Informal Maggie's Poll: When Did You Start Working?

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Tuesday, December 29. 2020

Informal Maggie's Poll: When Did You Start Working?

I took a survey today about working, and first jobs. One question asked the age of your first job:

Prior to 15
15-16
16-18
18-20
20+
I imagine most of our readers are in the prior to 15 group, but I'd figure I'd ask. Just so you understand 'the rules' - any job counts. My first jobs were cutting grass and babysitting when I was 13. My first real job occurred when a friend broke his ankle and I took over washing dishes at a local resort (minimimum wage was $2.30/hour, but we got meals, too, since we worked in the kitchen).

Once I started working, I never stopped. I had a job every summer, sometimes during school, always on breaks or holidays (ski resorts needed lift operator assistants during these periods) afterward. I'd sometimes offer to work off the books and under minimum wage if it meant I could get the work. I know I got most of the tax money back since I was a student, but that never bothered me. Money in the pocket beats waiting for it after April.

Posted by Bulldog in The Culture, "Culture," Pop Culture and Recreation at 17:24 | Comments (86) | Trackbacks (0)

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My dad had a small manufacturing company , I was sweeping the floor as soon as I could walk, well almost.

#1 Keith on 2020-12-29 17:36 (Reply)

Paper routes, going to work with my Dad who was a painter, I mostly sanded and cleaned. I started when I was 8 or 9.

Dad was a foreman in the union. Around age 12, some of the union guys complained that I worked too hard. This peaked in the summer after my graduation. I played basket ball and ran track, so I ran from one side of the new apartment complex to the other, and generally worked harder than anyone since I still wasn't that good at the painting.

This led to the general contractor asking if I would like to help him build a large house in Malibu. I said yes but explained I didn't have a car. He gave me his truck to drive and paid me substantially more than I would earn at the telephone company during my gap year.

Thus I have always believed that hard work pays off and that unions are generally pernicious.

#1.1 Michael Johnson on 2020-12-30 00:08 (Reply)

When I was a youngster in a union, anytime I worked better or harder than the older guys, they called it "breaking down conditions".

#1.1.1 Sixtyville on 2020-12-30 15:02 (Reply)

Pocket money 13. Worked every summer from 15 on through college. Paid for part of college.
Over the past 20 years I'm finding it harder to get high school boys to cut my grass/shovel snow.

#2 cc on 2020-12-29 17:40 (Reply)

My boys did that, when there was enough snow. Few kids cut grass anymore, I've found, due to the number of landscaping services that offer that in addition to snow removal, gutter cleaning, leaf removal, etc.

Around here in NJ, the issue is a mix of lack of initiative and pressure. The pressure is from professional services that have insurance and are bonded (and therefore report kids), and local ordinances that lead to occasional 'controversies' such as this (which reduce initiative further):
https://patch.com/new-jersey/bridgewater/teens-stopped-police-shoveling-snow-without-permit-0

#2.1 Bulldog on 2020-12-29 17:51 (Reply)

14. But I was only allowed to work in the summer until HS graduation at 17.

#3 jdgalt on 2020-12-29 17:47 (Reply)

9 years old, paper route. Saved my money and bought a camera and more before I was 10. Had another one at 13-14.

#4 Jeff Brokaw (Link) on 2020-12-29 17:51 (Reply)

My parents divorced when I was a toddler. My father was a school teacher. The only time I got to see him was in the summer. The whole summer. He installed flooring in the in those months and made pretty good money doing it. Since the age of eight, I did it along with him. Mostly just being a gopher and stuff at first, but I turned out to be sort of a prodigy. By the age of twelve, he'd leave me to strip and pad a house while he drove to Dalton to pick up a roll of carpet. This was way before anyone imagined a cell phone. I guess you'd get thrown in jail for that now, but it didn't seem abnormal then.
I'll bet 8 wasn't an option in the poll. hehe

#5 ccoffer on 2020-12-29 17:53 (Reply)

Nope it wasn't. I suppose I could count the paper route I had for all of a day when I was 10. Older kids chased me off it, and I wasn't big enough to stand up to them.

I did help my uncle do the drywall and plumbing when I was 10 and moving into our new house. Wasn't technically paid - but it was great life skills and experience that I still use to this day.

#5.1 Bulldog on 2020-12-29 17:58 (Reply)

Just remembered a funny one. When I was seven, one of my buddies told me about this cool way to make money. There was a driving range not far from our Jacksonville Fl neighborhood and the owner was paying cash money to pick up golf balls. Now this is two little kids strolling around on a driving range putting balls in a wheelbarrow and then bringing them back and getting paid like ten cents a basket (yeah, we had to fill the baskets) We'd be out there for hours with balls landing around us thinking we were getting rich.

