Did you work as a child?

[lg325]

A thing to remember .That buzz you hear is it an insect or a diamond backed rattlesnake?? Ran into one picking melons, field boss said just go around it! another pic not me but field workers. Reading post a lot of us involved in child labor .

 

[NewsVine_Mariyam]

Was it a character building experience for you?

Is a 16 year old considered a child for the purpose of your poll? If so, yes although it gave me a false sense that working would always be as fun as my first job for which I had to be fingerprinted (cashier at a local swimming pool).

 

[Oddball]

Was it a character building experience for you?

Yes....I was a country club caddie.

I continued the job, off and on, into my early 30s, culminating in working with Padraig Harrington in the 1993 Walker Cup.

Considered very seriously becoming a PGA tour looper after that experience...After seeing how most of them live, I quickly abandoned that notion.

 

[OldLady]

Except for some babysitting jobs, I didn't start working until I was 15, when mom wished me a happy birthday with a set of signed working papers and cut off my allowance. I didn't mind though--I was excited to get a job. Worked at the 5&10 for over a year. Then the self service gas station, then poured the beer at the snack bar at the beach all summer.

Good experience. Cash every weekend. Made me feel independent.

 

[JOSweetHeart]

My first real job wasn't until after I graduated high school, but before then, I did chores around the house which is how I scored allowances.

God bless you always!!!

Holly

 

[gtopa1]

OK; wogkind is in the spotlight...wog because THAT is what some locals called us because..well...they were dickheads.

But to the point; aged six I(and my two brothers)were helping dad by dragging concrete blocks (25lbs each)to the side of the truck so he could take them off; he did deliveries with his three ton Dodge truck. A typical load was about 550 blocks. Of course we didn't manage ALL of them until I was about seven yo.......my older bro would get the top ones and we would get them after he had made a dent...then he would start the next pallet and I and my younger bro would finish dragging the rest.


In 1964 Dad started his own factory making them; small time Like these; full range https://www.boral.com.au/sites/defa...ts/15519_Boral_SA_Block&Brick_Guide_FINAL.pdf ) ..two small machines; I was about eight at the time. Before work started we helped unrack the blocks and put them on pallets; by ten yo my brothers and I were unracking the previous day's production before the machines started at 7am. (Three of us; about 2000 units). It was all in the timing. Then we'd make the mixture for the day; two to one gravel to sand and one 96 lb of cement. I did the gravel (two truckloads a day by shovel) older brother (by 13 months) did the cement and my younger brother did the sand (one truckload per day). After work we did deliveries. This was on weekends, holidays and after school. After work we'd go to the beach and have a swim....used sand to remove the day's dirt. (Saturdays were a half day but we did deliveries in the afternoon).

Did this right through school until I was about 17 when Dad built a new factory (Columbia machines; semi-auto and second hand) and the mixing process was automated. Still operated machines, trucks, forklifts etc up to about 23 yo.

Oh: and if our grades fell at all we were not punished (it didn't happen) ...well; they just weren't expected to drop. Did the same work until graduation from Uni...no bloody excuses and we didn't look for any.

Now the question; was it "character building". It was something different; it was FAMILY SURVIVAL. The recession of 1967 nearly sent dad broke. He was down to five staff (essential workers) and us boys. Blokes would come to him and say they were broke but needed the product to try and make a living. Dad told them to pay when they could; he wasn't really expecting anything past paying the food bills and he NEVER short changed the workers; they had families too. After the recession was over those who could payed Dad what they could but I know for a fact that he gave them large discounts; he made sure they knew he valued their custom. I'm not sure what his reason was but I put it down to one thing; DECENCY. THAT is what I took away from my childhood experience working WITH dad.

Greg

 

[Quasar44]

My first job was at 9. I worked on a farm. Baled hay and branded cattle. It was a family farm and I wasn't paid beyond my allowance and I have no problem with that. My first job job was running the bumper cars at an amusement park at 14.

No !!
My first job was 17 at the JCC

 

[DudleySmith]

Was it a character building experience for you?

