Daily Times Paperrrrrrr!

My sister Cyndy and I were reminiscing the other day about J.L. Hudson's downtown Detroit. It was a different era, and a different way of doing things. When my dad was going to college in Iowa to become a Chiropractor, there was a store called Peterson Harned Von Maur. You might know it now by the name "von Maur". It was a fancy store with several floors. The clerks would follow you around when you walked in. (I guess so you didn't steal anything). That was a time when you were waited on and when you purchased an item it was put in a nice white box and tied with string.

Well, that memory led me to when I was about 11 or 12 on my first job. I went to work for the Times-Democrat, a local newspaper in Davenport, Iowa. My job was to pick up newspapers after school, take them and then go and stand on the corner and sell them. The papers cost 5 cents and my pay was 2-1/2 cents! Every day I'd go downtown, pick up the papers at the printing office. Boy, there's a certain smell of printers ink that permeated the place. It still brings back memories when I get the Sunday paper and get a whiff of it.

Anyway, I digress. I'd stand in front of the drug store downtown and yell at the top of my lungs "Daily Times Paperrrrr!" and try to sell newspapers. Some days went by quickly as I sold newspapers, and some days just dragged along. We could sell the newspapers wherever we wanted so I'd move around town trying to find a better place. Davenport, Iowa is right on the Mississippi River directly across from Rock Island, Illinois. Once in a while I'd take a ferry for 25 cents and go across the river and try selling in Rock Island. Never did any good, but it was a fun adventure anyway!

That summer was spent with the smell of newspapers, standing on the corner, spending my newly earned money on candy, and going home wondering why I was in that business. It was a fun time.