When my mother found out, she was furious. Not about the danger. Just what I was being paid. The outrage! That little career was short lived.

#5.1.1 ccoffer on 2020-12-29 20:32 (Reply)

Paper route at age 12. Had it for 18 months. I was making over $40 / week back in the 70s, so did pretty well. I was finding wads of cash I had crammed into various nooks and crannies of my bedroom for years afterwards.

Worked every summer through high school (truck dealership) and college.

Been working full time ever since, except for 12 weeks when I took a buy-out from my employer before I started working at my current job. Kind of a mini retirement- I kind of liked it.

#5.2 Hamlet's Fool on 2020-12-29 18:13 (Reply)

Worked in summers since 14. Printer's assistant, also had to run their adressograph machine.

So many jobs since then (lumber yards, landscaping, illegal boat captain for a rich guy - no license - etc), but my coolest pre-graduate work was driving the horses in Central Park all through college. A good deal, good for meeting girls too. I mean, really good.

#6 Bird Dog on 2020-12-29 17:58 (Reply)

Yard work for elderly next door neighbor started when I was 10.
Averaged about a dollar an hour. My family supplied the mower and fuel. Charity on my parents part.
First W2 job at 15 (@ $1.55 hour) working custodial for the school district every day after school. 8 hours on Saturday. 40 hour week during summer and school breaks. Parents supplied an old beater car and insurance. I paid most all my incidental expenses except breakfast and evening meal. I won’t tell you what most of my money was wasted on. But I did get wasted nearly every day. Shame shame.

#7 Franknbean on 2020-12-29 18:05 (Reply)

Nine or ten, delivering papers once a week. The Arvada Sentinel. It was not a subscription paper. I had 88 papers to deliver every Thursday morning. You made your money by collecting from as many of the 88 as you could. My first time collecting, I didn't know what 'No Soliciting' meant. I still can almost picture the front door and porch of the mean old man the berated me for knocking on his door. He never got another paper from me.

#8 B. Hammer on 2020-12-29 18:12 (Reply)

Starting working for pay at my grandad's when I was around 10, gardening, clearing, etc. Did other stuff, lawn-mowing, snow-blowing, for some extra cash when I could. Took my first real job - the kind where you discover the payslip miracle of involuntary taxation - as soon as I could, part time, in a supermarket. I think I was 15. Did that as much as I could around high school, supplemented in the summer painting houses. Worked at the same supermarket during university semester breaks when I could get it, even picked up a gig painting dormitories over the long winter break. I have always found that well-paid work is not scarce when you're motivated and eager, and dependable.

#9 Aggie on 2020-12-29 18:12 (Reply)

From 13 on up, spring breaks and summer vacations when not otherwise busy (summer camp, etc.). The switchboard operator and her cronies taught me bridge at lunchtime, though they preferred gin rummy.

I learned quite a lot working in my father's office (besides card games) and running prototype computers (programmable Friden machines w/punched-paper tape, and CRAM cards (mag tape predecessors)). His business was flour milling (like a small Cargill) -- early computer applications were often things like tracking railcar shipment movements.

Who knew that was going to provide cocktail conversation fodder for a career in IT?

#10 Karen Myers (Link) on 2020-12-29 18:14 (Reply)

My first paying job was at a corner grocery store in a small eastern North Carolina town.

Stocking shelves, checking out customers, cleaning and mopping, sorting returned soda bottles (remember that?).

I was 12 years old and have always had work, now 67.

#11 Michael B on 2020-12-29 18:14 (Reply)

Prior to 15, odd jobs and gardening
15-16, my brothers and I had our own ceramic handicrafts company. We made enough to buy my sister her grade school graduation dress, records, tools, models and a 1946 Ford Woodie Station Wagon.

#12 Harmon Ward on 2020-12-29 18:20 (Reply)

I started with lawn mowing and snow shoveling at around age 12. We moved to St. Louis when I was 14, and my first job with a paycheck was at the St. Louis Zoo, working in a concession stand for $1.70 an hour if I remember correctly. I made a ton of cotton candy, and had to wear a ridiculous uniform consisting of white pants and a red and white striped shirt. I left for Pope's Cafeteria to wash dishes for $2.30 an hour, eventually working up to cook by the time I graduated high school (the cooks at Pope's taught me most of what I know about cooking today). After that, in college, I did some carpentry and worked for Uni in the dorms. After graduation, got a job in management in the steel industry right before it collapsed in 1980. The only time I have been unemployed since before I started working was from September 1980 to February 1981.

