The Hardest Job I Ever Worked... Yours?

[Harry]

It was the hot, dusty summer of 1988. I don't know if it was especially hot or if my new job as a brick laborer just made it feel that way.

Sunglasses, shorts, Herman Survivor boots and a consistent sunburn were the extent of my work "uniform."

Although I wore gloves most of the time, my knuckles always seemed to be scraped from the materials all around. My knees even less fortunate than my hands...

As a brick laborer you soon learn that the only benefit of the steady flow of dust on a construction site is the fact that it seems to help blood to coagulate.

My boss referred to the tool that I used to pick up the rows of twelve bricks as the "Claw." It was my new best friend and trusty sidekick.

Mine was by far the toughest job offered. 9am I would pull on my gloves, grab the Claw, and head over to the hundreds of bricks piled in a huge square on old pallets.

If the stack was new I'd have to use industrial strength scissors to cut the steel band used to secure it during transport.

Then I'd position the Claw over top of the row and lift, squeezing the stack and allowing me to lift it up.

If you were careless and didn't get a firm enough grip, the bricks would slip out and land on your knee or maybe your toes. But you only make that mistake once.... OK, twice.

Since I was providing the bricks for two and sometimes three veteran bricklayers, I had to *hustle*. Those guys were fast!

I'd jog to the ladder and then run up to the top of the scaffolding as fast as I could, banging the jagged cargo against the side of my left knee as I ascended. After awhile I hardly even felt the pain.

In my haste I would inevitably slip as the smooth bottoms of the arch of my boots would cause either of my feet to slip through the rungs of the ladder.

When I had finally reached the top, there was no time to rest. I would heave the bricks onto the platform at the tradesmen feet and then rush to get another load.

The workmen were waiting...

I remember even the Spanish guys who worked hard mixing cement would look at me sympathetically as I double-timed it up and down that ladder.

I was strong so at one point I decided that I'd try to save time by using *two* Claws to carry two loads of bricks up the scaffolding.

I would attempt to hold onto the sides of the ladder using the insides of my arms and in desperate moments, I'd even use my chin. But of course I would fall.

Eight hours a day. Five days a week I did this. With a thirty minute lunch break. For the whole summer.... I was paid $3.50 an hour.

Enough scratch, however, to buy a few cases of Milwaukee's Best and party it up over the weekend with my friends in preparation for Monday morning.  

[wncbmw]

Mine was forest fire fighting out west. Long days, hot weather, breathing smoke, lousy food, steep and rocky slopes and of course, the fire!

[Harry]

Forest fire fighting. You win, bro!

I hope at least the pay was decent...?

[owldaddy]

Mine was as a boiler tech in the USN. The coolest place in the "Fireroom" was in front of the escape trunk door where we pulled fresh air in. So if you happened to be on a warm part of the planet, that was as cool as you could hope to get. It was so bad down there, that the Captain would send crew members down to work there as a form of punishment. The hot spots were well over 150 degrees, and could only be tolerated for a few minutes. We burned black oil, had soot and oil everywhere. One couldn't walk down the ladder and still be clean when they reached the bottom. I was a slim 130 pounds in those days.......... not an ounce of fat. It was also very hazardous, I had a boiler "puff" (read explode) and several feed pumps try to kill me (Blow head gaskets at 3000psi, temp was 260 degrees). If the steam leaks, or faulty equipment didn't kill you, then maybe someday asbestosis would. Oh, and the Viet Cong tried their best to get in on the act also. Even though it was tough, and the ship was falling apart in 1972, I loved her. It was a sad day when I found out that she was sent to the bottom during a weapons test, she was a target, and the test was successful, she sets in 2000 fathoms off the coast of California now. She was my home, job, and life for 3 years. The longest 3 years of my life, and without a doubt the hardest.
Don

[iowabeakster]

I've done some nasty jobs, like cleaning boilers, tarring wharehouse roofs in the summer (etc).... for minimal wages.

I may have bitched and whined at the time, but I was clueless.

Starting a small business with no money and no financial assistance is my BIG WINNER for hard jobs. (somebody shoot us)

[wncbmw]

I hope at least the pay was decent...?

Of course not! But I was young and strong and enjoyed the excitement!

I think the boiler room job Owldaddy describes is worse!

[MikeCam]

Raising three daughters?

No pay. High reward.

[garylspolar]

I worked for a company that made heat resistant gloves and mittens. After the gloves were cut and stitched, they were inside out. It was my job to turn them right-side out.

I spent 8 1/2 hours each day, with a phallic silver rod in front of me. I popped the fingers and thumbs out repeatedly, using one hand, up and down that rod all day. Come quittin' time, I was too tired to... well... you know.

Not the toughest job, but certainly one that sucked.

[owldaddy]

I have to add to my last post, that had I not gone through those 4 years as a BT, I never would have qualified for the easiest job I ever had. The Navy gave me the training I needed to become a Supervisor with Plant Engineering at what used to be the coolest place on the planet to work. I will close out that career in Oct. with 31 years of service. I regret nothing about the 3 years I spent abord the USS Hull DD-945, may she rest in peace.
Don

[Harry]

These are some great (and brutal) job histories. I'd like your guy's permission to post them onto my site as well?

