Growing Up, My Short Summer

The summer of June of 1969 held the promise of long languid days spent sunning one’s self at our recently acquired built-in pool. We’d moved into the neighborhood the previous Labor Day. As long as my minimal chores, mowing the lawn, cleaning the pool, and trimming the bushes, were done I was going to be golden for most of the summer. The only thing I really had to be concerned with was early football practice in August, and that was nearly two months off. School had let out on Wednesday, Thursday it had stormed and rained all day, Friday looked like a great day to start in on my tan.

I’d turned 15 the previous November and I was in limbo. I was not old enough to drive, and our new house was in a fairly remote part of DuPage County. I was going to be stuck at the house all summer. We lived on an acre of property in unincorporated Addison. Even being stuck didn’t look to be that bad, if I got bored with swimming (not likely), I could fish, the headwaters of the east branch of the DuPage river formed about a block from my house.

Besides fishing there was always reading, I could always catch up on the John D. McDonald Travis McGee series.

Only one other thing could make it better, I’d be able to occasionally ride with the old man on Fridays to deliver checks. My dad managed a steel-setting outfit in Chicago. Per union agreement, all weekly checks were due in the ironworker’s hands by end of business Fridays. It was expected that my dad and his partner/stepbrother would visit all of their jobs around the Chicago area to distribute checks to their various foremen so that they could hand them out by the end of the day. From the time I was 12 whenever I had a break from school, I was welcome to ride with him.

I was gladly willing to forgo the swimming, the fishing, even the McDonald novels for a chance to tool around with the old man in his boat of a Buick Electra to visit job sites and eat greasy hamburgers at one of the bars he knew around the city. Over dinner Thursday night my dad told me to get to bed early, we’d have to get downtown by 6 the next day so we’d have to be up by 5. My dad usually feigned shock and concern that as a growing teenager I was constantly eating. That night I thought it funny that he didn’t accost me with his usual chiding for taking thirds at dinner. I felt great, tomorrow I was going to be able to ride with the old man.

Before I knew it my alarm was going off the next morning and my dad was knocking on my door telling me to get my ass out of bed. Sometime during the night he or my mother had slipped a worn pair of his old boots into my room, I also found my worst pair of jeans slung over my desk chair. Thinking nothing of it I threw the clothes on and went downstairs. Mom had made breakfast. Eggs, bacon, toast I had to wonder what the occasion was, she seldom got up that early. But not being one to look a gift horse in the mouth I chowed down.

The trip downtown was uneventful, there was the usual small talk, was I looking forward to starting defense next fall, what were my plans for the summer, and were there any girls I was interested in? I was reminded that it was my job to mow the lawn and vacuum the pool over the weekend.

In 1969 the Eisenhower or Ike as it was commonly called was relatively new having been finished only 16 years before. Driving in dad had some choice words to say about the bottleneck at Hillside where on-ramps and merging caused a traffic jam. He also shook his head and derided the further bottleneck and confusion at Oak Park where the off-ramps at Austen and Harlem exited to the left instead of the more common sense right. For the umpteenth time, he described to me all the gravesites that had been removed from just south of the Ike to make room for the expressway.

Because of the bottlenecks on the Ike and congestion on the side streets we arrived at his first stop at about 6:00.

Most construction sites in the city have limited room. There is never enough room to park. When we arrived at the job we found just enough room to squeeze onto the site between the rebar delivery truck and the superintendent’s shanty. After he pulled on the job and parked dad retrieved two hard hats for us a new pair of gloves and a pair of linemen’s pliers from the trunk of the car. He then went over to the superintendent’s shack. He and the super stood outside the shack for a minute and talked. My dad handed him his keys in case his car needed to be moved, they looked over at me and laughed.

We stepped into the service elevator which ran up the 14^th floor. Construction site elevators have an inside dimension of about 12x20, and do not run on cables, they have a geared motor on a track. Material elevators are temporarily attached to the outside of the building. They have sides built of open grating, have a metal floor, and are large enough to handle 10 men plus several full sheets of plywood, a couple boxes of bolts, boxes of tie wire, brooms, concrete finisher’s tools, along with varied and miscellaneous things. They also rattle and shake quite a bit.

As usual, when we got to the top of the track we were still two floors from the actual construction. The material elevator normally doesn’t go all the way to the top. It stops two floors down. It gets extended as the concrete of the floors dries and cures allowing new sections to be added and bolted onto the floors. We had to climb two flights of stairs and a ladder to the deck that was to be poured in a day or two.

When we arrived on the deck my dad’s crew was already set up for the steel that had just arrived by truck. My dad walked over to the ironworker foreman Eddie Challenger shook hands with him and handed him the week’s checks. They both looked over at me and laughed. My dad waved me over.

Handing me the brand new pair of gloves and a used pair of linemen’s pliers he’d brought along he asked, “Jeff, would you do me a favor and help Eddie’s kid sling those bar joists and send them over the side?”

So I helped Eddie Jr. gather up the twenty or so joists that had been spread around the deck to keep the plywood decking from blowing off in the storm the night before. I received a very quick tutorial on the proper way to sling the joists, proper usage of hand signals, and how to properly balance the load so it was easy to land from Eddie Jr. Using chokers or cable nooses with eyelets on both end we hooked them up to the cable from the tower crane and sent them down to street level. Despite being one of the easier jobs on the deck because the tower crane did most of the work when we finished I was soaked with sweat. The humidity was rising, the sun was getting warmer.  I was ready to get off the deck and back into the old man’s air-conditioned car.

I looked around, I must have looked confused and anxious because Mr. Challenger walked over and asked what was wrong.