#13 John McC on 2020-12-29 18:24 (Reply)

Depends on how you define working. My father and grandfather ran a single badge car dealership and shop, and we were put to work around there from the time we could know enough to not get in the way. Prep work for the September new car roll out, cleanings and painting, stuffing announcement envelopes, etc. from whenever we were capable.
Actual first paycheck job was at 14. Needed to get work permits and whatnot. Involved showing up at local bakery at 5am to scrape back room floors down with bread blades prior to washing. Done by 8am. As I recall, minimum wage was $1.40hr, but since a bakery was a foodservice establishment and employees could be tipped, there was a lower hourly limit, $.90(?) or something. Nobody ever tipped the floor guy, as I recall.

#14 Bob Dwyer on 2020-12-29 18:25 (Reply)

Oh, I forgot. Started caddying at 9 years old, continued until about age 16. That was fairly decent money for the times, although I only caddied at a local private 9 hole course, never any of the good (and better paying I'm sure) fancier clubs, except for a few member guest tourneys when they would need some "outside" caddies.

#15 Bob Dwyer on 2020-12-29 18:29 (Reply)

Paper route with my older brother at about 13. We used to collect our $2.15 a month from then NV Lt Governor Harry Reid. We each made $20-30 a month, pretty big bucks for the time.

#16 Mark on 2020-12-29 18:38 (Reply)

Started off with summer yardwork in junior high, so 12 or 13. Got the opportunity (and education) of a lifetime when the high school biology teacher recruited me for his gang of gringo citrus pickers, working weekends and all summer picking lemons and oranges, alongside the last of the original braceros. Sweet damn! but those hombres could work, long, hard and fast. We schoolkids were no match for 'em, but when fruit's in season, it's all hands on deck. It was all piecework, but a little bit of money went a long way in the early 60's. I recall not having a teaching gig in the summer of 2000, so I guess I technically wasn't working; otherwise I've never been out of a job (and sometimes IN two or three) in almost 60 years.

#17 Mike Anderson (Link) on 2020-12-29 18:44 (Reply)

About 8. Cut lawns with a push mower. Shoveled snow. Delivered papers by 10. Sold magazine subscriptions. Worked in a brickyard at 17.

#18 Stargazer on 2020-12-29 18:55 (Reply)

Growing up on a farm presented many opportunities for work and play.

One time a grain truck was loaded with wheat and both combines were sitting with full bulk tanks. Since I thought I already knew how to drive I hopped in truck and drove it down the hill towards elevator that handled incoming grain storage. After meeting up with regular truck driver we switched vehicles since I was too young to drive on county road.

I was 9 years old at the time and remember making $1.25/hr. for several more weeks. A fortune in 1964.

p.s. I got out of milking cows too..

#19 Terry on 2020-12-29 18:59 (Reply)

A. I dated a girl whose father ran a Dairylea milk farm. I visited twice, and 'learned' how to milk cows. Which meant attaching these metal things to the teats and letting machines do the work. Pretty cool, really. Plus he told me that all the old cows were eventually sold to McDonald's for burger meat.

B. I'd have thought milking cows was fun and interesting, by hand. But I never learned how and after seeing it done I think it would be tiring and annoying. Especially early in the morning.

#19.1 Bulldog on 2020-12-29 19:12 (Reply)

It was. I was milking cows by hand at age 9.

#19.1.1 barnhill on 2020-12-30 07:50 (Reply)

Odd jobs until 14, then stocking shelves at retail and busing tables. Not that many hours though, except summers. Two six-hour shifts a week maybe, then whatever they'd let me in summer.

I can't remember if I found jobs hard. I think maybe not, because the first job I had out of college in the recession of 1975 seemed very tedious and difficult. I do remember getting treated badly at most jobs, however, of being told to do contradictory things, give up breaks and meals unpaid, being insulted. Lawns and driveways, people were more grateful, or at least polite.

#20 Assistant Village Idiot on 2020-12-29 19:16 (Reply)

Morning paper route at 12. At my first law firm interview I was asked “have you ever sacked groceries.” When I answered “no,” his face fell. I told him I had thrown papers. I got the job.

#21 Doc on 2020-12-29 19:26 (Reply)

13. Dad didn’t think a teenage boy should be sitting around during the summer.

#22 Spurt Reynolds on 2020-12-29 19:26 (Reply)

13 YO. My best friend and I had to apply for SS and have SSN 1 digit apart. Working at a car wash 1957.

#23 GoneWithTheWind on 2020-12-29 19:35 (Reply)

Yes, jobs in a steel fabricating plant (daytime) and movie theater usher (nights). In high school.

