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I don’t know when it started, but as far back as I can remember (and even further back than that), I was looking for ways to make money. It was important to me to have money of my own that I had earned. I got an allowance, but it was small (50 cents a week) and I had to earn it by doing my chores. That’s how I was raised: there were no handouts; you got what you earned.
Perhaps one of my less inspired methods of earning cash was with a lemonade stand. I started out with the traditional card table and folding chair, but when I saw an advertisement for a free Funny Face Drink Stand that I could send away for, I was on a mission to get one. They required 20 Pillsbury box tops and a form that you fill out and send in. If I waited until I actually had the required number of box tops, the summer would have been over and I would have missed my chance. So, always the problem solver, I found five Pillsbury products in our cupboards, tore four flaps off of each one (leaving some pretty messy boxes), put them in an envelope with the form, and mailed it all in. Amazingly, within a short period of time, a huge box was delivered to our house containing the ready-to-assemble drink stand like the one pictured here. With the help of my dad, I had it assembled and ready for business in no time. Since we lived on a cul-de-sac, I’m not really sure who I thought my customers would be, but I sure put the hard sell on anyone who stepped outside of their house or arrived in front of our house. I felt so professional behind my Funny Face stand.
That’s the part of the story I remember. What I don’t remember is this specific incident told to me by my mom: one Saturday, my Uncle Hoppe stopped by while I was selling lemonade. Always the sweet guy, he came over to buy a cup of lemonade from me. As he held the little Dixie cup and I poured from a heavy pitcher, an ice cube slipped out of the pitcher and plopped into the cup. He started to raise the cup to his lips, but I reached up and grabbed it from him before he could drink. I stuck my grubby little fingers in the cup, retrieving the ice cube and exclaiming, “You only paid 10 cents! Ice cubes are extra!”
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