Editor’s note: This is another column in Bill Boyd’s new series, “The Way It Was,” about growing up in Marysville. Bill continues to work with the Union County Historical Society to obtain information for his stories. With Marysville and Union County celebrating Bicentennial anniversaries in 2019 and 2020, respectively, these articles help depict what life was like in those early years.
A pruning problem
We use a small local lawn service company, to do our mowing, pruning and mulching. They do the pruning several times a year to keep the shrubs looking nice. We have used that same company for eight years, ever since we moved into this house. Their people are hard workers, and they do a good job.
This year, however, they seem to be running behind schedule. I know the owner pretty well, so I called him to see when they will be here to do some more pruning. He said they were swamped, and it would probably be a couple weeks or so.
I was surprised to hear that, as they have always been very punctual. As we continued to talk, he told me that it is much harder to get workers this year. There are so many new jobs being created in Columbus and central Ohio, that it is harder to keep good workers.
I got a similar report yesterday from a friend of mine who is in the home construction business. His company builds houses throughout Ohio and Indiana. He told me their sales are very good, but they are having problems with their subcontractors who do the framing, roofing and things like that.
He said it is becoming difficult for those subcontractors to keep workers, because of the many jobs that are opening up in the area.
This whole thing made me think about how things were when I was growing up in Marysville during the 1930s. Jobs were rare. Some of my earliest memories are of unemployed “tramps,” who could find no job. They traveled aimlessly around the country trying to scratch out a living. They often stopped by our house to ask for food. Sometimes they offered to do some work, maybe split some kindling, in return for the food.
They usually ate on our back porch, and I sometimes sat on the edge of that porch and talked with them. Some would tell me about places they had been and things they had seen. Or they might tell me where they were headed, maybe to Florida, to pick oranges, or to Pittsburgh, to look for a job in a steel mill. But a few didn’t seem to want to talk much. They just sat on the porch and ate the sandwiches my grandmother gave them.
Those people became a regular part of our lives, and we often fed several of them during the week.
I saw all this for much of the early years of my life. I thought this was the way it had always been. Not until World War II did they stop coming.
Then, when the war ended, and all those veterans came home, everything changed. There had been virtually no cars built for four years … no refrigerators, stoves or new homes. Just about everyone who wanted to work could find a job, and no one stopped by our house anymore to ask for food.
I was glad for all those people who found a job. And if the reports that I have been receiving are correct, and jobs in this area are now plentiful, then I feel pretty much like I did after World War II.
Although I’m happy for all those people who are finding new and better jobs, I hope this doesn’t mean that I will have to start doing my own pruning. I’m not very good at that.