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Everyone has memories they cherish from times when they were growing up. I have many memories, but none of them are as memorable as the ones I have of the Summer of “73”. That Summer holds some of the most cherished memories of my teen years. Not so much because of what I did that Summer, but more because of the woman I met who treated me like the son she never had.
It was long before I gave my life to Christ, but a time that helped influence the Christian I would one day become. If for no other reason than the woman who did her best to give direction and order to a teen who needed it.
It was a time in my life that I went farther and seen more than many do in a life time. I would travel through Canada, down through Montana to Tupelo Mississippi, and then to Birmingham Alabama, before catching a bus back home to Duluth Mn. All along the way I would spend time in places like Saskatoon Saskatchewan, Kansas City, Oklahoma City, Butte Mt, and even Bozeman Mt where my brother and I were able to get out to Gallatin Gateway to visit our grandparents. There were many small towns and big cities along the way where I met many different people, and fall in love with some young gals along the way more than a few times.
Every place I went has it's own memories, some I can recall with fondness, others with sadness and some with fear of what may come next. All this as I learned what it's like to live the life of a Carney. However, the biggest thing that has stuck with me all these years later, wasn't the games I ran, nor the places we went, or the things I did in the big cities, not even the memories of the girls I met along the way can match the memory I have of the woman I worked for.
As the youngest of eight children from a pretty screwed up family, I was the last one still living at home in 1973. Considering the examples I had, it was just a matter of time before I too decided to expand my horizons by dropping out of school. I was 16, and the last thing I wanted to do was attend any more 10th grade classes. My Mom tried to change my mind, but after 7 other children and all the troubles, she was tired of fighting.
So she took me down to the Army recruiting center to see if they would take me, but there was no way they were going to take a scrawny kid who barely turned 16 a few months earlier. She told me to get a job, so I did. I worked for Anderson Lumber driving a forklift, until I broke up with the owners daughter and got fired. I even met a girl at a neighbors wedding who's father offered me a Summer job in Southern Minnesota on his farm. I was ready to go down and take the job, when my older brother got a job working for a Carnival that came into town.
The Carnival was called the Thomas Shows, and it was based out of Southern Florida. Every Summer they made a circuit around the United States and Canada. They mainly played fairs at small towns, but a few places they joined other carnivals at larger Western cities like Kansas City, Oklahoma city, and Birmingham for their State fairs. Well my brother was able to get me a job with the carnival.
When the carnival was over and getting ready leave for the next city on their circuit, the owner of the game I worked, Mary Lou Zeicheck, told me she liked the way I worked, and wanted to know if I would like to travel with them. I was like, “You betcha”. I still had that strong Midwest accent that the movie Fargo made fun of. Anyway, Mary told me that I would need my Mom's approval and that she would have to give her legal custody of me, because we would be going into Canada. My Mom couldn't sign the papers fast enough. So with Mary as my legal custodian, I spent the Summer traveling around Canada and the USA as a Barker for a game called, “Crazy Ball”.
Sometime I find myself thinking about the girl I could have ended up spending my life with on a farm in Southern Mn. Well at that time the girl I met, and the job with her father on his farm was the farthest things from my mind. Instead I was on my way to Canada, and at 16 nothing was going to change my mind.
Mary was a good woman who owned 10 different games. The one I worked for was called the “Crazy Ball”. Mary expected everyone to work hard be polite and courteous with people, and to be very honest. As I would learn, stealing money from the games was a big problem with Carneys. Thus the high turnover of workers. Now as good as Mary was, she could not keep tabs on all her boys, as she called us. There were about 15 of us that worked her games. We all ranged from the late 30's down to me who was the youngest at 16.
She took a keen liking to me and seemed to go out of her way to protect me. She made sure I took showers often, and if my cloths didn't look right, she would purchase new ones for me. She refused to let her boys look like the ones who worked for others, and especially she did not want anyone who looked like the ride jockeys. As much as she wanted to be, she was less successful with the older guys, than with the younger ones. However, as long as the older guys worked hard and were honest she put up with them. As for the younger ones like me, she took more interest in the hopes she could mold us into the type of respectful decent men she expected us to be.