#24 PubliusII on 2020-12-29 19:50 (Reply)

Paper route at 11, plus a few neighborhood lawn mowing customers. I did our own yard free, as 'rent' for the mower. First "real" job, with a check, and withholding, was at 16, at $2 an hour. 1976. All my friends did the same. We thought work was just what you did. Construction and factory work during summers in college, before a career in a sit-down job.

#25 DMac on 2020-12-29 20:06 (Reply)

Mowed yards from about 12. Was a busboy at a Red Lobster at 15, when I got my license, I contracted, scraped and painted the wood siding and trim on a house. When Fall came, got a job in the kitchen of a Mexican restaurant. Got laid off from a toy store in after Christmas my sophomore year of college. Had a statics class I devoted my time to. I was a lot of fun being able to apply full force to the classes, but alas, I needed money. Became a gameroom attendant, think bartender for pre and teenagers.

#26 JK Brown on 2020-12-29 20:19 (Reply)

First job without taxes - light construction

Prior to 14.

First job with taxes

Prior to 15. (summer work program for state of MD) (they don't let them work that young anymore) mail room

#27 Saxinis (Link) on 2020-12-29 20:32 (Reply)

Cutting neighbors lawns and baby-sitting from about age 12, first regular job as a dishwasher at 15. $1.60 an hour and I was glad to get it. Then some evil rat poking his nose in where it didn't belong reported the restaurant for letting me work too late and too many hours for a high-schooler so I had my hours cut. I had my politics shaped early by that little incident.

#28 Jerryskids on 2020-12-29 20:38 (Reply)

First job? My first real job was Boxboy at age 14. Before that (around 8-9), I had my own business, catching crabs and selling them to tourists. That was more of a catch as catch can job but it did pay for ammunition for my .22 and a genuine Timex pocket watch.

#29 Michael Scott on 2020-12-29 20:47 (Reply)

Age 12 - picking strawberries by hand.

#30 MVD on 2020-12-29 20:47 (Reply)

At age 13 started cleaning my fathers General Contracting offices weekly, bathrooms and all for many years. Then at 15 got a job at a hardware store which I despised. (As a girl it was a tough environment to fit into) Didn’t last longer than a month! Then waitress at a diner and other restaurants afterwards throughout my teens and 20’s.

#31 AIM (Link) on 2020-12-29 21:11 (Reply)

Prior to 15, bussing and dishwashing at a Friendly's in my town. Lasted about a year and then worked at a pharmacy. The pay and hours were much better.

#32 steve walsh on 2020-12-29 21:24 (Reply)

First job (age 13/14) sorting returnable pop bottles at a Coca-Cola bottling plant. Piece work = 1.5 cents/case. Had to work like h**l and get very efficient to make any money!

#33 R C B on 2020-12-29 21:26 (Reply)

Started at 16 as a stock clerk for two years. Paid $1.65 an hour. Joined the military for six years to get a good paying skill.

#34 Conservative Beaner on 2020-12-29 21:33 (Reply)

Haying on my uncle's farm at 10... by 12 I could drive the tractor. At 15 a job as a dishwasher at a boy's camp in Northern WI...$125/month for six weeks. Worked out to an hourly rate of $0.35/hour. At 16 delivering bakery for $1.00/hour ,after one year I got a raise to $1.10. After HS graduation I worked in the woods peeling pulp for a month then got a job in the veneer mill for $1.40/hour day shift and $1.44 on swing. Then to college--my summer jobs during undergraduate years were on a tie gang, pounding spikes on the railroad. Lived in a boxcar and made $2.50/hour and paid $2.00/ day for room and board (we had great cooks) mostly paid my tuition and room and board at university .

#35 rocdoctom on 2020-12-29 21:56 (Reply)

13. I grew up on the Cape and my first job was sweeping sand out of the parking lot of the local yacht club for the start of the season, and other pre-opening tasks. Minimum wage at the time was $1.80 an hour. That job transitioned to dishwasher for the summer which necessitated my getting a work permit to work after 6pm. I've been working ever since.

#36 Pete on 2020-12-29 23:19 (Reply)

My earliest paid jobs were mowing lawns. Just home chores before then, mowing lawns, feeding livestock, milking goats. Milking a goat is a lot like firing a Dragon antitank missile. you have to lean into it to keep it from jumping. Earliest formal paying job was scraping the gum off the floor at Woolworth's. Got paid in cash in a manila pay envelope from the store cashier's barred window. Parked and fueled planes, that paid for my flight lessons. Worked at an asphalt batch plant, that paid my way through college. Busy and productive is good.

