WEBVTT - Dennis Peterson: Makin' Do

0:00:10.119 --> 0:00:14.040
<v Speaker 1>And we returned to our American stories. Up next the

0:00:14.120 --> 0:00:17.960
<v Speaker 1>story from our regular contributor Dennis Peterson. Today, Dennis shares

0:00:18.000 --> 0:00:20.840
<v Speaker 1>with us the story of something his father did called

0:00:21.320 --> 0:00:27.400
<v Speaker 1>make him do. Here's Dennis.

0:00:29.840 --> 0:00:32.720
<v Speaker 2>It surely had something to do with his having grown

0:00:32.800 --> 0:00:36.000
<v Speaker 2>up on a farm and during the Great Depression. But

0:00:36.080 --> 0:00:40.720
<v Speaker 2>Daddy expressed few desires for things, and he seldom made

0:00:40.720 --> 0:00:45.159
<v Speaker 2>impulse purchases. He bought only what he needed. If he

0:00:45.280 --> 0:00:48.800
<v Speaker 2>needed it but couldn't buy it, he made it or

0:00:48.880 --> 0:00:52.520
<v Speaker 2>did without. He was always looking for the better deal

0:00:52.720 --> 0:00:59.960
<v Speaker 2>on what few things he did buy. Daddy hated death.

0:01:00.800 --> 0:01:03.400
<v Speaker 2>He had built his own house on his own land.

0:01:04.080 --> 0:01:06.880
<v Speaker 2>The only debt he incurred was for the drilling of

0:01:06.920 --> 0:01:10.240
<v Speaker 2>a well on his property, something that he was unable

0:01:10.280 --> 0:01:14.240
<v Speaker 2>to do himself. He paid his brother in law, my

0:01:14.360 --> 0:01:17.600
<v Speaker 2>uncle Dylan, ten dollars a month until the total was

0:01:17.640 --> 0:01:22.559
<v Speaker 2>paid off, and he never owed anyone a dime after that. Rather,

0:01:22.880 --> 0:01:27.840
<v Speaker 2>Daddy saved money. Actually it was probably mother who saved it,

0:01:28.200 --> 0:01:32.360
<v Speaker 2>but Daddy certainly was behind her efforts, never fighting against

0:01:32.360 --> 0:01:37.960
<v Speaker 2>her on it. I recall that every time the Knoxville

0:01:38.040 --> 0:01:41.880
<v Speaker 2>News Sentinel raised its subscription rate, Daddy threatened to stop

0:01:41.920 --> 0:01:45.520
<v Speaker 2>the paper, But Mother always found some way to trim

0:01:45.560 --> 0:01:49.280
<v Speaker 2>the household budget, usually through getting better buys on her

0:01:49.320 --> 0:01:53.280
<v Speaker 2>grocery purchases, and saved enough to pay the higher rate

0:01:53.360 --> 0:01:57.000
<v Speaker 2>and keep getting the paper for years. Home delivery of

0:01:57.040 --> 0:02:00.400
<v Speaker 2>the seven day subscription was only fifty cents a week.

0:02:00.920 --> 0:02:04.640
<v Speaker 2>But if Daddy needed something, he saved for it, not

0:02:04.840 --> 0:02:07.919
<v Speaker 2>making the purchase until he had the cash in hand

0:02:08.160 --> 0:02:10.800
<v Speaker 2>to pay for it. That's what he did when buying

0:02:10.840 --> 0:02:14.359
<v Speaker 2>a car or a truck. He saved and saved over

0:02:14.440 --> 0:02:18.240
<v Speaker 2>a long time. Then when he was approaching the amount

0:02:18.320 --> 0:02:21.520
<v Speaker 2>needed for the purchase, he began shopping around for the

0:02:21.560 --> 0:02:25.320
<v Speaker 2>best deal. When he thought he had located the vehicle

0:02:25.400 --> 0:02:29.040
<v Speaker 2>he wanted, he sat down with the salesman and stated

0:02:29.120 --> 0:02:33.600
<v Speaker 2>his terms ninety days same as cash. If the dealer

0:02:33.639 --> 0:02:37.640
<v Speaker 2>wouldn't accept those simple terms, Daddy simply got up and

0:02:37.760 --> 0:02:41.440
<v Speaker 2>walked out. That's how he bought every car and truck

0:02:41.520 --> 0:02:44.880
<v Speaker 2>he ever owned. Daddy was not tempted to exceed the

0:02:44.919 --> 0:02:48.280
<v Speaker 2>top amount he had determined to spend by any dealer

0:02:48.320 --> 0:02:53.120
<v Speaker 2>add ons, options, or extra features or enticements. He wanted

0:02:53.160 --> 0:02:57.440
<v Speaker 2>no luxury features, no radio or air conditioning. When those

0:02:57.480 --> 0:03:01.560
<v Speaker 2>features were optional, he did at them when they became standard.

