The Grain Elevator

Graduating from high school is a monumental event in the life of a young person. They are ready to grab the world by the tail and give it a whirl. The first step towards becoming independent is that very first job we get on our own. Here’s the story of my first experience after graduation.

The Grain Elevator

 

It was the beginning of summertime of 1961. I was still living in Phillips Texas with my parents, and I had just graduated high school . I was very proud of my senior ring because you could read it right side up and it read 1961 and turn it upside down and it still read 1961. I had found me a job that would last about three weeks during the local wheat harvest at a grain elevator in Panhandle, Texas. I reported to work and they showed me around and explained my job to me. I was to direct the wheat trucks into the unloading stall and then call directions to the drivers to gradually lift the truck bed with his hydraulic lift. There was a 1 foot high by 2 ft long trap door in the lower center of the back of the truck that I opened to start the dump. The floor of the stall was made of heavy metal grating and the wheat fell through the floor Into a storage area below. My job also included scooping the last of the wheat out of the trucks through the trap door then directing the truck driver to move out. In some loads we found dead rabbits, hawks, pheasants, rats, foxes, and thousands grasshoppers that the combine harvesters had picked up during the wheat cutting. If the objects would not fall through the grating, we had to remove them and dispose of them. At one time I found a new pack of cigarettes in a load, on another a chopped up rattlesnake, and on another a live baby hawk. I always wondered if the thousands of grasshoppers in each load were ground up with the wheat when they made flour and ended up in our bread. In that three weeks, we unloaded about 500 tons of wheat.

 

When I first arrived, my boss told me to go up to top of the grain elevator and turn the exhaust fan on to clear some of the grain dust out and then left. There was an two man elevator there, but it did not work. I was determined to do what he told me, so I looked around and there was a 200 foot ladder to the top of the grain elevator next to the two man lift elevator. I started up the ladder and each rung had 1/8 inches of grain dust on it, and each time I put my hand on the rung above, I would knock a puff of wheat dust in my face. By the time I got to the top, my nostrils and throat were dried out and sticking together and my eyes were burning like crazy. There was a heavy man way at the top that I couldn’t budge, so back down I came. I told my boss about my problems and he showed me where the switch was to turn on the elevator. I wondered why he had put me through such an ordeal.

 

I had a friend named Eddy car pooling with me from Phillips. At lunch time, we would go up to the top of the elevator, sit in the shade, and enjoy the view while we ate. To the west 26 miles away, we could see Amarillo, Texas, and to the east 24 miles away we could see Pampa, Texas. It always amazed me that we could see so far from the top of that elevator.

 

All you employers out there remember to give new employees all the information they need to fulfill the instructions you give them. My first day at the grain elevator was miserable as a result on not getting all the information needed to complete the task I was given.

 

A grain elevator similar to the one I worked at in the summer of 1961. Quite a view from the top.

Thanks for reading The Grain Elevator,

Hawg Jaw Bill