First/Summer Job

[Peelz]

Anybody in the midwest ever detassle corn in the summer? oh baby! Rode my moped to the bus at 5 am, i made 4 dollars per hour, workin in the hot sun 10 hrs a day for about 2 months maybe?. It was absolutely dreadful, but dammit, it was MY money!

then went on to sling pizza for pizza hut.

My older son just turned 18. we were trying to work out a summer ozarks job for him, but housing is a difficulty. He's working at the local small town ice cream shop.

 

[adrianp89]

Selling beer - made me forgot I had a job running beer and kegs around at the local minor league stadium during spring training.

 

[rad1026]

Did lots of yard work starting at about 14, then worked in a cabinet shop with a buddy gluing Formica to countertops. Owner pretty much was never there. Like a lot of you said before, not sure I would leave two 15 year old's in a shop full of power tools unsupervised. But we did it and made good money.

First real job with a real paycheck was girl's gymnastics coach. Started at SCATS in Southern California. Here was my day:

up at 6:00 AM, ride bike 7 miles one way to Gymnastics team work out.
11:00 AM, ride bike 8 miles to Huntington Beach to meet friends, swim and meet girls
3:00PM ride bike home to shower
4:00PM Dad would drop me at SCATS until about 9:00PM
Then I was picked up by friends to party.
Repeat

I have no complaints about growing up at the beach in the 70's

 

[I_squared_r]

14 years old worked at a pizzeria
15-18 years worked the summer as a elementary school janitor cleaning classrooms, waxing floors, and cleaning vomit.
18 worked at a performance car shop and delivering pizza. I did a lot of powder coating here
19-25 car mechanics. This work really sucked.
then it was BIM coordination and electrical building design.
Also cleaned windows for rich people and home improvement work with my dad.

 

[Sean R]

Age 14 Fareway grocery stores
Age 16 Lifeguard & Fareway
Age 18 EMT/Lifeguard/Fareway
Age 21 FT Paramedic ever since

I credit my father for many things I learned along the way growing up. We didn't have much money so working on our own cars and homes were normal for us. By 14 I could frame walls, drywall and mud, run electrical to outlets, do my own vehicle services as well as change many engine parts, suspension parts, etc. This also pushed me into taking small engines and home improvement courses in high school. Now they have quite a few hands on courses I wish they would have offered back then. Growing up like that made me want to look into problems on my own. Crazy as it sounds, my twin brother wasn't like this, I had to show him how to change a simple headlight bulb the other day. Just sad to see that the ambition to do anything anymore seems to be diminishing in all age groups.

I have been feeling the same about ambition or lack there of with humans. But on a high note were I work they hired three new under 25 employees and I can honestly say all 3 are kick ass. Its extremely refreshing and has actually put a little fire under my ass.

 

[I_squared_r]

I have been feeling the same about ambition or lack there of with humans. But on a high note were I work they hired three new under 25 employees and I can honestly say all 3 are kick ass. Its extremely refreshing and has actually put a little fire under my ass.

Me too.. I was discussing this with a friend. Our country is falling behind in our potential because people are distracted and have a severe lack of ambition. People are more concerned about social media, identity politics, and netflix shows than anything. Think about it, when was the last time you heard an adult say "I want to learn a new skill"? take a night class? Watch a documentary maybe? It's very difficult just to find someone and have an intelligent and interesting conversation.

 

[Ronnie]

First job was gas dock attendant at Romp's WaterPort in Vermilion, Ohio. I was 15 and we had a crew of 3 guys who would handle gassing up, pumping out and running pick-up of food/drinks from the Marina to the docks for all the marina boaters. Best job ever - in the sun and outside - paid like $10 an hour plus tips. We had lots of Cleveland Browns players who docked at Romp's back in the day and we would all fight to angle for that boat turn on the dock to get the big tips. Leroy Hoard was the best tipper around - he would fill up with gas and get 2 hot dogs and 2 Brisk Ice Teas and hand over 2 $100 bills and say keep the change. Usually ended up being about $30-40 bucks left over - most boaters would tip you $5 bucks.

I wish I had a job like that on my resume, more so now that I have spoken to a few dock attendants. No shortage of eye candy in that job and some of the guys I have spoken with got great deals on used boats from customers upgrading or moving out of the area.

not my first job but my worst was gas station attendant, $3.25 minimum wage, at a full service gas station. Customers would insist on having their windows wiped down even during a storm. Now I’d be hard pressed to find a full service gas station in CA.

 

[rad1026]

I cleaned the meat market at a Boys Market for three weeks. It wasn't horrible. I really didn't mind scraping all the fat out of the grinders and saws. It was scraping the floors that sucked. They were so slick you could not get any grip to push against the scraper. They were so slick it was really like walking on ice. The store manager just thought it was funny. One night I slipped and fell hard and the oak handle scrapper came down and hit my head so hard I think I passed out for a couple seconds. I got up and walked out. Never went back.

 

[haknslash]

Laid sod and mowed lawns.

 

[Jimmers]

1968/69. Laying sod. About 4 of us got the job, we were 14-15. Worked our butts off for a week, 40 plus hours, come Friday it was payday and we were pretty excited about it. We got around $18.00 after taxes. Didn’t go back! Found out that it was considered agricultural help and that labor category didn’t have to pay minimum wage ($1.45/hr) at the time.