This week, in commemoration of Labor Day, The Times has collected a series of reminiscence of first jobs from a number of Fountain Hills residents.

We think you will enjoy these stories, as they may help you recall the effort that earned you a first paycheck.

Sherm Abrahamson is a retired attorney and busy volunteer for the Town of Fountain Hills, including organizing the weekly Men’s Discussion Group at the Community Center.

When he was growing up, Abrahamson said he loved visiting his uncle’s hardware store in East Chicago, Ill., about 20 miles from where his family lived.

“Whenever I could get there I worked there,” Abrahamson said. He was stocking shelves and sweeping up at age 14 or 15.

“My goal was that after I got out of college I would go back and buy the store from my uncle,” he said. His uncle passed away while Sherm was in college and he never got to purchase the store, but followed the path into the legal profession.

“It was a good experience for me, I learned how to deal with people and about money matters,” Abrahamson said.

Hank Brandimarte is a Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office captain and commander for District 7 based in Fountain Hills.

“I grew up in New Jersey and my first job was a paper route when I was 12,” Brandimarte said. “I delivered the Newark Star-Ledger to approximately 50 of my neighbors. I’d wake up every morning at 5 a.m. and ensure I had enough papers for my route.

“On inclement weather days, each paper had to be properly enclosed in a plastic sleeve to prevent damage. I’d load up my bicycle and spend the next hour delivering the morning news. The preparation and delivery of the paper had to be completed before I went to school each day.

“I was also responsible for collecting money for the subscriptions. I made about $20-$30 a week, which I thought was a king’s ransom back in those days. The pride I had in earning my own money to buy the things I wanted, taught me the importance of taking care of those items and also the value of a dollar earned through hard work.”

Brent Cruikshank, assistant publisher of The Fountain Hills Times, started earning money just up the street from The Times office.

He was 15 when he started working at McDonald’s, which refers to its jobs as “America’s best first job.”

Cruikshank said he agrees with that.

“I wanted to start saving money for my first car,” he said. “What do I remember most? Biting into a McDonald’s cheeseburger when I was on break. I loved those cheeseburgers.”

Cruikshank said he also loved the money he was making. He ended up with his sister’s car, so his money went toward gas and play money.

The assistant publisher said he loves to work.

“I have never gone a month without working. I love working and making money.”

He said he didn’t remember how much he made working three or four days a week, but he said he was happy with his salary.

Cruikshank said the most memorable thing that happened to him was when his dad, Publisher Alan Cruikshank, had to pick him up from work because of a tragedy.

“I had to go talk to investigators about a murder of someone I knew, and whose dog I watched when she was gone,” he said. “Julie Patterson lived three houses away from me, and murder to this day has not been solved.”

Rachael Goodwin is Community Services Director for the Town of Fountain Hills.

“My first job was at TCBY, while I was in high school. It was a ‘cool’ job; what high school kid wouldn’t want to work at the local fro-yo shop?” Goodwin said. “I worked there for more than two years and learned very transferable skills like cash handling, scheduling, and time management. Being in school, working a job, and playing sports demanded crucial time management. I also learned a lot of quirky things as well. I came to know our ‘regulars’ and their standard orders.

“I became a connoisseur of frozen yogurt and can absolutely tell the difference between fro-yo and ice cream. I know the perfect ratio of yogurt to milk for a milkshake. I can decorate a cake and pipe ‘Happy Birthday’ one-handed. And maybe the best skill: I can still make a perfectly stacked soft-serve cone.”

Boe James, a retired Naval officer, was another person who started his career as a paperboy. Likening his experience to what the sculpture in front of The River of Time Museum shows, James said he was paid 10 cents a week per customer. From that money, James said he paid for each newspaper, as well as any missed papers.

He started working when he was a sixth grader in Reno, Nev. After his family moved to Tucson just before he was in 11th grade, he started another route there.

One summer, James worked as an archery and canoeing instructor at a boys camp. In high school, he also worked as a stage hand, resulting in a life-long love for theater, ballet and other live performances.

He saved a good share of the money he earned before college, but when he received a “full scholarship with a stipend” (for room and board, books, clothing and spending money), as well as a guaranteed job and career upon graduation, he invested in stocks and bonds.

Who says there is no money in newspapers?

