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A Baby Boomer's Scrapbook |
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Back to People, Places & Things... Money… Being naïve about such things,
my financial goal when I left High School was to make at least $10,000 a year…
Little did I know that 40 some years later, I’d be working too hard to live
pay check to pay check on $10,000 a month… ;-) As the oldest child of a large
family with 7 kids, some people in the neighborhood assumed that I would be a
good baby sitter and, when I was in High School, that was one of the ways I made
a little money… I think the going rate was 50 cents an hour but sometimes, if
the dad was drunk enough when he took me home, I would get a little more when he
reached into his pocket to give me the cash…
;-) The jobs were easy
because the kids were always well behaved but once they went to bed and I looked
around for something to read (it was a quiet thing to do so I wouldn’t wake
the kids) all I could ever find was women’s magazines like True Romance and
True Love and such… I got real tired of reading different versions of the same
basic story over and over again… ;-) My other work while in High
School was yard work in the summer, again at the going rate of 50 cents an
hour… If that’s all I did was mow the lawn, it was $1 and acre… One
regular customer was extra generous and gave me $3 for 2 acres… Fortunately, at that time, $2 or
$3 seemed to be enough for most weekend adventures if I was just out and about
by myself… If I had a date, sometimes I’d hit my dad up for a few extra
bucks. He was almost always sympathetic and would pitch in, if he had it. My first 8 hours a day, 5 days a
week job was in the summer of ’65 after got home from my school year at Utah
State. Neighbor Joe Hansen had an insecticide business and, at a dollar an hour,
I helped him spray DDT for a couple of months until the season ended. Right after that I got a job as
a gas pump jockey at Harold Alexander’s Bay Station on Living at home with no expenses
and with a good car that my Mom got for me, I seemed to have more than enough
money and, even with the long hours, more than enough time to play and party.
Until I was drafted and then dodged the draft by joining and reporting to the
Air Force in February of ’66, this was a good time in my life. Sometimes I
think maybe the best… ;-) After being sworn in on the
night of February 6th, 1966, I got on an old prop plane in Money was not much of an issue
for a while after that because the Air Force fed, clothed and housed me at no
cost except a bit of personal freedom. Even at only $90 a month, Air Force pay
seemed to be enough at the time… For the first few times that we
got paid, we stood in a long line once a month to get a small handful of cash. While in Basic Training, and for some
time after, since I wasn’t allowed to go anywhere to spend it anyway, I
probably had at least 3 months of pay saved up… Eventually, after When I did finally get a car
that gave me the freedom to travel to place where money could be spent, of
course, that began to change… Still,
for awhile, I was careful and could usually keep a paycheck or two ahead of the
game. Then I got a girlfriend, got
married and had a baby and the paycheck to paycheck game began… Though the Air Force was not the
kind of life I wanted, with a promotion to Staff Sergeant and my quarter’s
allowance, I think by the time I got out, I was making a little less than $600 a
month and had I stayed in, I probably could have eventually done OK… Fortunately or unfortunately, I
didn’t have what it takes to survive a military career so, in December of
1969, I sold our car and took what I had saved up and moved with a friend to
Phoenix, Arizona… , With no job or
place to live there, I left Kerri and Scott in Cheyenne with her folks until I
could get started. My friend was moving to With a little high school
drafting experience, I got a job as a draftsman (map maker) at At a significant cut from the
Air Force, the pay was $421 a month before taxes and was barely enough to get by
even on my own… It took me until April until I
had enough saved to rent a small house in Having sold our car in My pay at the county went up a
bit and we were beginning to do a bit better financially… That changed when a
couple of Air Force friends who had moved to Phoenix decided to take advantage
of the GI Bill and go to school in the fall of 1971 and I decided to join
them… At the time, The 1971-72 Phoenix College school year was a bit rough and we ended up breaking open the piggy bank more than once…
...to be continued...
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