Published: Sun, Sep. 02, 2007 12:30AM

Modified Sun, Sep. 02, 2007 02:30AM

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Through his time there and at other shops and companies, Watkins soaked up enough about the business to teach himself the intricacies of shoe repair.

Once he took apart his daughter's little patent leather shoes just so he could stitch them back together. He made leather book bags and suitcases that his children still have.

"He used to say he was a jack-of-all trades and a master of none," Elaine said. "I dispute that."

Watkins worked hard to afford his children any opportunity. He helped them pay for college and chipped in for other relatives in tough times. That generous spirit carried over into his shop. "People would come through a little down and out on their luck, and he would do their repair work and not charge them," said son Reggie, a lawyer in the state Attorney General's Office.

"Little ladies would come in with bedroom shoes that should have gone in the trash years ago, and he would fix them up," Elaine added.

In the shop and at home, Watkins dispensed words of wisdom, or Junisms, as his family called them: Use common sense; do what's right; trouble is easy to get into but hard to get out of; always work hard and do your best.

The family patriarch rarely let a task befuddle him.

"Dad, I'd say, was mechanically gifted," Reggie said. "I often wonder if he had come up in a different time what he would have become."

What he was, though, was a gifted craftsman who worked hard to care for the family he loved. "There wasn't a better man," customer Doug Byrd said.

Watkins is survived by daughter Elaine, sons Reggie and Derrick, all of Raleigh; sister Ruth Horton of Baltimore; two brothers, Jesse Watkins of Detroit and Claude Watkins of Durham; 10 grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.

Memorial contributions may be made to the American Lung Association of N.C., 3801 Lake Boone Trail, Raleigh, 27607.