0:03:02.639 --> 0:03:06.880
<v Speaker 2>His trucks never had radios. They were work trucks. No

0:03:07.040 --> 0:03:11.519
<v Speaker 2>wide white sidewalls if it was extra, no fancy hubcaps

0:03:11.560 --> 0:03:15.680
<v Speaker 2>or wheels, no more chrome than was standard. And those

0:03:15.760 --> 0:03:18.320
<v Speaker 2>were the days before most of the cars were made

0:03:18.360 --> 0:03:25.840
<v Speaker 2>of plastic. That he saved more than money. Though he

0:03:26.000 --> 0:03:30.520
<v Speaker 2>seldom threw anything away. We might need it someday, he

0:03:30.560 --> 0:03:33.240
<v Speaker 2>would offer as a reason for hanging on to something

0:03:33.880 --> 0:03:36.360
<v Speaker 2>many a time when I had nothing to do, when

0:03:36.360 --> 0:03:39.000
<v Speaker 2>I went to work with him, or on rainy or

0:03:39.040 --> 0:03:42.000
<v Speaker 2>cold days when we could not work, he had me

0:03:42.160 --> 0:03:45.360
<v Speaker 2>pull nails from scaffold boards that had been nailed together.

0:03:46.640 --> 0:03:49.880
<v Speaker 2>After I removed them, he instructed me to straighten them

0:03:49.920 --> 0:03:52.920
<v Speaker 2>and store them in a large coffee can or jelly

0:03:53.000 --> 0:03:56.480
<v Speaker 2>jar or old wooden box. He might need to reuse

0:03:56.560 --> 0:03:59.760
<v Speaker 2>them later. He also had a similar collection of old

0:03:59.760 --> 0:04:03.880
<v Speaker 2>as or died sizes of screws, bolts, nuts, washers, and

0:04:03.960 --> 0:04:07.320
<v Speaker 2>rubber gaskets. Then when a need arose for one of

0:04:07.360 --> 0:04:11.200
<v Speaker 2>those items, it would be available. He wouldn't have to

0:04:11.280 --> 0:04:14.800
<v Speaker 2>run to the hardware store to buy one. He would, however,

0:04:15.080 --> 0:04:18.599
<v Speaker 2>spend an hour or so searching through endless cans and

0:04:18.640 --> 0:04:22.000
<v Speaker 2>boxes and other kinds of containers until he found the

0:04:22.080 --> 0:04:25.520
<v Speaker 2>right item for his current need. This was all part

0:04:25.560 --> 0:04:31.359
<v Speaker 2>of what he called making do. But to make do,

0:04:32.000 --> 0:04:34.640
<v Speaker 2>you had to have a ready supply of material and

0:04:34.720 --> 0:04:39.080
<v Speaker 2>tools to make do with. That's why he saved not

0:04:39.240 --> 0:04:44.159
<v Speaker 2>just money, but everything. But I was impatient. I couldn't

0:04:44.279 --> 0:04:49.479
<v Speaker 2>understand Daddy's thinking. Daddy, I sometimes tried to reason with him,

0:04:49.920 --> 0:04:52.800
<v Speaker 2>You save all these nuts and bolts and washers and

0:04:52.839 --> 0:04:56.520
<v Speaker 2>screws to save money, But then you'll spend an hour

0:04:56.600 --> 0:04:59.440
<v Speaker 2>or more hunting through the whole collection trying to find

0:04:59.480 --> 0:05:03.560
<v Speaker 2>the right wa Don't you know that time is money.

