajoling the whole time.

Such overtures, the recipient said, weren't always appreciated.

"There were days when I'd cuss her, " she said, alternately weeping and laughing as the memories spooled out like a West Virginia two-lane.

"I'd say, 'I don't wanna do this.' She'd day, 'I know, honey, but you're doing it anyway.'"

And when she was strong enough to go to work full-time, she wheeled up on an amazing surprise.

Croucher had retrofitted the whole place, specifically for an employee who happened to also be a wheelchair user.

Counters were lowered, doorways were reconfigured and pathways and walkways were paved.

"She did all that for me, " Belldina said.

"She didn't make a big deal about it. She just did it."

Consider that a Tire Lady operator's manual on how to found a corporation — while being a good corporate neighbor at the same time.

Hank jumpstarts a brand She was born in Pittsburgh, but grew up in the rural reaches, graduating with the Class of 1971 at Waynesburg Central High.

In the late 1970s and early 80s, before The Tire Lady rolled into being, Croucher was still a business owner, operating her own gas station in rural Pennsylvania.

One of her regulars was an older gentleman named Hank, who convinced her to buy a truckload of used tires.

Hank sweetened the deal with tire-changing machine — in ill-repair, but for free — that popped them off the rim, just like at the big garages.

A new enterprise was born.

So was a relocation to Wild, Wonderful — a deal on a piece of property in Masontown she couldn't say no to.

Her garage in Pennsylvania was right down the road from everyone's favorite bar, The Rainbow Tavern.

She thought it was a good name and took a variant of it with her to West Virginia.

One of her early customers in Preston County kept calling her the "tire lady, " which she liked.

Thus, a brand was born.

'She saved my life'

So was a reputation for outreach.

She doled out dollars, and tires, to community causes.

Volunteer fire departments and small-town police departments.

Special Olympics.

Fundraisers for seriously ill children and for groups wanting to turn the now-empty elementary school into a community center.

"Chris did so much that people didn't know about, " Belldina said.

"She always told me that if was going to contribute to something, to do it for right reason and not for me. She was humble."

In a 1998 profile in The Dominion Post, Croucher presented a road map, of sorts.

"I plan to work 'til I'm 55, " she said.

"That's my dream, " Croucher concluded. "I'm going to retire, and write."

In the end, she was too busy writing the story of her employees and her community, Belldina said.

"She was my second mom and she saved my life. People always said we'd make a good comedy team or reality show. I'm just lost right now."

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