#37 Martin Morehouse on 2020-12-30 00:01 (Reply)

At 9 I began working selling newspapers on a street corner at a traffic light, my assigned location. The law required one to be 12 to have a paper route which paid more money. Papers cost 5 cents & I recieved 1/2 + ocassional tips, usually a nickle. A lady seemed to like me, saying I was cute, & bought a paper at least once/wk & sometimes more & she always gave me a quarter tip.

By 12 I was illegally hired by a construction company earning more than a paper route, but could only work in the warehouse storing & retrieving lumber so no official would see me working. But I was paid minimum wage, ~$1/hr, the same as adult laborers & did the same amout of work, though usually doing the most unpleasant jobs which were assigned to me by the adult laborers, e.g. working in the top bins close to the extremely hot tin roof, but I was smaller & more agile & better suited for that.

At 14 I could legally work in construction & then worked on job sites and sometimes riding on trucks delivering materials, a pleasant assignment sitting on material in the wind doing nothing for a while. My 1st jobsite job was breaking up a concrete slab with a jack hammer & was surprised how heavy a jack hammer is & how much it shook me. All for the same contractor.

I continued working in construction during the summer through my bachelor's degree. I worked through grad school as a teaching assistant. Moving up in the world.

#38 tex on 2020-12-30 02:04 (Reply)

Probably about age 12. I did ironing for a neighbor who had a beauty salon in her basement. Then was asked by a teacher if I could wash out the coffee urn in the teacher's lounge each day and refill it ready to be plugged in the next morning (must have been awful coffee). At the end of the school year, the teachers gave me all the change from their coffee payments.
In high school I worked as a "page" (library assistant) at the Mooresville Public Library. Loved that job. Had one temporary job feeding the cat of a woman who had had a hip replacement and couldn't bend down for a few weeks. No pay, but I was able to live in her spare apartment for a first taste of independence.
Had a brief stint as a waitress at Frisch's Big Boy, then worked as a secretary in the Dept. of Journalism at Indiana University. Great job. Got to read books from Ernie Pyle's personal library and sit in the memorial room with his furniture to do my homework.
Got a job as a ward clerk in a hospital in Oakland, which was great prep for nursing school. Worked as a nurse for awhile, then left that for academic life. I've been retired officially for 6 years, but still do editing and manuscript prep for academics.
Cannot imagine a life without working.
Wish there were more opportunities for young people to have real jobs at least from high school age. Makes you respect those who work, and not just at the "classy" jobs.

#39 Alifa Saadya on 2020-12-30 02:51 (Reply)

Around 13, gardening, then at 16-18 I added two more jobs (labouring Mon-Fri and bakery cleaning Sat and Sunday whilst still gardening after the end of each work day). Then straight into the military until 28 then med school and I've been an MD ever since.

I don't think there's been a single day I haven't worked (now 55).

#40 Andrew Jones on 2020-12-30 05:20 (Reply)

Chores on the family farm started well before 15. Mowing the lawn, helping in the garden, doing some of the field work. Dad switch from a small pre-1960 Grade A dairy to laying hens when I was young so our primary job became gathering eggs after school and on weekends. One penny per flat (30 eggs), and at peak production we'd be picking up a dollar a day or a bit more. Being the prime labor source on the farm we didn't have much opportunity for other jobs (school came first) so I didn't have an actual paycheck until I was a youth camp counselor after graduation. That lead to leading freshmen orientation groups in the summers at college. Had a programming job lined up when I graduated, and have had the good fortune to have not been out of work since.

#41 Christopher B on 2020-12-30 06:19 (Reply)

Dropped out of HS junior year. Dad said you got to work fulltime if you're not going to school. So I did, and was happy to. I was 17. That was 1979.

#42 S Karlsson (Link) on 2020-12-30 06:25 (Reply)

When I was 12 I helped a neighbor with his paper route. At 13 me and a buddy started a lawn mowing business. We had 6 lawns in our neighborhood and drove our mowers on the street (pulling a walk mower behind) to the houses. We kept it up until we could drive and make more money elsewhere. At 14 I started refereeing youth soccer and did that for a few years. For one summer when I was 15 I split wood and was paid by the cord. At 16 I started working on a golf course mowing and continued there until college. I made minimum wage at $3.35. In the winters when the course was closed, I worked on a horse farm mucking stalls, mending fences, chipping brush and whatever else they had. On the weekends, I also worked behind the counter at an indoor soccer place serving drinks, candy, hot pretzels and beer, even though I was too young. (After the last adult league game finished around midnight, the owner would let me and my friends play soccer until the wee hours. Just pull the door behind you when you leave. It was so much fun. One of my best memories ever.)

