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FAMILY HISTORY Friends Steakhouse becomes Sandy’s Friends
FAMILY Friends Steakhouse becomes Sandy’s Friends as tribute to owner’s parents History.4
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LEFT: This Coker family photo is from the time of performances with the Louisiana Hayride and at the Grand Ole Opry. ABOVE: Sandy Coker, Aunt Alvadean Coker and Al Coker Sr. performing at the Grand Ole Opry.
STORY BY ZACHARY SEIFTER PHOTOS CONTRIBUTED
Michael Mims grew up with extraordinary parents.
His father, Alvis Coker, also known as Sandy Coker, was a musician and an actor. He starred in old western movies, but was perhaps most known for opening for Elvis Presley on the Louisiana Hayride. He also performed at the Grand Ole Oprey.
His mother, Christine Thomas, who also went by the name Sandy Mims, was a Clanton native who moved to California at a young age and acted as well.
Thomas and Coker met in California. Together, they had Mims, who went back to Alabama with his mother after she and Coker split.
After that, the two went down a road that created one of Clanton’s longest-standing eateries.
When Mims and Thomas came back from California, they did not immediately find their way back to Clanton. They spent some time in Montgomery. After a few years, Thomas returned to her roots, bringing her son to Chilton County.
Growing up, Thomas was poor and did not have a home for some time.
“She lived in a dumpster, ate out of trash cans, dirt poor,” Mims said.
Her past did not define her future though. Thomas and Mims went on to become very
— Michael Mims
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successful through different business endeavors, including opening the restaurant that is now Sandy’s Friends.
“She ended up being a millionaire,” Mims said.
It began with Thomas owning a convenience store in Clanton. She owned it for three years, and in those years when she owned it, Mims worked there as a child.
After Thomas sold the convenience store, Mims worked in Clanton for a few more years and then joined the military.
Thomas went on to open up a curtain business called Curtains Unlimited. It was one of her most successful business endeavors, as she sold curtains all over the state, and sold them to high-profile customers like the mother of Stevie Wonder.
Years later, after Mims came back from military service, he and Thomas decided to get into the bar/ restaurant business. In 2003, the two of them opened Friends Steakhouse.
They opened it in the Southgate Mall in Clanton, and Thomas oversaw day-to-day operations.
“Sometimes she had to cook, she had to bartend, she had to waitress, she had to do everything,” Mims said of his mother. “A lot of people hated that, but they would
ABOVE: Sandy’s Friends owner Michael Mims renamed the restaurant and bar, formerly known as Friends Steakhouse, in honor of his parents. Both his father, Alvis Coker, and mother, Christine Thomas, went by the name Sandy at different points in their lives. BELOW: Christine Thomas died in 2021.
Alvis Coker died in 2020.
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0817-501HC-19806-2/11/2021 Voted Chilton County's Best Insurance Agent! Thank You for your votes! Sandy Mims started going by Christine Thomas after she married Lindell Thomas.
look me in the face and tell me how much they loved her.”
In 2017, the two said goodbye to the restaurant that they created, as they felt it was time to move on.
“She talked me into letting her sell it,” Mims said. “‘You don’t need the stress (she said). You’ve had a heart attack in 2012, tried to run for mayor against Billy Joe (Driver). So, let’s sell it.’”
Only three years passed before Mims got the business back.
He purchased Friends Steakhouse following a tough year in 2020. His father, Coker, passed away just months before Thomas did in Nov. 2020. The people who originally took the restaurant off Mims’ hands wanted to sell it, and Mims felt it was time to bring it back to the family that created it.
“Everything was paid off,” Mims said. “I said ‘Well, I’ll try to get along.’ I don’t want to see this place fail.”
This time though, Mims was looking to change some things up. He wanted a fresh start for the restaurant, and the first thing he wanted to do was change the name.
“I thought about it for about January, February and March, and then I went to my lawyer… and said ‘Hey, can we make an LLC for Sandy’s Friends before I buy it?’” Mims said.
The name was chosen to honor his parents. Sandy Coker (Alvis Coker) and Sandy Mims (Christine Thomas) paved the way for Mims’ extraordinary life. He felt it was only right to honor their legacy in the place he and his mother built together.
Now, Sandy’s Friends lives on in Clanton, and it is run by one of the two people who saw it come to life in 2003. While it may not have the second half of the mother-son duo that built it, it still has the spirit and legacy of the parents that paved the way for its success and the success of their son.
