Whats everyone do for a living?!?
- Thread starter Rotax
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Turbys_1700
Elite Member
I worked on the farm until I went to school. My grandparents actually operated a small fertilizer and seed store when I was young and helped them out also. Worked 12 years in the furniture industry in management and engineering after college. The last 21 years I've worked in the community college system teaching furniture and now computer technologies.
Eric Salop
Elite Member
As a teenager I had weekend and summer jobs selling suits in a tailors shop, making bricks, then sorting springs in a steelworks.
Don't suppose anyone would call that a true "living" as I barely made enough to take my girlfriend to the pictures.
Looking back, it was more like an investment - 42 years later I'm still married to that same girl.
Took a job with a large electric motor manufacturer and they let me take a part-time degree in Electrical & Electronic Engineering.
Great experience too as they put me through every department. Then I thought there may be a future in these new things called microprocessors. My employer didn't agree.
Taught myself just enough to get a job using them to control the electronics for coal mining machinery.
Had many good years there, then our prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, decided Britain would buy coal from other countries instead (she hated coal miners with a vengeance).
Guessing redundancy would soon be on the way, I started on freelance circuit and software design in the evenings with a friend. I divided my garage into 2 - one half for electronic testing, the other half for metalwork plus a spraying booth. We made controls for heating systems, light sensors for textile machinery, drives for optical measuring gear, temperature controls for aquariums, simply anything to still pay our mortgages.
Finally, with enough cash in reserve, we started a full time business with a couple of other guys manufacturing fire control panels.
It grew quite quickly, then got sold when one of the other founders wanted out.
The buyer of the fire business then went and pulled the work away and made just about everyone in manufacturing redundant and threatened to do the same to the design team.
(There was no need for them to do that as it was doing well, expanding and making good money for the owners).
So I got together again with many of the old team, formed another company and did it all over again.
15 years later it too got sold. I'm still on good terms with that last company and do some software design work for them when I'm not outside in the fields.
Don't suppose anyone would call that a true "living" as I barely made enough to take my girlfriend to the pictures.
Looking back, it was more like an investment - 42 years later I'm still married to that same girl.
Took a job with a large electric motor manufacturer and they let me take a part-time degree in Electrical & Electronic Engineering.
Great experience too as they put me through every department. Then I thought there may be a future in these new things called microprocessors. My employer didn't agree.
Taught myself just enough to get a job using them to control the electronics for coal mining machinery.
Had many good years there, then our prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, decided Britain would buy coal from other countries instead (she hated coal miners with a vengeance).
Guessing redundancy would soon be on the way, I started on freelance circuit and software design in the evenings with a friend. I divided my garage into 2 - one half for electronic testing, the other half for metalwork plus a spraying booth. We made controls for heating systems, light sensors for textile machinery, drives for optical measuring gear, temperature controls for aquariums, simply anything to still pay our mortgages.
Finally, with enough cash in reserve, we started a full time business with a couple of other guys manufacturing fire control panels.
It grew quite quickly, then got sold when one of the other founders wanted out.
The buyer of the fire business then went and pulled the work away and made just about everyone in manufacturing redundant and threatened to do the same to the design team.
(There was no need for them to do that as it was doing well, expanding and making good money for the owners).
So I got together again with many of the old team, formed another company and did it all over again.
15 years later it too got sold. I'm still on good terms with that last company and do some software design work for them when I'm not outside in the fields.
kcflhrc
Veteran Member
I'm a Legacy Nortel PBX Dinosaur. Still working on Nortel as well as Avaya, ShoreTel and our own Hosted VOIP. Started in 1979 with 1A2 Key Systems, then Electronic key, Mitel SX20, 100 and 200. Lots of other products along the way. Full time Nortel guy since 1991 when I got a real job instead of mom and pop companies. Got in the business by chance. I had Vocational Training my senior year of High School and was going to follow my Dad's career path in machine shop. I was only 17 when I graduated so I had about 3 months before I could take my job at a local machine shop, had to be 18. I went to work on a temporary basis, so I thought, with a job pulling phone cable. That was 35 years ago and I'm still in the business. I hope it lasts another 10 years or so. I will be 54 this year. It's been a good gig. Sometimes I wish I would have done something else. But the customer interaction I really like. Most people are nice to the phone guy.