#43 Jason H on 2020-12-30 06:34 (Reply)

First job at 8 as Santa's elf - handing out gifts.

#44 Clovis Sangrail on 2020-12-30 06:43 (Reply)

Prior to 15. I never got an allowance, either.

#45 tim ferrell on 2020-12-30 07:21 (Reply)

I was cutting lawns for neighbors at age 14. Before that I never got an allowance; I was paid piecemeal for chores completed.

#46 John Fisher on 2020-12-30 07:32 (Reply)

Picking tomatoes for 20 cents an hour at the age of 9.

#47 Stephen Lawrence (Link) on 2020-12-30 07:51 (Reply)

4-5 as a "watchman" for my next-door neighbors/surrogate grandparents (keep an eye on their house - while they went to the grocery, doctor, etc.). Every day they'd tap the horn twice when they were leaving and I'd run and sit there playing with my trucks and cars on the sidewalk for who knows how long, watching. Was paid 0.25 a day + all the Pac-Man banana flavored popsicles I could eat + stories of what it was like growing up 70 years before.

#48 BornSouthern on 2020-12-30 08:20 (Reply)

Looks like a popular topic BullDog
Suggest you ask what our children’s first jobs entailed.
When does your survey analysis come out?
Ha ha.

#49 Franknbean on 2020-12-30 08:31 (Reply)

Maybe 14? Got $2/hour cash from a guy that had a business maintaining pools in the rich areas. He'd sit on the deck having iced tea with the owners while i did the work, and he got most of the money. Taught me I wanted to be "management".
Another interesting point. I listened to a podcast a while back, not sure which one, maybe Freakonomics? But they talked about a study a huge law firm did to determine what made successful partners. Turns out it wasn't the law school attended, or the grades, but the most reliable indicator was at some point the lawyer had done manual labor.

#50 bk on 2020-12-30 08:32 (Reply)

Prior to 15 - I had a regular Babysitting gig, plus others.

#51 Terri Goon on 2020-12-30 08:34 (Reply)

Mowed lawns and had a paper route starting around 12. Worked with my dad in a bakery at age 14 - Friday nights from 11 p.m. until 8 a.m. Saturday. FRIDAY NIGHT while my friends were out going to football games and having a good time. My first get-a-check job was working at a Bird's Eye pea viner at age 14. That was in the mid-60s before the machines could leave the pea fields with the peas in the hopper.

#52 Phloda (Link) on 2020-12-30 08:41 (Reply)

I was 13 and washed dish's in a small diner from 3pm to 7pm nightly till they closed 2 yrs later still went to school daily while working worked as a laborer for a mason from 15 to 18 Military service from 18 to 22 held a steady job 40 to 50 hr week until I was 70 I am 74 now and still work collecting scrap to sell for something to do .Guess I will do this till I can't any more just passing time till I see my beloved wife again on the other side

#53 joekath69 on 2020-12-30 09:01 (Reply)

Age 6 - helping bottle feed the lambs and other chores $.75 an hour

Age 8 - started cutting hay in addition to the other chores, pay raise to $1.50 an hour

By the time I graduated from college I'd cut and raked hay, swept hay (we did loose stacks and round bales), fixed fence, moved cattle, wrestled calves during branding, irrigation, doctored cattle, helped with calving, drove truck when chopping corn, plus worked at local grocery store and local clothing store. We still help out on the ranch when needed.

#54 Nina on 2020-12-30 09:10 (Reply)

Before 15, babysitting, grading papers for my mom, candy counter at movie theater, burger assembly and drinks at Burger King. The burger gig might have been when I was 16. Then waiting tables, then typing, a good gig back when no one typed for himself.

#55 Texan99 on 2020-12-30 09:10 (Reply)

Picking strawberries and Drop apples, when I was 12 I haunted a local bike shop asking to be a mechanic, always got turned down. One day I tried one last time, the owner was out getting his appendix out, his mom (co-owner) had an angry customer with a new bike with busted brakes, She hired me on the spot. I was there till my first professional job out of trade school. Thusly, I never bagged groc. or shoveled fries.

