From when I was a small boy, I wanted the feeling of independence that having money jingling in your pockets gives you. I earned a little doing yard work for a few people around town, but my first real job was shining shoes at my dad’s shop. Dad said if I would work for him shining shoes on Friday after school and all day Saturday, he would give me a nickel for each shine, which was half of the cost. He said I could keep all the tips, but even with that I couldn’t make over a dollar and a half a day—and that was a good day. So when I was thirteen, I went over to Mr. Eddie Mahaffey, who owned the Gulf Service Station on Main Street, and asked him for a job. Mr. Eddie didn’t hesitate. He just said okay, and called out, “Hey, Taft, get over here. I want you to teach Mike everything you know about this station.”
Taft Hill, a tall black man who worked for Mr. Eddie, was always Mr. Taft to me. He had no fingers on his right hand, just a thumb, but that didn’t keep him from performing any job around the station. In fact, it didn’t take me long to realize that, although Mr. Eddie was supposed to be in charge, it was Mr. Taft who kept everything going. Mr. Eddie mainly gave orders and occasionally pumped a little gas, but Mr. Taft could do anything. It seemed a shame, but I never saw him get much credit. Although Mr. Eddie treated Mr. Taft respectfully and often deferred to his judgment, he never complimented him on a job well done or gave him any credit for the success of the station. I sort of thought Mr. Eddie acted like a colonel who has a buck private doing the real work. And Mr. Taft might have made five dollars a day, probably less.
The station, which was built almost up to the sidewalk, was small, with one big room and a couple of small rooms on the back and side. The gas pumps were on city property between the sidewalk and the street, and customers could gas up sitting in the street or in the space next to the station that included the sidewalk. Oftentimes, pedestrians would walk around cars being serviced, but no one seemed to think that was strange.
There were separate restrooms inside the building for white women and white men, but there was only one colored restroom out behind the building. One of my jobs was cleaning the white restrooms, but Mr. Taft had to handle the colored facilities.
There was also a Coca-Cola drink box, where six-and-a-half-ounce bottles sat vertically in cold water. As the box lacked an electrical cooling component, the water was cooled with blocks of ice delivered daily to the station by Mr. J. A. Brown’s delivery man from the icehouse across the little red bridge on Shelby Street and later by an employee of Dolan Small’s dad.
One of my routine jobs was to drain the old water from the box, then go out to a little room in the back and get out wooden cases of twenty-four bottles to restock the drink box. After the ice had been delivered, I would chip it up with an ice pick. Mr. Eddie told me that I needed to make the pieces small enough to fit between the bottles, but not a bit smaller, as he didn’t want the ice to melt too quickly. Just about everyone who traded with Mr. Eddie bought a nickel sweet drink—Cokes, Grapicos, Orange Crushes, root beers, and even bottles of chocolate milk.
Mr. Eddie’s wife, Miss Mary Lee, sat all day on a stool behind the only showcase, where she kept cigarettes, bags of tobacco and cigarette papers for those who rolled their own, cigars, chewing tobacco, and snuff. She also had penny boxes of matches as well as inner tubes and tire patches, valve stems, and valve stem covers. When it came to tobacco, Miss Mary Lee must have been her own best customer, as you seldom ever saw her that she didn’t have a cigarette hanging out of her mouth. Her job was to collect the money and place it in the huge cash register, which was an antique even then. She must have opened that register a thousand times a day. I always called her Miss Mary Lee, but Mr. Taft always referred to her as Miss Haffey.
Miss Mary Lee and Mr. Eddie Mahaffey, the couple who gave me my first jobs, instilled a work ethic, and helped inspire my music career. They were both big-band musicians and played with the Bama Skippers.
In those days there was no such thing as a credit card, but in addition to cash Miss Mary Lee would accept checks drawn on Merchants and Planters Bank. The only credit I remember them extending was to some of Mr. Eddie’s friends or to Alabama Power Company. Each of these accounts had their own little book about 3 x 6 inches in size with carbon paper so the customer always could have a receipt. These little books were very important because they were the only records of accounts payable. Occasionally Miss Mary Lee would ask someone to sign the book after a purchase, but generally the credit system was based on trust. Most folks settled up their accounts on Friday, but some had monthly accounts. Miss Mary Lee watched these charge accounts like a hawk, and if they ran on too long she would tell Mr. Eddie he had to call somebody to remind them a payment was due. But overall there was no problem. After all, Mr. Eddie knew all these people very well. He knew where they lived, and he knew their reputations.
At Mr. Eddie’s service station, the work was long and hard, and you got very dirty. I worked right alongside Mr. Taft, and by lunch my hands were as black as his. There was no OSHA in those days, and personal safely was left up to workers for the most part. And in that regard, Mr. Taft really took me under his wing. He not only taught me what I needed to know; he looked out for me. One day I went home and told Dad that Mr. Taft Hill was safety officer, production manager, and quality control man at the service station. And it was really true.
