Chapter 5

 

 Kid of the 50ties

Chapter 5

    Upon arriving in Cheyenne, I got out of the train yards quickly before the train detectives saw me and headed for the unemployment agency.  There they told me that there was a pipeline job over in Laramie Wyo. So I headed over to Hwy 80 and hitchhiked there.  I found the foreman of the pipeline and asked him for a job.  He hired me as a swamper and told me to come back in the morning at 7:00 am. Swampers guide the pipe when the tractor driver moves it up and down the ditch line before lowering it into the ditch. He told me that a work bus would pick us up in the morning at 6:30am in front of the bus stop.  I than found a cheap hotel room, got something to eat and set my alarm for 5:00 AM and went to bed.  Next morning, I was up at the alarm, got something to eat at the local restaurant and headed to the bus stop, box lunch in hand. My union pay was to be $2.00 per hour with time and one half after eight hours, time and one half on Saturdays and double pay on Sundays. I was making big money. I worked that job for about 10 weeks until heading back east for school. I made friends with most of the workers except for two rich wise-guy college kids who thought they were better than everyone else. Some of the things that happened in those ten weeks were that I bought an old Buick for $150 to get around in. I still rode the work bus though. One night I came back to my hotel room about 9 o’clock and the cops pulled me over in the hotel parking lot, searched my car, took me up to my room searched it. It all lasted about 40 minutes and they would not tell me anything. Kind of scared me, being that I was alone in town. Found out later that someone had robbed a store in the area. Played a little poker on Friday nights. Didn’t win or lose much but one night I went home an eighty-dollar winner. My luck was good that night and one of the college brats lost a lot of money and was really mad because I was winning so much haha. Never had any more trouble with them on the job after that. I didn’t like snakes and there were a lot of big rattlesnakes around. Most were in the ditch from trying to jump across at night and the surveyors had to really watch while walking the ditch. I was around loud equipment noise most of the day and only saw the dead ones along the top of the ditch that the surveyors had killed and thrown out.  Before I knew it, it was time to head east to school.  I had a lot of fun on that job for the 10 weeks I was on it.  I sold my car back to the salesman for 100 bucks went up to the highway and stuck my thumb out. I will always remember while standing there that a guy drove into the gas station on a Harley with a dog on the seat behind him.The dog jumped off when he stopped and the guy went into the store, came back out and got on his bike.The dog jumped up on a seat behind him and off they went. How that dog stayed on the seat was beyond me. I stuck out my thumb and the 3^rd car stopped and picked me up. The young man in his middle 20ties said hi and asked me where I was headed.  I told him Decatur IL Illinois.  He said you’re in luck cause I’m headed for Indianapolis Indiana.