Iconic Palmer Carrs bagger retires after 15 years

PALMER — Of all the places to find a celebrity, Carrs Safeway is probably not where most people would look. Nevertheless, it’s true.

“Hey Kim, I’m going to be a movie star,” James “Bim” Hoylman said to his co-worker when the press came to take his photograph.

Bim has been in the Frontiersman more than once in the last few years, but now that he’s retiring and moving to Washington state, it’s time to share some memories once more.

Born in Lincoln, Nebraska Jan. 22, 1950, Bim has lived in Alaska for many years. From umpiring with Little League baseball to bowling and playing golf for the Special Olympics, Bim has long been a presence in the Valley, but it was as a bagger for the last 15 years that he seems to have made the biggest impression on people.

“Like anybody in Palmer, I met him at Carrs,” said Palmer City Council member Linda Combs. “Frankly, grocery shopping is one of my least favorite chores, but knowing I was going to run into Bim, that wouldn’t matter.”

Bim’s supervisor and Carrs store manager Terri Clark-Newman said local grocery store employees used to get together for Christmas parties, and Bim dressed up as Santa Claus more than once, handing out candy canes to customers one year.

“He’s very diligent as a worker, and he rarely calls in sick,” Clark-Newman said.

At the store’s previous location, she said, they even got permission from the City of Palmer for Bim to drive his four-wheeler to work, since the only pavement he really had to cross during the trek was in the store’s parking lot.

Oh, and he loves “harassing” people who don’t love the Denver Broncos or the Mat-Su Miners, she said.

When Bim was hit by a car in 2011 while rolling someone’s groceries out of the store, Combs said, she and Clark-Newman jumped into action on Facebook, calling Bim the “heart of Palmer” and asking for people to send get-well cards, one of his favorite things. Within eight hours of posting, Combs said, they had more than 1,000 hits between messages and memories from friends and community members. Even Combs’ oldest grandson, who was in Florida at the time, stopped what he was doing to write a note about Bim.

Despite what Bim’s niece and caretaker, Tina Everly called a “very traumatic” and “serious accident,” he was working again in almost no time.

“He recovered faster than anybody they’d seen before,” Everly said, referring to Bim’s doctors. “He was up and moving, back at work at six weeks.”

Maybe it was the greeting cards.

Combs said when she visited him at home just after he had finished his first session of rehabilitation, he had an entire wall full of cards.

“He’s got a real good family there (at Carrs) but I think he considers all of Palmer his family, if you want to know the truth,” Combs said.

After the accident, Everly became Bim’s legal guardian — should something similar ever occur again — but her uncle is perfectly functional for everyday life, she said.

“He doesn’t want to be alone but he can do everything,” Everly said. “If something (is) going wrong, he has the ability to communicate just fine.”

Bim’s exploration of his religious faith is just one example of how capable and self-aware he is.

Earlier this year, after he had attended St. John’s Lutheran Church in Palmer for a few months, Bim asked Pastor Jonathan Rockey to baptize him. On March 16, Rockey obliged.

“As a pastor I can tell you he is very strong in his faith,” Rockey said. “He always says ‘Jesus is with me and he helps me.’ He knows that, I believe that.”

Jim Summers, Bim’s golfing buddy, said he and his family had been going to pastor Rockey’s church for years but never connected with Bim until Jim was invited to help him prepare for the Special Olympics this summer. Not only that, but they soon discovered that they only lived about 1,000 yards apart.

“Everybody knew who Bim was, but we didn’t know him personally,” Summers said.

Once they began golfing together, Summers said, Bim caught onto the sport quickly, despite having some small physical limitations left over from the accident. Although they won’t be able to attend the state tournament next weekend, since Bim will be starting the moving process then, it sounds like Summers has gained more than just a few extra games of golf.

“He has a very uncomplicated faith, and it’s been a real blessing to my wife and I to be around him,” Summers said. “He’s optimistic and hopeful and always looks forward to the future. If you find yourself down and thinking ‘woe is me,’ you can get around Bim for an afternoon or evening and just forget about all that.”

But how did he get the nickname, Bim?

A Jim Reeves song that his dad liked to sing around him when he was a kid, his niece said, “just stuck.”

“Bimbo, bimbo, where you gonna go-e-o?” Reeves sings.

Though Bim begins his move to Washington next weekend, our readers should keep on the lookout for him. Everly’s daughter will keep his Palmer residence warm for him around vacation time.

“He’s definitely made his mark here,” Combs said. “I’m happy for him, but I think we’ll be poorer for not having him around.”

In the meantime, be sure to say hi to Bim if you’re shopping at Carrs this week. He’ll be on the job through Sept. 13.

Contact Caitlin Skvorc at 352-2266 or caitlin.skvorc@frontiersman.com.