Economics 101

The backyard taught me the principle of barter economics. I was introduced to this concept when I was around six years old. Dad did not like to fish but he loved to eat them. At the same time, he knew fishermen who loved to go out to Clayton Lake and spend the day catching their limit, but they didn’t like to clean nor eat their catch. To these fishermen the belief was that the best bait was earthworms and unless you had a worm source, they were a pain to get. That is, of course, where the Sharp Worm Farm came into play. Dad built a box complete with a retractable lid. He filled it halfway with very fertile loose soil and some seed worms. My job was to take the coffee grounds out there each morning to help the composting process along. As it turns out, worms are better than rabbits when it comes to reproduction. Since there are no male or female worms they can mate with just any worm who happens to be crawling by. It didn’t take long for the word to spread that we had worms that we would trade for fish. Consequently, our freezer was full of trout and catfish and our worms had a happy home for at least awhile. Fortunately for me, Dad cleaned all the fish. Soon the production of the worms exceeded the trading volume, so I would put worms in pint paper containers and take them to Isaacs Hardware Store that would sell them on consignment. This put some extra change in the pocket and sparked my love of the world of business.

By the time I was ten I felt a tremendous need to expand my business interests. Since the high school was only a block away from our home, all of the school owned ground around the high school was within walking distance of our house. To keep the growth down, the school would hire someone to come in a few times in the summer to basically mow the vacant lots with a tractor pulled mower. Frankly, it didn’t look much better after the mowing simply because of the method used. Seeing the need for a better way, I finally convinced my father to get me an appointment with the Superintendent of the schools, so I could offer my services. In early May of 1960 at the age of ten I met with Don R. Wood and we reached an agreement that I would mow the high school vacant lots twice a month during the summer months in exchange for $70 per month. In today’s dollars that would amount to over $550 per month. I went down to Isaacs Hardware and they agreed to finance a lawn mower to be paid for over the summer. This arrangement with the school continued until I was old enough to get a driver’s license. Since the school work took approximately one week to complete, I was able to mow several little old lady’s lawns during the off weeks. Did all work and no play make Tommy a dull boy? I think not!