It was a money building experience for me. Since few farmers have any character and will cheat anybody and everybody, especially their illegal aliens, it wasn't 'character building' in any way, just all that was available for a kid at certain times of the year. It did make me immune to their sniveling and welfare mooching hypocrisies and bullshit propaganda, though so I guess that could be 'character building' after all. A short stint running a paper route also informed me of how sleazy and crooked newspapers were and a distrust of media companies became a pillar of my real life education as well. Most people today don't realize how big a role organized crime played in the newspaper distribution biz in many cities; more gangsters got their start in crime working for newspapers than any other biz.

My first 'legit' job was at 14, working the gate at a drive in at night, and during some days sacking groceries and mowing yards in season. At 16 got a crappy car and got a much better grocery sacking job in an affluent part of town in an era when people still tipped and tipped well, so I was feeling lucky by then. I learned character from parents and grandparents, not businesses or 'hard work'; I learned early on 'hard workers' only got cheated and abused. My 'lowly grocery sacking job' paid a lot better than construction and factory work by a long shot, and the faster and harder you worked the more you made. I was making more part time than my friends made busting their asses at the 'character building' stuff, and none of them developed much 'character' from it.

 

[Quasar44]

Was it a character building experience for you?

It was a money building experience for me. Since few farmers have any character and will cheat anybody and everybody, especially their illegal aliens, it wasn't 'character building' in any way, just all that was available for a kid at certain times of the year. It did make me immune to their sniveling and welfare mooching hypocrisies and bullshit propaganda, though so I guess that coud be 'character building' after all.

I worked at the JCC in 1992-3

 

[DudleySmith]

Now the question; was it "character building". It was something different; it was FAMILY SURVIVAL.

Pretty much it for me and my brothers; we didn't get 'allowances', we had to hustle for a dime to go to the movies on. They still paid deposits on pop and beer bottles back then, and also old car batteries and that sort of stuff, there were more ways for a kid to make some money back then, too, not so much any more. Today it's fast food or nothing, and illegal aliens everywhere getting the warehouse and construction site cleanup jobs, no grocery store sackers carrying groceries out to customers' cars,, no gas station service jobs, no nothing for teenagers any more, just bullshit lies about having to spend $300 K on college for non-existent 'job shortages'.

 

[gtopa1]

Now the question; was it "character building". It was something different; it was FAMILY SURVIVAL.

Pretty much it for me and my brothers; we didn't get 'allowances', we had to hustle for a dime to go to the movies on. They still paid deposits on pop and beer bottles back then, and also old car batteries and that sort of stuff, there were more ways for a kid to make some money back then, too, not so much any more. Today it's fast food or nothing, and illegal aliens everywhere getting the warehouse and construction site cleanup jobs, no grocery store sackers carrying groceries out to customers' cars,, no gas station service jobs, no nothing for teenagers any more, just bullshit lies about having to spend $300 K on college for non-existent 'job shortages'.

Bottle deposits were cool....did plenty of that too. Had a deal with the guy opposite the beer garden; Schweppes bottles were normally 3c Deposit. I got so many that he paid two each for bulk; win win. lol

Greg

 

[katsteve2012]

Had an uncle who owned a barbershop and a men's clothing store in the downtown area of San Diego back in the 60's. I cleaned up the barbershop after school and on the weekends at 9 years old, and would put away new clothes that were shipped in. The cool thing was that San Diego was a Navy town and sailors that came in and got shaves and haircuts and bought clothes would ask where to go to find girls and have fun, they would give me tips just for telling them where to go and who to see.
That area of downtown had arcades, strip clubs, pimps, hookers, drug dealers and lots of bums, so it was a character building and learning experience about what to stay away from in later years.

 

[Blues Man]

Was it a character building experience for you?

It was survival for me.

 

[DudleySmith]

Now the question; was it "character building". It was something different; it was FAMILY SURVIVAL.

Pretty much it for me and my brothers; we didn't get 'allowances', we had to hustle for a dime to go to the movies on. They still paid deposits on pop and beer bottles back then, and also old car batteries and that sort of stuff, there were more ways for a kid to make some money back then, too, not so much any more. Today it's fast food or nothing, and illegal aliens everywhere getting the warehouse and construction site cleanup jobs, no grocery store sackers carrying groceries out to customers' cars,, no gas station service jobs, no nothing for teenagers any more, just bullshit lies about having to spend $300 K on college for non-existent 'job shortages'.

