Legacy

This is a synopsis of the life of George Wulfort.  George was born to Christopher and Carolyn Wulfort in 1902 in the small rural Kansas town of Everest. His parents had come over as immigrants from Germany.  His mother did not like it here and divorced his father to return to Germany.

His father remarried a woman named Nellie.  She did not want George underfoot, so his father reluctantly sent him to live with a farmer only four miles away.  They maintained good contact as George’s father was also the local Postmaster and rural carrier.

George only finished the eight grade, but did well and was quite literate.  It was on the farm from about age 9 on that he self taught himself to work on farm equipment; he had a tremendous mechanical aptitude. He read all he could about mechanics.

At age twenty one he met and married Rosie Kersner. By that time his ability to work on farm equipment had become widespread common knowledge.  He rented a sizable truck garage and went into business for himself specializing in repairing farm equipment.  The business went well as far as having lots of customers go.  But financially it wasn’t doing well.  So he decided he had no choice but to go out of business.

The numerous farmers in the area were very distressed over his decision and begged him to reconsider.  They even formed a committee to try and induce him to stay.  He would have liked to as he liked them as well as they liked him, but he could not.  He explained to that committee that he had to make a living.  While he could always use some chickens, eggs and potatoes, those didn’t make his house payments nor pay the wholesalers for the parts he put in their equipment.  That required cash not farm products.  He knew times were tough for all, but his first duty was to wife and self.

From there he moved to Horton, Kansas a large place compared to Everest.  Horton had a population of about eight thousand compared to Everest’s fifteen hundred.  In Horton he went to work for an auto dealer as an auto mechanic.  He was good with autos also.

There was a rich banker in town by the name of   Phineas B. Worthington.  Phineas drove a high end Packard, an expensive car for the year 1936.  That beautiful car drove like a dream but it was driving Phineas nuts.  It had a most annoying rattle.  Phineas had apparently been to ten or twelve auto repair places even some in another nearby town.

No one it seems could fix the rattle.  Phineas kept trying, hoping by some miracle someone would eventually. Then he tried George.  George found and fixed the rattle. When Phineas came to pick up the car he was mighty happy.  He asked George where it had been.  George with a sheepish grin, almost embarrassed to say how simple it was, told him someone at the factory as they were putting this car together left a pair of pliers inside the door.  I removed them thus ending the rattle.

Phineas was so pleased that in addition to paying the dealership George worked for the labor bill of six dollars, he slipped George a ten dollar tip on his way out.  Ten dollars was a good hunk of change in those days.  Phineas however was more than a little irritated with the Packard Company.  He using his influence talked to the local newspaper about it, and George became a bit of a local celebrity.

From that day on as long as he worked for that dealership he had to endure the nick name of Rattle Trap.  All in fun of course.

Even though it was in the late 1930’s and the bulk of the depression was past, money was still scarce and times got a bit tough.  Business was down at the dealership and they had to lay George off.

That left George in a bit of a pickle, as he and Rosie had adopted a son only four years previous.  George had two mouths to feed.  George borrowed fifteen dollars from his father-in-law back in Huron, Kansas.  He used that money to move to the capital of Kansas, Topeka.  A city of abut seventy thousand at that time.

He had no idea what opportunities if any he’d find in Topeka.  For a few months he worked at the Martin tractor company as a mechanic on work relief, a federal program at the time.  A whopping fifty cents a day. Rough, it was a stretch.

He saw an add in the paper for an opening for a auto mechanic at the State Highway Commissions, First Division.  It was a civil service position.  George applied for it along with two hundred and ten other well qualified mechanics.  World War II hadn’t quite started yet and work was scarcer than hen’s teeth.

The man in charge of interviewing herded everyone into a large room.  He got up and said, I know you would all like the position.  It’s unlikely we will interview all of you.  I will now ask a question that will set the criteria for getting an interview. The question was.

How many of you have your own tools? Raise your hands.  Only one hand went up, it was Georges. George got the job, no completion at all.  The only reason George had his own tools was that he’d been in business for himself at one point.  The state did not provide its mechanics with tools.

George was so happy; it paid a starting salary of two hundred and thirty seven dollars per month.  That amount to a person of lean means in those days was almost like winning the lottery, at least made one feel as good as if they had.

Fate and the good Lord intervene in many things.  It was two weeks later before George had got his first paycheck that he spotted something green rolling along in the gutter pushed by a mild breeze.  It was eighty one dollar bills in a roll with a rubber band around it.  George figured it had probably been some drunk’s flash roll and it got lost somehow.

That worked out good; it was almost the equivalent of a week and a half’s worth of good pay.  He used that money to swing a deal buying an airplane bungalow directly from the owner.  Better yet it was across a vacant field and about a half a block from where he was now working for the state.  Walk to work, simple, save wear and tear on the poor old car.

George remained there the rest of his working life, sent to Chicago at the States expense to learn new technologies, that got him promoted and more money, he wound up as Foremen of the division before he retired; his final salary was triple that he started with.  Even after being retired George kept working on cars until he was 82 and health issues forced him to stop.

George died at age eight five from Leukemia, leaving his wife, son and two Grandchildren surviving.