A Working Man's Hero....Jobs When I Was Young

My sister and I were incredibly fortunate!! I cannot speak for her but as for me....I NEVER remember wanting for anything. I'm not saying that my parents gave us everything we ever wanted but on the other hand, I don't remember ever asking for something and NOT getting it. That could be due to the fact that we never asked for much.

I was lucky in the fact that I did not have to work while in high school or college. The funny thing is that even though I didn't have to work, I worked all the time, especially in college. In high school I only had two jobs and I did both when I could. First, I help my father by working in one of his warehouses. I don't remember ever getting paid but then again, I received a nice allowance every week. For that allowance, I did what my dad ask me to do, either at his business or around the house. Cutting the grass, painting, taking out the garbage, washing the cars, just odd jobs. None of it I really considered as work. I did take a job in Baltimore that I have already talked about. I worked in a Johnny Unitas' bowling alley. I did not have set hours...I just showed up when I could...usually after school and on weekends. I was just a gopher but I really enjoyed it. I think I got a little pay but when times were slow, I could bowl for free and eat at the lunch counter for free (great hamburgers at bowling alleys by the way!!) and if the Pro wasn't busy....he would give me free lessons. I really wished I had been able to work at one of my dad's country clubs....I would have loved to be a caddy or just work around the pro shop. I had the opportunity once but I was doing something else and had to turn them down.

Once we moved to San Antonio....my work changed. I did not work my senior year of high school/college but in the summer of 1964 that all changed. I worked because I wanted to. I remember both my parents telling me that I did not have to work because they both wanted me to spend the time studying (yeah, right). I was in college now and getting through college and getting a degree was all that mattered. Like I said before, I was a good student and was smart. Early on in my college career, I just had a hard time focusing....having fun took precedent.

MY CAREER AS A FURNITURE DELIVERY GUY

I met a guy who was a bit older than me. His name was Clem and he came from a very wealthy family. His family owned a chain of restaurants around San Antonio and also owned two furniture stores. We met through our love of cars. He drove a Corvette and a Shelby Cobra. He would drive into the Frontier Drive In and we would gather around the car that he was driving at the time. We all became friends, even though his friends were older than me and my friends. This would eventually lead to some interesting experiences. Anyway, Clem was the black sheep of his family. He wasn't disowned per-say, his family just gave him what he wanted and told him to stay out of their way. Clem ALWAYS had lots of money, pretty girls and fast cars. One night, I was sitting in Clem's Corvette and he asked me if I wanted to have a part time job. I said sure, even though I didn't need one, but what I needed was the extra money. Like I said, Clem's family owned two furniture stores and Clem was in-charge of and made all the deliveries. He wanted to know if I would like to help him deliver. I said sure and that really was my very first official job. What was fun about that job was that we got to deliver furniture to all the wealthy families in my parents neighborhood, along with Alamo Heights and Terrell Hills....all three very expensive neighborhoods. Making deliveries, especially when you get to enter someone's home can be very interesting. It always amazed me what state of dress or should I say undress, women would answer the door and allow you to enter. I did enjoy some very interesting sights. Remember, Clem was older than I was and there was a time or two where Clem would send me out to the truck to wait for him....he would emerge 15 to 30 minutes later and it didn't take a genius to figure out what he was doing. Yes, there were a few lonely housewives out there. Clem always said it was a "perk" of the job. I didn't mind because when he did something like that, he would always come out hungry and we would get to stop by one of his family's restaurants and eat free. That was MY perk!!  Moving furniture was a good way to stay in shape. I was really a skinny kid. My first year of college, I weighed about 135 to 140 and was 6 feet tall. Moving furniture was just the thing to help me bulk up. It seemed liked Clem knew everybody. He was nice enough to consider me a friend and he introduced me to all sorts of people....something that would come in handy a couple of years later.

MAKING AMMO BOXES FOR THE MILITARY JOB

I also was employed making ammo boxes for the government. I spoke about this little adventure in my last blog so I won't repeat my self.

THE HOBBY SHOP

I was a very good model builder and was always building model cars. I also was very good with an airbrush. There was this one hobby shop that was family owned not far from my house. I use to be a fixture in that place always buying my model building supplies. One day in the summer of 1966, the owner asked me if I wanted to work there. He said he would pay me so much an hour and give me a discount on what ever I wanted to buy. Well, I thought this to be a dream come true so I said yes. All we had to do was work around my college schedule. I ended up working in this hobby shop until we moved to Oklahoma City. What a great job it turned out to be. It wasn't long before I knew just about every male, young and old and many in between. That was back in the days of Slot Cars and almost every kid and his dad had a slot car track at their house. I became an expert on slot cars and what made them go fast. I use to build my own cars and race for money.