Now Lou and Mary never had a son, and since I was the youngest she favored me. So much so that I felt like she treated me at times like I was her son. The other workers actually kept their distance from me for some time, for fear I would get them in trouble for things. I remember it bothering me at first, but after a few cities they began to realize I was cool. In time some of the older guys even began treating me like a little brother in how they watched out for me and even shared their wisdom on life.
We all got paid on a weekly basis, except for me. She took me aside and told me she would give me enough for what I needed, but the rest she saved to give me at the end of the Summer. Late at night after the carnival closed, her husband, Lou, ran a casino type of game tent that was only for the carnival workers. It was a way to keep the workers from going into town and getting into trouble. Mary Lou made sure that I was not allowed in there. There were guys my age that got in, but they didn't work for her. Most of them worked for the guy who owned the rides. Lou was less caring, buy she made sure he knew that I was not to be around the drinking and gambling.
She felt a strong sense of responsibility since she was my legal guardian. She would often repeat the line, “Your different from the rest of these boys. I've never had a son, and by golly I am not going to let anything happen you.” Then she would smile and just walk away. She was a real darling, but she had a hard cold side to her also. If you crossed her, you knew you were in deep trouble.
One time an older guy in his 30's was caught stealing. The guy had his wife and two children with him, but it didn't matter to her. I remember her cussing him out in her trailer home. She was so loud that I swear the whole county must have heard her wrath. He crossed her by stealing, and in the carnival life that is an unforgivable sin. The penalty is immediate release with nothing but your belongings, but not before everything you own is gone through. Even if the money found is yours, you lose it. They left town with him and his wife and kids standing in an empty parking lot. Broke, and no where to go. I often times wonder what ever happened to them.
Lou was more low key, he didn't say much, he was usually all business. He grew up in the carnival life. His father and mother were both Carneys, and he was born and raised working them. When he was 12 his mother ran off with some guy in some town. I guess she was tired of the life, and a guy with money and a steady job won her away. From the stories I heard, his father never blinked an eye when she left. Lou grew up just as hard and just as cold, but he learned everything he needed to become a millionaire by the time he 40. He could have retired, but it was in his blood.
Mary Lou was different. She came from a good Jewish family of respectability. From what I was told, she met Lou when she attended the carnival that came through her hometown of Kansas city. She was only 16, and Lou was about 30. After the carnival left town, Mary ran away to be with him. Her family never knew she left with him, because they planned it out so that she would run away a few weeks after the carnival left town. She jumped on a bus and met him in Tupelo where the carnival was playing. They went to the Justice of the Peace and got married. They have been together since.
You would think that it would never last, but because Lou was loyal and faithful to her, and a good business man, they lasted. The Summer I began working for them, they were celebrating their 28th anniversary together. Just as much in love then, as the day he convinced her to run away. That was the Summer of “73”, and they could still be alive and still as much in love as they were when I worked for them.
It was mid September when the last stop of the circuit took place in Birmingham Alabama. The day after we tore everything down and had it all packed up, Mary Lou took a couple of us to get our hair cut and purchased some new cloths for us. We all had lunch and then she took us to the bus stop, where she gave me an envelope of the money she held back for me. She gave us all hugs, but she hugged me last, with tears in her eyes. Not a lot, but enough for me to know she was going to miss me. I tried to be strong, but I too had wet eyes.
On the long bus ride home I had a Summer of memories to pass the time by. It was Summer of my life that I could probably fill a book with. I would be telling a lie if I said I didn't grow up a bit that Summer. If Mary knew half the things I did with the older guys, and the girls I got to know in the many towns we were in, she probably would have sent me home early. When I look back at that Summer, I remember many things, but nothing surpasses the memory I have of a middle aged woman who had me as her son for the Summer of “73”.
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