By Art Snipes,
Guest Writer
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CLOVIS REMEMBERED
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My dad believed his two sons should learn how to work early in life so Bob, my brother, and I spent a lot of time hanging out at his shop---O.K. Rubber Welders, at 301 West Grand.
He kept us busy. The floor always needed sweeping, tires coming out of the retreading machines needed to be trimmed and painted black, and flats had to be repaired.
Fixing flats involved patching the inner tubes of the tires. (This was before tubeless tires made inner tubes obsolete.) Later he taught us how to repair those old cotton and rayon cord tires that the farmers brought in damaged. In those days, nobody disposed of a tire if it could be repaired and put back in service.
By the time I finished high school, I knew what I wanted to do. That was---marry Wanda and become a tire man. Dad offered to send me to college but I rejected his offer. A few short years later I realized my mistake, but it was too late.
It wasn't hard work ALL the time. We did our share of clowning and having some laughs. Here is a funny story! I remember the time we wired a toilet seat up to a Model T coil. We shared our bathroom with Empy's Welding Co. and the dry cleaning shop to the west, next door to us.
We could count on the little dry cleaning guy to use the community bathroom at the same time every morning. There he was, sitting on the throne and when I hit the coil, blue blaze erupted and he bounced off the walls and came out of there like a mad grizzly!
The next day our little neighbor dry cleaning guy approached Dad and said: "Jake, there must be a short circuit in the bathroom. Yesterday, something knocked the hell out of me!"
I can tell you that Dad didn't think it was so funny!
********30********
FOR MIL'S
BY ART SNIPES
Guest Writer
CHS Class of '51
Sent from my iPad
Guest Writer
********************************
CLOVIS REMEMBERED
********************************
My dad believed his two sons should learn how to work early in life so Bob, my brother, and I spent a lot of time hanging out at his shop---O.K. Rubber Welders, at 301 West Grand.
He kept us busy. The floor always needed sweeping, tires coming out of the retreading machines needed to be trimmed and painted black, and flats had to be repaired.
Fixing flats involved patching the inner tubes of the tires. (This was before tubeless tires made inner tubes obsolete.) Later he taught us how to repair those old cotton and rayon cord tires that the farmers brought in damaged. In those days, nobody disposed of a tire if it could be repaired and put back in service.
By the time I finished high school, I knew what I wanted to do. That was---marry Wanda and become a tire man. Dad offered to send me to college but I rejected his offer. A few short years later I realized my mistake, but it was too late.
It wasn't hard work ALL the time. We did our share of clowning and having some laughs. Here is a funny story! I remember the time we wired a toilet seat up to a Model T coil. We shared our bathroom with Empy's Welding Co. and the dry cleaning shop to the west, next door to us.
We could count on the little dry cleaning guy to use the community bathroom at the same time every morning. There he was, sitting on the throne and when I hit the coil, blue blaze erupted and he bounced off the walls and came out of there like a mad grizzly!
The next day our little neighbor dry cleaning guy approached Dad and said: "Jake, there must be a short circuit in the bathroom. Yesterday, something knocked the hell out of me!"
I can tell you that Dad didn't think it was so funny!
********30********
FOR MIL'S
BY ART SNIPES
Guest Writer
CHS Class of '51
Sent from my iPad
Sent from my iPad
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