An Entrepreneurial Legacy
Mennonites are also renowned for their entrepreneurial skills. The Russian Mennonites from the Ukraine were not only land owners, they created and controlled the means of productions, ironically a skill set that cost them dearly during the Russian Revolution a time when ownership, wealth and control were actually a bad thing, who wants to own the land when the peasants finally revolt?
My family, on my mother’s side, were wealthy land owners while on my father’s side they owned a farm implement factory. Later my grandfather sold his share in the family business so he could finance his training as the first professional photographer in his village. He cornered the market. I come from great stock.
As a child I think I had the potential to continue the entrepreneurial legacy as a representative of the first Canadian born generation of my family. My father who actually lacked those entrepreneurial skills did possess a strong unionist mentality yet never joined a union. I’m not sure what he saw in me, either a social agitator for workers rights or a capitalist king and the peasant be damned, at any rate, my father launched my brief retail merchandizing career. Perhaps, he was looking for a wood working project to keep him busy and out of my Mother’s hair, or he wished to rekindle, in the
My dad built me what I considered to be a state of the art retail roadside lemonade stand with franchise possibilities with great potential for expansion. With no training and lots of enthusiasm I established the first family retail outlet on
I was no stranger to retail as my older brother had earlier that year split his lucrative paper route with the St Catharines Standard and sold me at current market value, 8 paper route customers. I think these were the outliers to his rather concentrated core route. By selling these fragmented scattering of customers he could focus on his main route and be done much faster. For me it was an opportunity, eventually the neighbourhood grew with development characteristic of the sixties and my paper route soon numbered over 36 paying customers. I realized before my time the potential of the “Freedom 55” concept. I was motivated to succeed.
I’m not sure if Donald Trump ever delivered papers, but he should have, it would have given him some of the people skills he now lacks. I learned much about organization, planning and dealing with unreasonable customer rage, miscellaneous dog attacks and deadbeat customers who would not pay and never tipped at Christmas. Despite the various hurtles to success I delivered the paper with the ardor of a pony express rider of the previous century.
It was the night of the” Perfect Storm” when the elements of nature conspired against me to challenge my natural born zeal. I shielded my face against the icy gale force winds that had quickly arisen from the NW as the barometric pressure did a brief pirouet on the barometer dial and dove to record lows. I could barely see the sidewalk as I struggled against the icy tides to get the days news, stories of intrigue and disaster, rape and mayhem, safely and firmly planted behind a storm door, into a snug mailbox or milk box as prescribed by my customers who are seemly always right.
The first abdominal pains I felt that evening while delivering in the Arctic temperatures were generalized, but as the rest of my body progressively grew numb from the cold the pain began to focus on my right side. It was intense. As I struggled to keep my balance, with folded newspaper in hand, I eventually succumbed to the searing pain as my appendix smugly snug and warm at the end of my intestine was about to burst. I stumbled, went to my knees and finished with a rough little tumble into the ditch. Cold, in pain and now hidden from the rest of the world in a hard hitting winter snow storm I lay waiting for my redemption, a rescue I thought in my delirious state would be nice at this point.
On a few previous occasions my short little insignificant life had flashed before me in other near death out of body experiences, but when least prepared, with no prep time the story is usually brief and fragmented with many gaps and poor character and plot development, no dramatic arc, sub plots or nemesis or cathartic insights. It was like puff this is it. You are going to freeze to death in a ditch.
Today, I keep my complete and totally unabridged life story on a flash drive in case any near or potentially near death experiences should arise. I wear clean underwear like my mother taught me and I am prepared. That frigid night was different. My retail world, of being a paper delivery boy in sub-Arctic conditions brought me many painful lessons about sacrifice and duty and other miscellaneous insights about life that I cling to this day. Values to a little Mennonite boy are sometimes learned in a ditch.
My dad, realizing that I was out in a storm, and very late in getting home launched an organized grid search with my brother who was toasty warm after quickly delivering his paper route, you remember the concentrated one designed for ease and efficiency of delivery, while I had the Resolute Bay version lying in a ditch as my appendix was about to burst. They found me that Spring in surprisingly good form. I had learned remarkable survival skills while waiting for a rescue and had bonded with an old volleyball I discovered in the culvert. I called him Spalding. We became life time friends.
My appendix was operated on at the
I at the least expected to see my picture in the very same paper I delivered. You know a tribute to my youthful bravery and sense of duty and the heroic, but slow rescue by dedicated and loving family members. I remained quietly bitter to this day although I proudly carried that paper through all types of weather until my earlier retirement at age 13.
My lemonade stand, operated in summer months concurrent with my newspaper delivery business. It served as a good introduction to the concept of moonlighting which was to serve me well in my adult life.
I sold a variety of goods that I could easily find around the house. My main product line of course was Kool-Aid which I bought at the local Dominion store. The term Lemonade stand is actually a misnomer as I sold no lemonade, unless on those rare occasions when I could get a lemon flavoured Kool-Aid. My mom supplied me with home made baked goods that I’m sure, although I did not know at the time, I sold at a loss, but it kept my mom happy that I was out in the business world.
My inventory also included old Dell Classic Comic books, and Marvel Comics. Although I enjoyed the classic stories such as Moby Dick, A Tale of Two Cities and Frankenstein that joy was only superseded by my love of super heroes. I have always harboured the wish to be a super hero as I have this odd affinity for capes and like to change my cloths in phone booths, a practice made progressively difficult today due to the overwhelming advent of the cell phone.
My biggest day at the lemonade stand was on a very hot humid July day when to my delight and surprise a city bus stopped in front of my humble stand. I sat there in shock as if a Great White Shark had just leaped on the shore where I was walking and scooped up a seal while shaking it furiously in its mouth than playing with it out to sea in a rare scene of raw natural predatory barbarity, a seen to appear on Planet Earth much later in my future.
Shark, fade to bus. There in front of me bigger than my world with air brakes hissing sat a red on white bus. The side folding doors opened slowly this being a” close encounter of the third kind”. From each perch the bus driver looked down at me sitting behind my little plywood stand while asking if anyone in the bus would like some refreshing Kool-Aid. This stranger, my bus driver was my sales agent. My vision of early retirement loomed large.
The scale of my operation had exponentially expanded with one single, large vehicle. With encouragement from the bus driver and to the bewilderment of the passengers I brought him some refreshing nectar from my dispensary. I thought he might pay with bus transfer tickets, but instead he chose to give me an entire quarter for a 2 cent drink. I have never forgotten his generosity and although I dread using public transit as an adult I have a deep and abiding respect for kind, thirsty bus drivers.
By summers end and before Labour Day I closed down my operation and got my mind around going back to school all the while doubting in my heart of hearts that I would learn the lessons in the school that I had out in the harsh real world of hard knocks in retail and paper delivery. I had brought the news of the world to the common man and I had eased the thirst of the masses. I was now mentally prepared for my formal education a process of life long learning I could not escape.
