MARION COUNTY (WBTW) – A passing car is about as busy as things get on Pee Dee Island Road.
Cleveland Paige has lived in the Nichols community his entire life. He says blood or not, he counts everyone on the street as part of his own.
“We got neighbors that are all different colors, and we still love one another,” said Paige.
So, when Paige heard that his brother’s son, 33-year-old Manasses Page, was dead at the hands of thief, he could not believe his ears.
“It was a surprise to me,” he said. “We didn’t have these kinda problems in our area.”
Paige says his nephew had lived a few doors down from him for most of his life. He did his best to guide Manasses along the way, and he must have done something right.
After high school Manasses enlisted in the Marine Corps.
Neighbor and fellow veteran Walter Lowell remembers Paige’s sense of humor.
“He was easy to talk to,” said Lowell. .”He loved to laugh and we’d crack funnies.”
Lowell — known as “Skip” to friends and neighbors — said although they were in different branches and served in different wars, his friend Manasses became more like a brother.
“He was a patriot,” Lowell reflects. “He was a marine, always a marine; I’m always a sailor.”
Lowell recalls sharing stories with Manasses from their times overseas. Now after his friend has fallen, not on the battlefield, but at home, he wants to make sure that the world knows the story of his friend and fellow serviceman.
“He was an ordinary fellow with a lot of ordinary things about him,” smiled Lowell.
Just a few houses down, Cleveland Paige and his family prepare to move on, without their hero and smiling neighborhood mechanic.
They can only pray that the peaceful road they all call home can stay that way.
“There’s nothing we can do to protect ourselves,” said the elder Paige. “We can just put our trust in God.”
