THE MAIL ROOM
I was eleven years old when
I asked Mr. Brambles who lived across the street at 450 Harvard Ave, if I could
work for him doing yard work.
“Ok!” he said. I got 25 cents an
hour. I was elated. It was my first experience with Mr. Brambles who was the
Comptroller for Auerbach’s Department store. Auerbach's was a big, five story
building on the corner of Third South and State Street in Salt Lake City.
Before long, Mr. Brambles asked me if I wanted to be a mail boy at Auerbach’s.
“Sure,” I said, I was elated. The job
paid 75 cents an hour, which was 50 cents an hour more doing his yard work. The
third and last time Mr. Brambles hired me was in 1952. I was attending South
High school at the time. He, bless his heart, took me into his office and
called me his “mail boy,” then and there. No application form needed. Once
again, I was elated. It’s who you know not what you know that counts. That’s
for sure.
When I first started the job, it paid
80 cents an hour, five days a week, with lots of slack time. I loved slack
time. I delivered the mail to the thirty departments in the store twice a day,
once in the morning, and once in the afternoon. It took me about twenty minutes
to deliver each mail run. After a short introductory period, I was
irreplaceable. I was Mr. Bramble’s Comptroller, mail boy, and next door
neighbor to boot.
About a week after beginning work, and a Social Security card applied
for, convinced I had locked in the job, I placed a flattened out empty
cardboard box on a deli table, next to the back wall, at the dark end of the
dingy mezzanine mail room. I used the spot for cat naps, reading, studies, day
dreaming, most anything. I would punch in at the Auerbach’s employees, time
clock, and then walk two blocks to the post office on main street for the mail.
Then I would walk back to Aurbach’s and go to the mail room. I’d put everything
on a large table: letters, packages, magazines, etc. I would open the letters
with the automatic letter opener-stamp machine, place a rubber band around each
department’s mail, and put everything on a flat, oversized cookie pan left
there by the previous mail boy, Gordon Belnap. I would go about the
five-storied building, up and down, through the back halls, unseen by either
the stores customers or Mr. Brambles. But then, after nearly a year, the good
old days slowly dead-ended. Nothing lasts long in a mail boy’s world. I was
making the same old stinking’ 80 cents an hour, carrying 70-80 pounds of mail
back and forth to the post office, twice a day. Additionally I under-appreciated,
criticized. Slack time was non-existent, and my time card had to be validated
by a security guard each time I came and went.
Another thing that pissed me
off, the mail didn’t show the department numbers or the buyers’ names, which
caused me to often deliver mail late, or to the wrong place. I was giving mail
to the “Lingerie Department,” when it should have been left at the, “Women’s
Ready- to Wear Department,” and mail at the “Men’s-Wear Department,” when it
should have been dropped at the Boys Dept.
One time in particular, a short lady
buyer who wore short skirts said to me, “I don’t want to have to sort through
the morning mail you bring me, wasting my time, doing your job. Place all of my
mail on my office desk, and do so only at five o’clock from now on.” I felt
like placing her mail you know where.
Often the department buyers weren’t
sure a letter, magazine or sample, belonged at their department. With one
exception: The Credit Department. That department would send out self-addressed
envelopes with its billings and advertisements. That mail would be returned in
easily identifiable, self-addressed envelopes with checks or concerns. It
seemed reasonable to me that the other departments could handle the mailings,
like the Credit Department.
One fine day, I thought to myself,
why do so many places send us mail inadequately addressed? For one thing, they
do not realize I’m a part-time student attending High School, getting loaded
down with 75-80 pounds of mail, twice a day.
I
don’t remember the exact date, but one day in 1951, I walked nimbly into Mr.
Brambles’ office asked for a raise. He
turned a deaf ear,
“Just do your job.” He said.
Times had changed for the worst. I had to wait until after five to leave
the store. I had to wait until after five for the gross receipts and expense
envelope at the Comptroller window. off
at the post office. All this just to please Brambles and Richie Mrs. Auer Bach
in New York.
“Just do my job.” he said. At this
point in time, I asked for a raise. Straight forward, and calmly he said, as if
it were his money,
“No! As a matter of fact I’m rather
disappointed in you, Mr. Hickenlooper.”
“Why?”
“Just one example is you put the wrong date on the mail yesterday.”
“The post office put the wrong date in
the stamp machine, when I took it over on Monday.” I said The postal clerk put $800
dollars on the stamp meter, and Monday’s date on the stamp machine, and I
didn’t use the mailing machine until Tuesday.”
It was no use, “I give my two weeks’ notice.”
"Don’t bother to turn in your time card,” he said calmly, without
emotion.
The next day, I hired by the Parris Department store, a half block west of
Auerbachs, as a night watchman and janitor, at 1.25 cents an hour, including a
yearly employees Christmas party, and lots of slack time. I like slack time.
Mr. Brambles, I’m sorry Mrs. Auerbach closed your store shortly after
you fired me.
DR. KARL
WALLACE D.D.S.
For more of
my stories go to:
w.w.w.karlwallaceblog.blog.spot.com:
