Tell Us Your Work Truck Story In Honor of Labor Day

[Gorehamj]

John Goreham
Contributing Writer, GM-Trucks.com
9-5-2016

Labor Day celebrates the men and women who, by the sweat of their brow, and the skill of their hands made this country great and keep it great. Today I reflected on how trucks played a role in my life when I was a laborer. For four years I worked on a construction crew that cleared lots and constructed the landscape for new homes. We also did large projects like horse farms and had some commercial property customers. I was 18 - 22 years old and among my co-workers, I was the only one who could drive a stick aside from the owner and foreman. At the time I was working my way through the second clutch in a 1979 Toyota Supra, and I could drive a stick like ringin' a bell - in my mind.

 

Because I drive a stick, my boss put me behind the wheel of a Chevy truck. We had many trucks in the two companies at which I worked. Regular pickups, HD pickups, rack-body trucks, and many with dump bodies. My role morphed into the guy who would "go get that stuff." Whether it was stone dust and cobblestones for a walkway, bark mulch for planting beds, or railroad ties for walls, I was dispatched in the truck. That was the best job at that company. The guys left behind were digging holes, grading new topsoil and doing real work.

 

Driving those trucks made me a much better driver overall. If you can back a rack-body truck carrying two pallets of paving stones up a muddy driveway in the rain, you can back a compact car out of a parking space at the supermarket. It also taught me the importance of closing the passenger side window when I whacked the out-rigger mirror on a telephone pole one day and had the glass fly into the cab.

One client we had was a famous photographer, and she took a picture of our crew using a special Polaroid camera. It had to be in her studio, not outside. More than one of the guys on the crew said, "we have to get the trucks in the picture!" That's how the toy truck ended up in the image above. We even taped the company logo from a business card on its door.

 

During the four years I did that work, the Supra went away, and I bought my first new vehicle - a truck. I had side jobs of my own by then, and the truck made me money. After I landed a job as a junior engineer, I bid for, and got, the contract to maintain the property the pump company was located on and also some work at the large home of one of the owners of that company. Without the compact truck I owned, that moonlighting work would not have been possible. That money was very important to me back then. I had taken a pay cut when I left my job as a laborer to become a junior engineer.

 

To me, "labor" and trucks go hand in hand. What's your truck work story? We would love to hear either the short or long version in the comments below.

[barry G]

it is endless.

 

I was a crew chief in the air force, sometimes third shift. The trucks had nicknames being so close to life and death.

Bouncing LOX carts, or a generator running..

3 of us at a time in Brd dog, with the radio to the tower, telling the kc10 where to park.

 

Construction was a job I had for sometime. always the bosses trucks. We used to freight an IDI 7.3 to the point where the f350 four door was a bouncing trampoline. Stick shift, he had me drive all the time. I was taught in a IH cabover when I was 11. We could feel the rails change. That truck nearly killed 3 of us in a slow motion accident. it looked like a 100mph into a brick wall. The whole front end bent up beyond the top of the cab. Diesel sitting on the ground. We may have weighed 10k or so.

 

there is humble things with trucks too. I recently helped a disabled couple moving on a deadline. No cost. The woman crying was enough. 1000-1500# at a time in my half ton. No trailer was available. Just kept going round trips to storage. Getting things for my father is a joy, he has been trucking for 40 years. He always has something to say about hauling things. I go get lumber and whatever he wants.

[CommDiver]

[CommDiver]

I'm new at posting things.My pics tell it all,laying pipe,concrete sonotubes and flooring down, in Mississippi with my Blue 2003 HD 2500 which I just sold. Same tool boxes/rack,new truck,2016 HD 2500 LTZ Z71 8' ft. Ones before that were 1998 3/4 ton and an 1988.All brand new...... Chevys been working good for me my whole life. Hope the same for you!