#56 Dale the peasant on 2020-12-30 09:30 (Reply)

12 Worked at funeral home yard work and cleaning inside.

#57 mike on 2020-12-30 09:47 (Reply)

I got paid to mow lawns at 11 or 12. Started lumberjacking trees when I was 14. Began painting houses about 15. First job with a paycheck and deductions was sacking groceries at the local supermarket when I was 16. By 17, I was one of the managers at the store.

#58 Dangerous Dean on 2020-12-30 10:07 (Reply)

First real job was at 13 with a paper route. cut grass for four neighbors at 14 and my SSN and child labor permit at 15 to work in a Print Shop. Been working ever since till I retired.

#59 Jan Blickenstaff on 2020-12-30 10:08 (Reply)

I experimented with paid work in my mid-teens, but it didn't become a habit until after I graduated from high school at 17.

#60 Another Guy Namded Dan on 2020-12-30 10:12 (Reply)

First real job was at 13 with a paper route. cut grass for four neighbors at 14. Got my SSN and child labor permit at 15 to work in a Print Shop. Been working ever since till I retired.

#61 Jan Blickenstaff on 2020-12-30 10:15 (Reply)

I worked as a deckhand on sport fishing party boats at 13. I found that I didn't care much for helping inept tourists bait their hooks so I switched to commercial fishing boats by 15. I worked summers and weekends on a dragger (trawler) through high school then college. Got my first small boat at 22 and have been at it full time for 49 years now.

#62 Bill on 2020-12-30 10:16 (Reply)

I worked on my University's Poultry Farm for 3 summers. I was in Poultry Husbandry until they caught me at it. (That's a JOKE, son; I say, that's a JOKE; my thanks to Foghorn Leghorn.)

#63 Sam L. on 2020-12-30 10:37 (Reply)

I was 12.
Ticket taker at a theater.
One of my duties at closing was to check the toilets to see if anyone was in there.

I saw this on one of the stalls:
"Here I sit, broken hearted.
Paid my dime and only farted".

Then delivered packages on bike for a Scotty's Moving company when I was 14.
Delivered Telegrams when I was 16.
Marine Corps at 18.
Have always had a job.
Or two.
Retired from HP in '98

#64 oolioo on 2020-12-30 10:47 (Reply)

Prior to 15

9 years old, summer 1957, San Jose, CA. Cutting cots @ 25 cents a box. Take freshly harvested apricot, longitudinally cut the flesh all away around the pit, split it open, husk the pit into the pit can, and lay the split apricot on the drying tray. By 12 had my own lawn mowing business I developed to taking care of 3 lawns properties. Started babysitting on the side after my older brother went away to school. Always worked and when I wasn't, I was working on getting a job.

#65 Steve K on 2020-12-30 11:18 (Reply)

ANY job counts? OK, I was 5, and cleaned the storefront windows for my aunt's jewelry stores in a small town in Illinois. I think it was just to get me out of the way for a few minutes.

Actual "job" for money? 13, Paperboy in a small city in Illinois. Not bad in the warm seasons, but terrible in the winter, delivering papers on my bike. Or my father driving me...

15, bus boy in the restaurant where my mom worked. 17, runner in a factory. 18, Boot Camp, followed by 21 years in the US Navy. Now I'm 70, and been retired for a year, and enjoying NOT working. But getting just a little antsy, so maybe I'll look for something else to do. Y'know, other than playing video games.

#66 Kenneth C Mitchell on 2020-12-30 11:37 (Reply)

Ditto, here. Began cutting grass & paper route when in 6th grade (1958). 74 yr old but drive once a week & do the books for local Meals On Wheels pgm. I'm hoping to burn out rather than rust out.

#67 Hugh Davis on 2020-12-30 11:39 (Reply)

Prior to 15, babysitting for neighbors.
Always worked summers after that unless getting some academic degree. Have worked in some capacity all my life.

#68 CT on 2020-12-30 12:39 (Reply)

I worked for my older brother at 9 years old. He paid me $5.00 a week to help deliver papers, collect for the papers at the end of the month and help him scrape Barnacles from boats in the summer season. This was back in the very early 60's

#69 eclectickelvin on 2020-12-30 13:48 (Reply)

Paper route at 12, but before that, when my parents dumped me at my grandparents' farm for the summer, I spent many days picking gherkins for nothing to help them out. Bee stings, sunburn, a goose who hated me, and a cold root beer at the A&W in town once a week as the reward.

#70 Sixtyville on 2020-12-30 15:09 (Reply)

Got first job at 13 at a concession stand at the race track. Used most of that money on food. At 14 spent a summer working on my great-aunt's truck farm. It was slinging burgers and washing pots for the rest of school until I went off to the Navy at 17

#71 Bill on 2020-12-30 17:55 (Reply)

Don't remember how old I was when I went door to door selling magazine subscriptions and helped the local paper carrier. Do remember was about 11 or 12 when started babysitting.