“Where’s my dad?” I asked.

He wrapped his arm around my shoulder, walked me over to the side of the building, and told me to look down. What I saw was disorienting and disconcerting I watched as my dad’s red Electra deuce and a quarter drove off the job site.

“Kid, you see your old man’s car? He’ll be back about three. Do what I tell you to do when I tell you to do it, do it quickly and we’ll get along fine. You’re mine for the rest of the summer.”  He said with a smile.

Now, we’d talked about my eventually working for him, we’d even talked about what the work entailed. But, there had been no mention of my starting this summer. What about swimming? Fishing? Hell, when was I going to be able to read the Travis McGee series? I felt like crying for the first time in a very long time.

My next six and a half hours were a comedy of errors. Because of the rain the previous day the deck was slippery. To keep the plywood from sticking to the concrete it is liberally oiled with a foul smelling substance known as form oil. Because of the rain from night before and the oil I slipped a lot and fell down more than once over the next few hours.

    Though I’d seen them most of my life I didn’t know how a #4 rebar differed from #5 rebar. A concrete floor gains its strength and rigidity from the iron or steel that is latticed throughout it. The most commonly used steel or bars used on a residential building’s floor are # 4’s and #5’s. They are measured by one of three ways, length, diameter and weight. The difference between a #4 and a #5 being is approximately 2/3 of a pound per foot length. Different bars are used in different sections of the floor depending on the stress expected or the weight that the floor or wall is expected to bear.  A #4 would weigh about ¾ of a pound and a #5 ¾ of a pound more. You start adding the length of the bar and number of bars to the mix the weight can add up quickly. I also didn’t know how to read the manufacturer’s tags on the steel but in reality, it didn’t really matter because once a bundle of bars is opened the tags usually disappear anyway.

I had no idea what a chair was, what a bolster looked like. Steel can not touch the plywood deck or it would be exposed to both the elements or be unsightly sticking out. Chairs are made of heavy wire with nylon or plastic feet and are usually about two or three inches tall. The steel bars rest the chairs and bolsters. They offer just enough distance for the steel not to be exposed to the elements or to be seen through the concrete. Bolsters are the same but set up with a wire running along the top tying numerous feet together. I frequently got the two confused and grabbed the wrong item.

 I didn’t move fast enough. I messed up the coffee order when I was sent down to get coffee for the crew. Instructions for which bar, which bolsters is needed in what area are written on the deck with grease crayons. I was given little info as to how to read the instructions. I struggled to read the deck where that obnoxious, loud-mouthed, cigar-smoking, ginger of an Irish…….er, I mean Mr. Challenger had written the instructions for the crew to lay out the steel.

The crew, the guys who’d been on the job since it came out of the ground 4 months earlier yelled at me for moving too slow, tripping over my own feet, asking stupid questions, and for always being in the way.

I was yelled at, “You sure you’re Dick’s kid? Naw, you can’t be his kid, he’s the best ironworker I know. I think your mom has some explaining to do. I can’t believe you’re his kid.”

“Your dad said you’d be in shape. He’s always bragging you’re an athlete. Damn, look at you, you’re sweating like a pig. I’ve never known your dad to lie before. ”

“Hey College.”  College? The Hell? I’m still in high school, “What the Hell are you doing out here? You’re gonna get your pretty hands all tore up.”

“Hey kid, a work crew is only as strong as its weakest link. Do us a favor will you? Stay in school, you really stink at real work.”  

Yet another crew member called over to me and asked, “Are you sure this is what you wanna do when you grow up? Stick with school, your hands really will look nicer.”

Just about the time I felt I was either going to fall on my face or take a swing at someone Mr. Challenger called me over and slipped me a twenty.

“I want you to go downstairs. Run across Rush to the liquor store and pick up three six-packs of Old Style. Get a can of Coke for yourself. Hurry, get back here in under 15 minutes”

“Mr. Challenger, I’m 15, I can’t buy beer.”

“Damn it, kid. Why you gotta to argue with me? As big, as dirty, and as ugly as you are no one is going to question you. Just do it. Make sure you get back here in 15 minutes”

When I got to the store I tried my best not to look 15. I grabbed the beer out of the fridge and put it along with the twenty and a can of Coke on the counter. Remarkably the cashier barely looked away from the Cubs game on the portable TV behind the counter. I gathered up the change made a hasty retreat across Rush and back to the deck. The round trip had taken me just over twenty minutes. So much for getting back on deck in less than 15 minutes

The crew was just finishing up when I arrived on deck. We were ready for the pour on Monday. Mr. Challenger called the crew over. I got jostled out of the way as everyone grabbed a beer. I stood to one side looking off the building trying to stand upright. I felt a tap on my shoulder, it was Mr. Challenger. He handed me a beer.  

“Drink up kid, you’re part of the crew,” he said.

     I’d just pulled the ring off the can and was about to take a sip when I heard him.

   “What the Hell you doing punk? You’re 15.” the Old Man had arrived.

  I handed him the beer, I started to reach for the Coke. My dad looked at Mr. Challenger and Challenger nodded.

 “Go ahead punk, take a beer.” My dad said. “A cold one tastes good after working hard.”

So there I was, at 3:00 on a hot sweltering afternoon, covered in rust, dust, sweat, and form oil drinking a beer with the old man. Despite barely being able to stand I felt 10 foot tall. As we stood there the old man nudged me and told me he didn’t want to hear any of my newly acquired vocabulary at home, especially around my mother. He also told me that as soon as I got in the door he expected me to brush my teeth.

 I ended up sleeping the whole way home.