On the left side of the building there was a grease pit with a sharply raked ramp on which cars and trucks would be driven over the pit. Mr. Taft and I could get under the vehicle, take a wrench and remove the plug out of the oil pan, drain out the old engine oil, replace the plug, and put new oil in the engine. The oil we drained was black and strong-smelling as it drained into a small barrel on the floor of the grease pit. Few people worried about the environment in those days, so there was no recycling. The used oil was dumped in a big hole out behind the station. We also checked and changed the oil in the transmissions, which were manual and usually under the front seats.
In the grease pit there was a long red hose from the air compressor out behind the station. On the end of the heavy stiff hose was a silver Alemite gun, as Mr. Taft called it. On its barrel end was a little opening that you pushed over the grease fittings under the car, near the wheels, brakes, springs, steering gear, and so forth. You would pull the trigger and the air pressure pushed the dark, thick grease into the fittings. I had to learn all brands of cars, as the fittings varied from make to make. I remember how Mr. Taft would say, “Any grease you see coming out between them fittings ain’t doin’ no good. It’s the grease you don’t see that does the good.”
Mr. Eddie had the only hydraulic lift in town, which was used only for cars and light trucks. One of us would drive the vehicle over long parallel I-beams at ground level and let the axles rest there. Then we pushed a lever to raise the car or truck. Once the hydraulic lift was up, as a safety precaution we would take a piece of 4 x 4 lumber and stand it under one of the high beams. We didn’t intend to let a car fall on Mr. Taft or me. Not only could we change oil and do grease jobs here, we also could repair brakes, replace mufflers, and do other small jobs. I was responsible for changing batteries and replacing headlight and taillight bulbs, and I was proud to be trusted to do those jobs correctly.
We also fixed flat tires on cars, trucks, and bicycles. If it was flat, we could fix it. As usual, Mr. Taft was my teacher. First I had to learn how to get the lug nuts loose. We had a big silver wrench in the shape of a cross, with each of its four arms ending in a different size socket. You had to find the socket that fit the lug nuts on the vehicle being worked on and with hand pressure twist the lug wrench to the left to loosen and right to tighten. I can hear Mr. Taft now saying, “Lefty loosy, righty tighty.” This was graduate education that I received from Dr. Taft Hill. Occasionally I was not strong enough to loosen the lug nuts, and I’d have to call Mr. Taft. Invariably, I would hear a loud squeak, and the lug was freed. Mr. Taft said, “Now when it comes to tightening the lugs, you gotta tighten ’til it squeaks. Then you know it’s done tight enough.”
The most difficult job in the station was changing tires on the big trucks from Alabama Power. Removing the tire from a twenty-one inch rim was tough and really dangerous. You had to take the valve core out of the valve stem with a special wrench, which Mr. Taft always kept in his pocket. When all the air was out, the tire would be placed on the ground and, using a special tire iron, you broke the seal between the rim and the tire. On a tire this size, Mr. Taft would use a five-pound sledgehammer, after which he would remove a heavy metal ring and the inner tube. If you could, you patched the tube, but often you had to replace the tire and the tube. Then you would take the big metal ring and, using the sledgehammer, mount it where the tire meets the rim. Now you were ready to take the air hose and inflate the tire.
I was never allowed to be around when Mr. Taft was putting the air in truck tires. You had to be very careful to be in just the right position because if the air pressure went in too quickly, the heavy ring could be pushed off the wheel and fly out into the air. “If that ring blows off, Mike,” Mr. Taft told me, “you could get hit in the head and get killed. Or you could get an arm cut off. You just stay back when I’m putting air in a truck tire.”
I never saw a rim ring blow, but I was quite concerned that Mr. Taft was in harm’s way every time he aired up a big truck tire. And I appreciated that he would look out for me as he did. Among the many things he taught me, I gained my lifelong habit of keeping my tools organized and in their proper places.
Our hours were long, from seven in the morning until six at night. And there was little idle time. Most of my time was spent waiting on customers at the pumps. Mr. Eddie wanted this done properly, which meant I was to go to the driver’s window and ask what I could do for him or her. Most often it was gas they wanted—the better-off would get a fill-up and the not-so-well-off a dollar or two’s worth. I’d also lift the hood and check the oil. I always had a rag in my pocket to wipe off the dipstick. Cars burned a lot of oil in those days, and I opened many a quart metal can of oil with the beer can opener (or church key, as we called it) I kept for that purpose. Then I would wash the windshield, clean headlight lenses, and check the air in all the tires. I quickly learned you could take a big-handled screwdriver and rap the tire, and from the thud or the sharp sound you could tell if a tire needed air. If the customer had gone inside the station, I would take a whiskbroom and sweep the floorboard in front of the driver’s seat. At Mr. Eddie’s Gulf station we were proud to live up to the words, “Complete Service.”
Mr. Eddie said we were always to keep busy. If we weren’t waiting on customers or doing some other task, we were to sweep the sidewalk and wash the concrete around the station. But he didn’t mind us having a cold drink a couple of times a day. I preferred Grapicos, and I have never enjoyed any drink more than those at Mr. Eddie’s. When I finished my lips and tongue would be purple, and Mr. Taft would laugh when I would stick out my tongue at him.