0:05:04.000 --> 0:05:07.320
<v Speaker 2>He couldn't see it that way. I'd resign myself to

0:05:07.400 --> 0:05:11.320
<v Speaker 2>his never changing. The problem was that it was often

0:05:11.560 --> 0:05:20.760
<v Speaker 2>my time too. The place where Daddy's making do concerned

0:05:20.760 --> 0:05:24.640
<v Speaker 2>me most was on the job site. He sometimes improvised

0:05:24.680 --> 0:05:28.560
<v Speaker 2>in ways that clearly were unsafe to himself, me and

0:05:28.680 --> 0:05:32.200
<v Speaker 2>other workers. For example, when I was so young that

0:05:32.279 --> 0:05:35.120
<v Speaker 2>I could carry a maximum of only three bricks at

0:05:35.120 --> 0:05:38.040
<v Speaker 2>a time, I was working with Daddy on a house

0:05:38.360 --> 0:05:41.479
<v Speaker 2>that on the upper end was one story tall, but

0:05:41.600 --> 0:05:45.640
<v Speaker 2>on the lower end was three stories. The pile of

0:05:45.800 --> 0:05:48.320
<v Speaker 2>used bricks that had been dumped on the upper end

0:05:48.720 --> 0:05:51.599
<v Speaker 2>meant that I had to transfer them as needed on

0:05:51.680 --> 0:05:54.000
<v Speaker 2>the scaffold all the way to the other end of

0:05:54.040 --> 0:05:57.719
<v Speaker 2>the house. Daddy rigged a two by ten walk board

0:05:57.839 --> 0:06:01.000
<v Speaker 2>running from the brick pile to the uppermost scaffold. I

0:06:01.160 --> 0:06:03.960
<v Speaker 2>was to carry my three bricks up that board and

0:06:04.000 --> 0:06:07.400
<v Speaker 2>along the scaffold walkway to the other end of the house.

0:06:08.080 --> 0:06:10.880
<v Speaker 2>My problem was that with both of my hands on

0:06:10.920 --> 0:06:14.080
<v Speaker 2>the bricks, I had no way of balancing myself on

0:06:14.120 --> 0:06:20.640
<v Speaker 2>the walkboard. I would fall off. Listening to my complaint,

0:06:20.960 --> 0:06:24.560
<v Speaker 2>Daddy conceded and agreed to put a handrail on one

0:06:24.600 --> 0:06:28.040
<v Speaker 2>side of the walkboard. That sounded to me like a

0:06:28.080 --> 0:06:31.279
<v Speaker 2>safer solution to the problem. But after he added the

0:06:31.400 --> 0:06:34.479
<v Speaker 2>rail and I tried it out, I discovered that the

0:06:34.600 --> 0:06:37.960
<v Speaker 2>rail made the walk space on the board even narrower,

0:06:38.760 --> 0:06:41.600
<v Speaker 2>forcing me to walk toward one side of the board.

0:06:42.160 --> 0:06:46.080
<v Speaker 2>Daddy insisted, however, that it was safe. I tried to

0:06:46.120 --> 0:06:49.400
<v Speaker 2>make it work and promptly fell off the side without

0:06:49.400 --> 0:06:56.840
<v Speaker 2>the rail and into the pile of bricks below. Daddy's

0:06:56.880 --> 0:07:00.920
<v Speaker 2>making do once just about did him in too. He

0:07:01.040 --> 0:07:03.840
<v Speaker 2>was working high on the scaffold in the gable end

0:07:03.880 --> 0:07:07.960
<v Speaker 2>of a house. He used two walkboards nailed together with

0:07:08.040 --> 0:07:11.880
<v Speaker 2>sixteen penny nails to span the central part of the scaffold.

0:07:12.600 --> 0:07:17.480
<v Speaker 2>Is that safe, I asked, with genuine concern. Of course

0:07:17.520 --> 0:07:21.360
<v Speaker 2>it's safe, he responded, sounding a bit hurt by my doubts.

