MICHAEL J. LACIVITA Some job -- turning trash to treasure

During the Great Depression era, we teens went begging for jobs. Today, even in the summertime, when kids are on vacation, jobs go begging for teens. What a contrast several generations can make. There is an availability of fast food restaurant jobs, newspaper carriers, grass grooming, etc. I see many "help wanted" signs, even in our so-called depressed area. The jobs may be entry level and minimum wage, but they are jobs.
Earned money is appreciated money, something I continually preach to my four grandchildren. In my teenage days, the signs boldly proclaimed "no help wanted."
In 1937, at 13 years of age, I had my first summer job. I was my own boss. I worked six days a week as a junk picker from dawn to dusk, during the entire summer vacation at our beloved East Side city dump. There was gold in them thar hills. Other people's trash became my treasures.
The sound "rag man, rag man" was music to my ears. It was the sound of the junkman working his way through the neighborhood proclaiming his willingness to pay money for the scrap we had collected.
Real treasures
Since hindsight is 20/20, there is no telling how many real treasures were hammered into scrap by our junk picker generation. Viewing some of the so called junk of our day on the various antique and collectible TV programs almost sends me into a state of shock.
I can recall an old Tiffany type lamp my mother threw out many years ago. The key to recognizing treasure from trash is to be well informed. Libraries and book stores are a great source of collectible information. Old jewelry, such as broken wrist or pocket watches, even though they may have been gold or platinum, have been tossed into the garbage can.
I recall going to a garage sale one day and asking for these items and being told they had just been thrown out with the trash. The same thing happened when I asked for old fountain pens, except the woman thought they were still in the garbage can. We took a look, but the trash was gone.
Without a doubt, junk picking during the summer of 1937 remains forever imbedded in my memory bank.
X Michael J. Lacivita, a Youngstown retiree, recently published a collection of his columns under the title, "Rag Man, Rag Man."