The most memorable moment I ever had at Mr. Eddie’s Gulf Station involved Miss Ethel Reisener, an interesting character around town. Miss Reisener, who lived with her companion Dr. Ann Eastman in a little duplex on Highland Avenue, ran The Little Shop on Main Street, which sold very fine ladies’ clothes. In those days we called them roommates; today we would probably call them gay or lesbian. Miss Reisener was a large, mannish woman—obviously the dominant one in her relationship with Dr. Eastman. She wore men’s suits and smoked cigarettes incessantly, holding them between her thumb and index finger like a man would. She walked with a male gait and cussed like a sailor, and every two weeks, when she came to my parents’ shop, she did not go back to the beauty shop, but took her seat in one of the barber’s chairs for Dad to cut her close-cropped hair.
Miss Reisener brought her black Chevrolet sedan of pre-war vintage to the station every Saturday and left it to have it washed. The first time I washed it, she picked it up and left, but in no time I saw her coming back, driving like a hot-rod speedster. As she got out of the car I could see a distinct scowl on her face. She walked up to Mr. Eddie, who was standing by the gas pumps.
“Eddie, who washed my car?” she asked sternly.
“Taft,” Mr. Eddie said, “who washed Miss Reisener’s car?”
At that point I decided I should speak. “I did, sir.”
“Did you wash my car, Mike Mahan?” Miss Reisener asked.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You didn’t wash under the fenders,” she said scornfully.
“No, ma’am,” I said weakly, “but you couldn’t see under there.”
“I wash my ass every night even though no one can see it. Now, get this car in there and finish washing it.”
As I obeyed, I saw Mr. Eddie walk inside shaking his head, and Mr. Taft, I could have sworn, turned white. But Miss Reisener had taught me a lesson, and I have never forgotten it.
One day Mr. Eddie announced that he was closing the Gulf Station and would be opening a Western Auto Store. He rented a building half a block away on the corner of Main and Boundary, where Whaley Furniture Company had been. This building had two floors, the second of which was an apartment occupied by the Albright sisters.
When I was told he was closing the Gulf Service Station, I was broken up. I thought I had lost my job, but Miss Mary Lee informed me if I wanted to I could move to the Western Auto and work some after school and on Saturdays. This made me very happy because I didn’t want to go back to shining shoes at Dad’s barbershop. But I was shocked when he told Mr. Taft there was no place for him. It seemed so callous to let Mr. Taft go after all those years he had given to making the station a success. But I knew, of course, that in those days a black clerk was unheard of. Luckily, because of his work ethic and his talents, Mr. Taft was quickly hired by Smiley and Giggles Frost at the Montevallo Lumber Company, where he served until he got old enough that he could no longer do heavy work.
I don’t know how well Mr. Taft was treated by Smiley and Giggles. Many times I would be walking down the street and hear one of them yelling loudly, “Damnit, Taft, get in here.” And I would think to myself that Mr. Taft Hill deserved more respect than that.
The whole town was excited about the arrival of Western Auto, its first national chain store, which would handle auto parts, fishing tackle, guns, kitchen appliances, radios, and later household goods. We all watched excitedly as Western Auto headquarters sent in workers to remodel the old store. They brought in showcases, display counters, and tables, and they stocked the shelves and cabinets with Western Auto merchandise. And practically everybody in town attended the grand opening.
Once a “grunt, grease monkey, and hey boy” at Mr. Eddie’s Gulf Service Station, now a clean, well-dressed sales associate (the only one) at the Montevallo Western Auto, 1952.
Miss Mary Lee was again in charge of the cash register, which rested on a showcase in the middle of the store. I think she carried her stool from the service station there, and she still used the old manual register. I feel sure her fingerprints were permanently etched into the handle that opened the cash drawer. One other duty Miss Mary Lee took on seems rather quaint today. She waited on all the lady customers.
I was amazed as I watched Mr. Eddie become an expert on car parts. Someone would want a water pump for a 1949 Hudson, and he could pull it from the shelf without even consulting a parts list he kept on the counter. Although I was hired as a gopher for both Mr. Eddie and Miss Mary Lee, as time went on I too began to sell parts and whatever else the store carried. Because of my extensive auto repair experience at the service station, I quickly moved up to changing batteries and light bulbs of all descriptions. And I was the number one assembly person in the store. Whatever was ordered from Western Auto warehouse and delivered by a big truck on Wednesdays or Thursdays, I was assigned to put it together on Saturdays or after school during the week.
I was very proud of the trust Mr. Eddie and Miss Mary Lee put in me after opening Western Auto. Very quickly they even trusted me to make change out of Miss Mary Lee’s cash register if she was busy with a customer. On occasion, I took money to Merchants and Planters Bank for deposit. I was also trusted to add charges to the charge account ledger. I was proud of my work with the Mahaffeys, but in time I left them to begin working for H. H. Tchakarian and Sons Organ Builders. Even then, when I was home I would help out at Western Auto if I was needed. And I was happy to find that my friend, Teeny Mahaffey—a nephew of Mr. Eddie, would be taking my place.