[Just-Beeming]

I used to de-beak chickens with a hot knife for 12 hours at a time in a dark dusty (stinky) chicken house...of 12,000 birds.
Does that count as a dirty job?

Hey, I still have a pair of Herman Survivors. They are still excellent boots. I have had them since 1977. I rode in them for a few years.

Just Beeming

The job that was hardest on my body was stringing pole beans....I did that when I was about 17. All day long you reach high for the string, pull it down to the young plant, wrap it 2 times then reach back up again....ALL DAY Long....I could not walk for days.

[rdsmith3]

Raising three daughters?

No pay. High reward.

You beat me to it.

I was thinking that my most difficult jobs have been:

parent

husband


The relative rank depends on what day it is.

[jas]

Although fight fire (Wildland fire) for the past fifteen years was somewhat tough, tiring and dirty, it has also been very gratifying and enjoyable. Who else will pay you to travel throughout the US and Canada (along w/ Australia & Puerto Rico). And then you can spend your winters in places like Manhattan climbing trees in Central Park looking for invasive beetles.

I must say the toughest job I have ever done is string barbed wire for miles in below 0 degree temps (F) throughout the Great Basin.

[DJ Downunder]

This thread has me thinking Python.... ...."The Four Yorkshiremen"

Watch it here...warning...Too funny... http://www.metacafe.com/watch/87609/four_yorkshiremen/

DJ

SECOND YORKSHIREMAN:
We were evicted from our 'ole in the ground; we 'ad to go and live in a lake.
THIRD YORKSHIREMAN:
You were lucky to have a lake! There were a hundred and fifty of us living in t' shoebox in t' middle o' road.
FIRST YORKSHIREMAN:
Cardboard box?
THIRD YORKSHIREMAN:
Aye.
FIRST YORKSHIREMAN:
You were lucky. We lived for three months in a paper bag in a septic tank. We used to have to get up at six in the morning, clean the paper bag, eat a crust of stale bread, go to work down t' mill, fourteen hours a day, week-in week-out, for sixpence a week, and when we got home our Dad would thrash us to sleep wi' his belt.
SECOND YORKSHIREMAN:
Luxury. We used to have to get out of the lake at six o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of 'ot gravel, work twenty hour day at mill for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would thrash us to sleep with a broken bottle, if we were lucky!
THIRD YORKSHIREMAN:
Well, of course, we had it tough. We used to 'ave to get up out of shoebox at twelve o'clock at night and lick road clean wit' tongue. We had two bits of cold gravel, worked twenty-four hours a day at mill for sixpence every four years, and when we got home our Dad would slice us in two wit' bread knife

[MikeCam]

I got nothin' to compare to you folks...

I do have a deep respect for each of the jobs you have described.

My ranking so far:

de-beaking chickens has to be the worst

bricklayers' helper second place (very good description...I felt the effort)

stringing beans? I can't imagine!

But Vann, forest fire fighter, really, that's adventure!

[TonyT607]

Eight hours a day. Five days a week I did this. With a thirty minute lunch break. For the whole summer.... I was paid $3.50 an hour....

Wow Harry, that brought back memories..I was a union laborer in NYC during college 1979 - 83. I did much of the same thing as you and also did cement mixing, scaffolding, rigging, etc...but damn ! $3.50 ?? I was getting about $11/hr plus OT during my last summer..I really loved the high altitude work. It was so quiet 300 feet up in the air. The roughest I ever had it was one year I was working during winter break, we were putting up the Harmon Cove Towers in Secaucus, NJ. The developer wanted to go all winter so we had to use heaters to keep the bricklayers and the mortar from freezing. We would encase each floor in plastic sheeting as a crude insulator and then bring in the salamander heaters. Above 20 floors it was so cold and windy we had to work laying on our stomachs as we rigged the sheeting to keep from getting blown off the building. We were tethered, but it was still scary as hell. Absolutely the coldest I've ever been.

If you're a "Sopranos" fan, these two towers are in the opening credits as Tony S drives on the NJ Turnpike.

Thanks for the memories !

[wncbmw]

Sounds like jas has me beat on the firefighting! I only did it part time and not for too many years. But as the Navy says, it was an adventure, not at job!

If I had daughters instead of sons, I probably would be doing 15-20 years for manslaughter after watching some horny teenage boy sniff around my girl! You guys raising the girls have all my respect!

[GypsyRR]

Yep, I deleted my post - Decided I better not share those stories

[Harry]

You've got it, Tony: $3.50 an hour:-(( Apparently that was all you had to pay a 17 year old non-union kid back in the late 80's...

But I don't envy your high up, cold temp work. Way too dangerous.

It makes me think that I was lucky to be sweating b%##s relatively low to the ground.

One of the bricklayers used to tell me almost every day: get an education, man. Cuz' this is no way to make a living...

The other guys seemed to like what they were doing OK though.

[OU812]

1973, as a 14 year old. Taking up hay as they put it. Hot, and itchy! $1.40 per hour. But I did have my first beer after a Saturday's worth. Hamm's in the little keg can!