Bottle deposits were cool....did plenty of that too. Had a deal with the guy opposite the beer garden; Schweppes bottles were normally 3c Deposit. I got so many that he paid two each for bulk; win win. lol

Greg

My town was dry, which was a good thing as the drunks would toss their bottles out rather than have them in their cars, so there were always plenty of empties around, and if you got up early on Sat. and Sun. mornings you could rake in some dough if you didn't mind dragging your wagon loads out to the liquor stores and Seven Elevens just outside city limits. Of course in those days the carnage from drunk driving every year exceeded the entire toll of the Viet Nam War, and a national scandal.

 

[Devils_Advocate]

My Uncle bought me a lawnmower and told me to mow lawns for a living if I wanted baseball cards and such, so I started at the age of eight...

 

[norwegen]

I delivered newspapers (the Sioux City Journal), babysat, and walked beans, all before I was 14.

At 14 and 15, I detasseled corn for two summers.

I sucked at Little League.

What's walking beans?

The hardest part was keeping their little necks from slipping out of their little leashes.

 

[Muhammed]

My first summer job was working for the city of Toledo parks department at the federation league baseball field when I was 8 years old. I would help prep the field before games. I recall that my duties included chalking the foul lines, baselines and batter boxes. Picking up garbage from underneath the bleachers. Occassionally I had to change lightbulbs on the scoreboard. In retrospect, that scoreboard tower was really high for an 8 year old to be climbing.

Then during the games I would chase down foul balls and home run balls that went over the fence. I hated it when they they got knocked over the left field fence at night because sometimes they would go down into this overgrown ravine where there was a stinky drainage creek that led to a tunnel where a bunch of bats lived. It was also rumored that the monster from Boggy Creek lived in there. I was afraid I would get bit by a bat and catch rabies or get caught by the monster.

When I was 9 years old I found out we weren't getting minimum wage and organized a sit-in strike and the parks director fired all of us.

Then I just started being a volunteer bat boy. Most of the players would tip me some pocket change. I made more money doing that. No taxes and no Boggy Creek monster to worry about.

 

[Michelle420]

My first job was at 9. I worked on a farm. Baled hay and branded cattle. It was a family farm and I wasn't paid beyond my allowance and I have no problem with that. My first job job was running the bumper cars at an amusement park at 14.

Who got an allowance??

Greg

 

[Michelle420]

My first job was at 9. I worked on a farm. Baled hay and branded cattle. It was a family farm and I wasn't paid beyond my allowance and I have no problem with that. My first job job was running the bumper cars at an amusement park at 14.

Who got an allowance??

Greg

I got an allowance when I was really little for cleaning my room and for doing other house chores My Mom would put every room name in a hat and all of us had to pull a piece of paper until they were all gone and whatever room we got we had to clean real thorough. My Mom would make us take plates off the cabinet shelves and wipe them down every week. She was fanatical. Which is why I'm a slob today. but we got an allowance for doing the chores. By the time I was 14 I was babysitting, house sitting, and pet sitting for money and I think allowance stopped around then. My first job was at McDonalds in Las Vegas on Paradise rd. LOL.

 

[HenryBHough]

Starting at age 10 I spent my summers and school vacations working in my dad's small food store. The days when home delivery of groceries was the norm and there was no service charge for it.

The one employee drove the truck and I carried the boxes (no paper or plastic bags) up typically two flights of stairs to deliver them. I didn't have to collect - they were monthly accounts. Tips? Hell no! Delivery was part of the service.

That unpaid work ended when the store closed because too many people weren't paying their accounts though they still called for delivery.

Dad's been dead for over 50 years now and I still have the packets of sales slips for the groceries delivered but not paid for. No hope of ever collecting them - even though that would have been done anytime between the time he closed the store and when he died. But he wouldn't do it. So I wouldn't either.

Instead I just take them out and look at them when someone asks me for a loan.

Oh yeah, and it's the reason my credit cards are paid off in full when rendered.