Fast forward to the next generation: they all went to a school which had an "exchange" program with Québec (were in French immersion), and money was scarce. So all three offsprings found themselves delivering flyers for a couple of years to help pay for their airfare (Granny would match their savings). Do remember one offspring complaining that had worked all those hours to pay for trip and still couldn't sit with friend.

Fast forward, and Grade Seven is there. Offsprings were told 1) you will graduate from Grade XII; 2) you will go on to some form of post-high school education; and, 3) you will be paying for same. We did modify #3 to say we would pay for room and board at an institution of our choosing which - given we live within walking distance of both a uni and a polytech - made our choice of institution.

All the offsprings did babysitting and a couple worked at the local library. One - who wanted to be a vet - found weekend and other jobs at vet clinics doing work from looking after the boarding animals to being the Saturday all purpose person.
One offspring had a Rotary scholarship for a year in a foreign country, but came back to realize that now had to find a job just like the sibs
as there was a limit to what we could provide. Said offspring got a job at a local fast food outlet and proved to be really good at up-selling. Was also a really good learning experience as in careers said offspring decided did NOT want to pursue.

All three went on to university (some graduated with more honours than others) and then to good careers. I am convinced their early experiences working out in the "real" world were instrumental in focusing them on jobs they would enjoy and which would give them satisfaction, both in terms of recompense and the reward of a satisfying job well done.

#72 Frances on 2020-12-30 21:18 (Reply)

Other than pick-up gigs, the first formal job was just before my 17th birthday, and I had to fight for it. The only reason I got it was the neighbour's sister offered me a job in front of my family, not knowing the answer was [supposed to be] no, as it had been for over a year.

It turned out to be the newest Sears store in the metropolitan area, which is now the last one in the entire region. It's also the last of the original anchor stores, as well as the last major retailer of any sort in that mall. The core city of the area, unusually successful by American standards, has been systematically destroying itself for three decades. I marvel that Amazon is succeeding wildly with what amounts to Alva Roebuck's business model, and that I've lived to see all this.

#73 Phil, Jr. on 2020-12-30 22:54 (Reply)

First job for pay from a non family member was at a campground / marina. The campground had outhouses that needed to be cleaned and that was one of my jobs with the owner who was about 70. Best part was I learned to drive a International pick up with a three speed on the column. I learned a lot about life that year.

#74 Don (Link) on 2020-12-31 16:17 (Reply)

Mid 1960's I was 16 and a neighbor worked at the city auditorium. This was before there were alarms on emergency fire exits so they would hire teenagers to sit there during paid events to keep people from letting their friends in for free. One event the manager gathered all of us and threatened us that if we let anybody in what he was going to do to us, so much that it made me very angry, so I decided I wouldn't open that door even if it was the fire dept. Then the manager said the governor was going to make a suprise appearance and would come in at a door two down from me. As you guessed some one was tapping at my door. Ignored and then there was pounding and pounding. The manager came running, screaming for me to open up...Thats how I met the governor and one very angry State Trooper .

#75 Arny Ripp on 2020-12-31 18:24 (Reply)

I grew up on a farm and never escaped. The first job of substance I remember doing was pushing a John Deere mower when I was in second grade. Pull start, heavy as hell, not a safety device of any means on it (it was 1969, a time when you bought things expecting them to last many years and it was possibly 10 years old by then) and before it had occurred to anyone to make a self propelled walking mower, which was how kids USED to get stronger. When you grow up around people who worked outside all day it really wasn't work. It has taken me most my life to wise up.

#76 ricefarm on 2021-01-01 09:58 (Reply)

15-16, got a job selling candy in the concession stand in the park.

#77 Dark on 2021-01-01 12:10 (Reply)

First job at 13 creosoting fences for Cross Country horse trials. Have to do it in the summer heat so it dries, but have to be fully covered up as it's corrosive. Nasty stuff- banned in the UK now!

Then moved on to post hole digging for post and rails with a double handed shovel, then building the jumps themselves. I remember that everyone else at my school came back from the summer holidays having put on weight; for me it was the only time I ever had a six pack! My buddy and I used to joke we should bring city people out to do it as a health camp!

Potwashing at the local pub from 16, then holiday jobs at my aunt's office in town from 18 through university.

#78 William of London on 2021-01-05 15:13 (Reply)

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Tuesday, December 29. 2020

Informal Maggie's Poll: When Did You Start Working?