Turning a Daydream into a Reality

Turning a Daydream into a Reality

In the spring of 1960 as a junior in high school I got a job working at Hall’s Lumber Company in Auburndale, Florida.  This small lumber company was located on the west end of  Pilakalahaha Avenue by the railroad.  I worked there some afternoons after school and on Saturdays.  My friend David Lord also began working there shortly afterward.  We were both hired by Mr. Hall, and I feel sure that it was not only because he needed help but our families attended First Methodist Church as did Mr. Hall and his wife. 

I liked Mr. Hall and he was kind to us, but he was not known for his generosity.  David and I each made sixty cents an hour.  After school was out in June we were able to work a few more hours each week, and the number of hours we could get depended on the orders that Mr. Hall received.  I convinced David that we should ask Mr. Hall for a raise.  David was more hesitant than I was about asking for a raise being fearful that we would be fired, but he finally agreed and we approached Mr. Hall timidly.  David told me that I had to be the one to do the asking.

Mr. Hall, in no uncertain terms, told us that he was paying all that he could, was giving us all the hours he could, and we ought to be thankful that we had jobs.  If we were not happy, we could quit.  Seeing that it was a losing proposition David and I both expressed our appreciation for his letting us work.

At that time our primary job was making wood pallets for the citrus industry.  These pallets were purchased by the citrus packing houses in the area for stacking and moving around orange crates.  We would cut the lumber to size, assemble and nail the pallets together.  By the first of June, however, the citrus season was over and Mr. Hall had us doing other jobs, one of which was working in his small citrus nursery alongside the lumber company.  During the spring the Bermuda grass had grown extensively throughout the nursery and needed to be dug out.

In the hot month of June we were working in the citrus nursery hoeing grass more than we were working with the lumber.  I had a feeling that it was punishment for asking for a raise earlier.  Bermuda grass is an especially tough, wiry grass which is difficult to hoe, but we were doing our best.

One day while hoeing and sweating David and I began to dream about doing something else.  David’s family was going on vacation to Massachusetts on the first of July, and my family was going on vacation to Kentucky the last two weeks of July. So, we came up with a plan, and to our great surprise our parents went along with it!

This was the plan:  We would both go with his parents to Greenfield, Massachusetts, and stay about ten days.  From there we would catch a bus to New York City for two nights.  After the two nights in New York City we would connect with his parents as they were heading home through New Jersey.  They would let us off in Maryland and we would go into Washington, D.C., for a night or two.  From D.C. we would hitch-hike to Louisville, Kentucky, and match up with my parents for the last two weeks of July and return home with them.

Believe it or not, it all worked!  A rather large volume could be written about all that happened in those thirty-one days.  The short of it is that we were gone from home the entire month of July and each spent less than $50.  Now, a half-century later, David and I still talk about that daydream which became a reality.