0:07:21.800 --> 0:07:24.880
<v Speaker 2>I built it, didn't I. He walked across it once

0:07:25.120 --> 0:07:28.120
<v Speaker 2>and then recrossed it, bouncing up and down on it

0:07:28.160 --> 0:07:31.320
<v Speaker 2>a little to demonstrate his point. Over the course of

0:07:31.360 --> 0:07:35.000
<v Speaker 2>the day, however, his repeated walking and bouncing across the

0:07:35.040 --> 0:07:39.680
<v Speaker 2>gap caused the nails to begin working loose. Near the

0:07:39.800 --> 0:07:43.160
<v Speaker 2>end of the day, the boards suddenly separated as Daddy

0:07:43.200 --> 0:07:47.000
<v Speaker 2>walked across them and down he fell about twenty feet

0:07:47.560 --> 0:07:52.200
<v Speaker 2>into a wheelbarrow of freshly mixed mortar. Other than a

0:07:52.280 --> 0:07:56.560
<v Speaker 2>skinned shin and a bruised ego. He was uninjured, but

0:07:56.680 --> 0:07:59.320
<v Speaker 2>what would have been the result of that fall had

0:07:59.360 --> 0:08:02.720
<v Speaker 2>that barrel of mortar not been there to cushion the fall.

0:08:05.120 --> 0:08:09.040
<v Speaker 2>On another occasion, when Daddy made do, he nearly burned

0:08:09.040 --> 0:08:12.960
<v Speaker 2>our house down. We had been having some trouble with

0:08:13.040 --> 0:08:15.560
<v Speaker 2>our water heater, not being able to meet the demands

0:08:15.600 --> 0:08:19.600
<v Speaker 2>of a family of six. One Saturday, we asked Daddy

0:08:19.680 --> 0:08:21.680
<v Speaker 2>to look at it and see what the problem was.

0:08:22.880 --> 0:08:26.640
<v Speaker 2>Upon examining it, he determined that one element had burned out,

0:08:27.120 --> 0:08:29.160
<v Speaker 2>but he thought that he could jury rig it so

0:08:29.320 --> 0:08:33.479
<v Speaker 2>that it would still produce heat. I don't understand electrical

0:08:33.520 --> 0:08:37.120
<v Speaker 2>appliances enough to know exactly what he did, but I

0:08:37.160 --> 0:08:41.280
<v Speaker 2>think he somehow bypassed something and rewired some other thing

0:08:42.040 --> 0:08:47.840
<v Speaker 2>and it worked. Problem solved, or so we thought. On

0:08:47.960 --> 0:08:51.400
<v Speaker 2>Monday afternoon, we drove into the garage when we got

0:08:51.400 --> 0:08:54.640
<v Speaker 2>home from work, and for some odd reason I happened

0:08:54.679 --> 0:08:57.440
<v Speaker 2>to look toward the opposite side of the garage where

0:08:57.480 --> 0:09:01.000
<v Speaker 2>our water heater was. I saw on one side of

0:09:01.080 --> 0:09:05.600
<v Speaker 2>it blackened from bottom to top. My eyes followed the

0:09:05.640 --> 0:09:09.040
<v Speaker 2>direction of the rising soot stain to the ceiling joys.

0:09:09.679 --> 0:09:15.640
<v Speaker 2>They were charred, and the insulation between the joys was blackened. Fortunately,

0:09:16.000 --> 0:09:18.920
<v Speaker 2>the fire caused the circuit breaker to do its job,

0:09:19.360 --> 0:09:23.160
<v Speaker 2>cutting off the power and preventing further damage. That's what

0:09:23.400 --> 0:09:27.680
<v Speaker 2>can come from making do. But Daddy remained a make

0:09:27.800 --> 0:09:30.480
<v Speaker 2>do man all his life.

0:09:32.880 --> 0:09:35.840
<v Speaker 1>And a great work is always by Monty Montgomery and

0:09:35.960 --> 0:09:38.920
<v Speaker 1>a special thanks to Dennis Peterson, and you can go

0:09:38.960 --> 0:09:43.000
<v Speaker 1>to Dennis Lpeterson dot com to hear more of his stories,

0:09:43.000 --> 0:09:46.880
<v Speaker 1>the upsides and the downsides of having a making do

0:09:47.520 --> 0:09:50.320
<v Speaker 1>kind of dad or mom or anyone around you. And

0:09:50.360 --> 0:09:52.559
<v Speaker 1>I've had enough them around me in my life. And

0:09:52.640 --> 0:09:55.960
<v Speaker 1>sometimes they're a joy, and sometimes they'll kill you. The

0:09:56.000 --> 0:09:59.440
<v Speaker 1>story of Dennis Peterson's dad. So many dads around this

0:09:59.480 --> 0:10:44.920
<v Speaker 1>country like them. Here on our American Story.