 I didn't know it at the time I started working at this hobby shop but it turned out to be WAY, WAY more that just your run of the mill place. I always wondered how the family who owned this hobby shop could live such a grand life style. Big house, nice cars...everything!! Well, it didn't take me long to learn that this hobby shop was into so much more than just hobbies....and no, they were NOT selling drugs...even though the owners oldest son was eventually caught selling drugs on the side. We were all questioned but it turned out that the son was acting on his own......I knew everybody and I didn't even know about him. He kept it well hidden.

To understand this story...you have to understand that there were 7 MAJOR military bases in San Antonio, mainly Army and Air Force bases. There were literally thousands of military guys stationed at these bases. All these guys (and gals) worked hard during the week and always seemed to have a lot of free time. Many took up the hobby of building models, especially models of the things they were use to like jeeps, tanks, armored carriers, and airplanes...jets and prop trainers. They would come into the hobby shop and want to buy the plane or tank they were trained in. Some didn't want to take the time to build the models...all they wanted was the finished product. I went to the owner of the shop and asked him if I could build and paint these models for the customers and get paid for it. Here is what we agreed upon. If the customer bought the model from the hobby shop, then I could build and paint the model and charge him a certain price. The owner did not take a cut of my labor. I agreed that I would build and paint models for the shop to sell to walk in customers and the owner would pay me a flat fee. This worked perfectly for the both of us. This hobby shop was also big into model trains and antique trains. So I got into building and selling scratch railroad cars and engines. I also got into restoring antique model trains. I could do all this at the shop when times were slow. I had my own work area where customers could watch me do my thing. I kinda became a semi popular tourist attraction. One of my best customers for model cars was a guy named Ricci Ware. He was the most popular radio DJ in San Antonio at the time (he is still around I think), plus he was a stock car racer on Saturday nights. I turned that friendship into all kinds of things. I was always trying to find ways of promoting the hobby shop. Not only was it good for the shops business but it was good for mine. I would talk Ricci into displaying his race car in front of the hobby shop on Saturday, before the race that evening and talk about it on his radio show. Every once in awhile, he would make a personal appearance and sign autographs. We also sold models of  Ricci's race car along with his autographed picture. The shop got a cut, I got a cut and Ricci got a cut....we all won.
Ricci would talk about the hobby shop on his radio show and he would always mention me as the go to person when they visited the shop. It gave me some attention and people got to know me. I also got permission to go onto the military bases and leave fliers and a newsletter I created, advertising the hobby shop and everything we offered. I talked the owner into expanding into hobbies that he had not been in before, especially hobbies for women. All these military guys would come in on weekends with their wives, girlfriends or both, and we had nothing for the women. We added art supplies, Decoupage supplies, picture framing supplies, the forerunner to scrap booking and all kinds of stuff like that. During my time at this shop, we expanded the location three times. I even went so far as to add model making and model painting classes to the mix on Tuesday and Thursday nights. I would bring in factory reps from the model companies we dealt with and have them put on demonstrations. I didn't realize it at the time, but this would end up training me for a profession I would have for the next 40 years.

I did wonders for this "little" hobby shop and I was rewarded very well. I got a piece of a lot of the action. I got to meet all kinds of people....even some famous ones. Ben Crenshaw, a famous pro golfer, lived in Texas at the time and was both a model builder and antique train collector.

I also got to know Perry Bass, the Texas oilman and father to the famous Bass brothers of Dallas and Fort Worth. Perry Bass was also an antique train collector. People would bring their antique train into the owner of this hobby shop to sell or appraise all the time. We bought and sold antique trains all over the world. When the owner finally saw my value, he put me in charge of the hobby shop which gave him more time to concentrate on his first love, the antique train business. Remember, I was a full time college student at the time...not a great one, probably because I had all this going on.

 I could go on and on about the hobby shop...we got into all types of things and maybe I will expand in a later blog.

Needless to say, I made hundreds of friends, I was a local personality and I made a ton of money. I bought my first Rolex watch at the age of twenty....here I was, a twenty year old kid, walking into a jeweler and paying cash for a brand new Rolex watch. My son is now the proud owner of that watch....I gave it to him right after he graduated from high school. I hope he knows how much it meant to me.

I also had a side job that made me more money than I could ever have imagined. It was part time and I had to do it in my spare hours which I didn't have many of, EXCEPT between 10pm and 6am. I will write a special blog dedicated to this job. All I will say here is that it made me some money, it brought me into contact with a very unique group of people and it raised my profile much higher than I ever wanted it to be or was comfortable with. So until next time...thanks for reading and being a loyal blog follower!!