RetiredCarGuy
Silver Member
- Joined
- May 2, 2014
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- 116
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- New York State
- Tractor
- John Deere X575 4X4 and GT235 6 speed, plus an old Allis Chalmers
Retired car guy... how would you know it!
the old grind
Elite Member
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- NH T-1520 HST, NH TC33DA HST, Case DX26 HST, .Terramite T5C, . NH L785
Union Toolmaker GM/UAW, retired. (8 yrs, now)
Raised in 'white collar' family while Dad ran the local TV station. Was the A/V guy in Jr High and at church where I taught Sunday school in the '60s. 5-time college dropout. 2 yrs Army artillery. Just couldn't stay away from metal, and did small engine and m'cycle repair on the side while working production at GM and during years in the trade. Raised one son that lost his Mom at 14 mos, is currently a project manager (BEE, MBA) for a large engineering firm.
Have a small machine shop now and haven't been paid for a job in years, if I could help it. Tractors have replaced the motorbike, boating, and computer hobbies, but remnants of all clutter my bachelor digs. (widower of 35 yrs, .. she could not be replaced) Still shooting and reloading when not improving my wildlife refuge (duck, goose nesting). Also, still trapping to protect wildlife around pond and toys in the barn.
Raised in 'white collar' family while Dad ran the local TV station. Was the A/V guy in Jr High and at church where I taught Sunday school in the '60s. 5-time college dropout. 2 yrs Army artillery. Just couldn't stay away from metal, and did small engine and m'cycle repair on the side while working production at GM and during years in the trade. Raised one son that lost his Mom at 14 mos, is currently a project manager (BEE, MBA) for a large engineering firm.
Have a small machine shop now and haven't been paid for a job in years, if I could help it.
Tractors have replaced the motorbike, boating, and computer hobbies, but remnants of all clutter my bachelor digs. (widower of 35 yrs, .. she could not be replaced) Still shooting and reloading when not improving my wildlife refuge (duck, goose nesting). Also, still trapping to protect wildlife around pond and toys in the barn.
LD1
Epic Contributor
Was your plant always a M-F 3-shift operation?
I too started about 2 years before the buyout. March 2006. IIRC the buyout was Aug 08, And I was laid off March 09.
The reason I was hired is in 2006 weyerhaeuser was expanding to 24/7 and needed to fill the 4th shift. So about 50 people were hired. 3 years later, when cutting out the 4th shift, ~50 people were let go.
If I was hired to fill a void in the 3-shift, and that plant never went to 4 shift, I would likely have been there, cause there wouldnt have been a reason to lay-off so many.
Mt Vernon isnt a large city by any stretch. But quite a bit of MFG facilities for its size. Weyerhaeuser used to be one of the best places to work there. Benefits and pay were above most other similar jobs in the area.
You guys work alot of 6-day weeks though the summer there too?
2LaneCruzer
Super Member
Dutch445
Elite Member
so many started as paper boys! yup, did that.
had a wide variety of jobs while younger, from factory work to
machinist/mechanical repair, to auto, insurance, and now equipment sales.
been selling green turf and small ag equipment for 16 years now.
had a wide variety of jobs while younger, from factory work to
machinist/mechanical repair, to auto, insurance, and now equipment sales.
been selling green turf and small ag equipment for 16 years now.
RetiredCarGuy
Silver Member
- Joined
- May 2, 2014
- Messages
- 116
- Location
- New York State
- Tractor
- John Deere X575 4X4 and GT235 6 speed, plus an old Allis Chalmers
Thanks!