Leona Johnston, who has served in a number of capacities in the local Republican Club, as well as in state and national Republican organizations, started out with a paper route, as well. She and her younger brother, Richard Bobin, shared the route in Beaver Falls, Penn., serving more than 100 customers. Richard was 11 and Leona was 13.

Leona, who retired after 35 years teaching, said her first “real” job was working in an old-fashioned ice cream parlor.

She said she also worked as a waitress in a truck stop when she was in high school, and when she graduated, truckers took up a collection to help her with her college expenses.

Johnston later married a man with five children. He was a bartender, so in addition to teaching, Johnston worked in the bar. The couple served as travel guides later.

“I have had a wonderful, interesting life,” she said. “I wouldn’t change a thing.”

Jim Judge retired as a human resources executive with John Deere, Corp. after 40 years with the company, but his work experience began on the dusty farm fields of Iowa, first as a child doing chores on the family farm.

“I did that just like all farm kids,” Judge said. “My first paycheck came when I was 15 years old, working for a farmer a few miles from us.

“My buddy and I spent our summers working six days a week, 10 hours a day for three months, all for 55-cents an hour. We were planting and cultivating all summer. We were back in school by harvest time; someone else did that.

“The second summer we got 65-cents.

“It was a really good learning experience having to work a set schedule and take direction from someone other than a parent.

“I learned the skills that transferred to my first real job after high school with John Deere. I worked there summers while in college for $1.60 an hour.”

After graduating Judge continued working with John Deere, eventually moving into personnel management.

Mayor Linda Kavanagh’s early work experience came in college as a volunteer.

“Volunteering was always a very important part of my life as far back as my college years. I remember getting a postcard in the mail during my sophomore year from our neighborhood volunteer ambulance corps asking for help as either a dispatcher or attendant on the ambulance.

“While I never thought of doing anything medical with my life, I thought I could lend a hand as a dispatcher. So I took a bus down to their storefront headquarters and spoke to the coordinator about helping out. The first thing she said to me was that dispatching was for the older volunteers and that I should sign up to get training as a medical attendant.

“There was no saying no to this woman, who was determined to hold on to me as a volunteer. She signed me up on the spot to take the beginning first aid course which later led to the advanced course and to the new emergency medical technician course, which had just been released for the public. I was one of the first civilians in the country to be a certified EMT.

“But that beginning first aid class was the one that would change my life forever. There in the front of the room was the instructor; a tall, slim, handsome guy with a mustache who I was told worked for a hospital ambulance and wanted to be a cop. First day of class this guy needs a volunteer to come up and help him demonstrate some first aid techniques. While I did not raise my hand, and I’m sure I didn't, he must have thought he saw it go up because I was chosen...again and again.

“The ambulance corps headquarters was also a social gathering place whether you were on duty or not. Good friendships always happen among volunteers and soon I was part of the group in more ways than one. That included being constantly teased as to why this instructor always picked me in class. Then the matchmaking started and the whole group felt so successful and pleased with themselves when the instructor and I had our first date.

“That date led to many others and 42 years later we are still happily married. And John still has the mustache.”

Kay Kinder, owner of Fountain Fashions, said babysitting was her first means of making money.

“I babysat a lot,” Kinder said.

But her first “real” job was as a switchboard operator for the Holly Corp., a company which sold property in Lake Havasu City. On weekends, she worked as a “Holly Dolly,” serving customers who were interested in buying property in Lake Havasu.

“It was a fabulous time,” Kinder said. “I worked seven days a week, but when you’re 22-years-old it doesn’t matter. I was having a great time.”

She said she didn’t remember how much money she earned, but it was enough to enjoy her life.

“I first went to work for the Holly Corp. when I was 19,” she said. “I was young, but I was ready to get out in the world.”

She met her husband, the late Don Kinder, who worked for the late Lorne Pratt, one of the original developers of Fountain Hills. They ultimately moved to Fountain Hills, where Kinder has owned her store since 1973.

Jerry Miles, former Fountain Hills mayor and retired attorney, worked as a box boy in his father’s grocery store.

He was 12 years old, earning 75-cents an hour at the store in Clayton, N.M.

A long-time Fountain Hills resident, Miles is credited with the creation and ongoing success of the town’s public art collection.

Heather Nelsen, who works as teen librarian at Fountain Hills Branch Library, credited her first job with a greater appreciation of subsequent positions, although she noted that she really enjoyed her first job working at Harkins Superstition Springs Theater in Mesa.

“There were things about the job that were tough,” she said. “The usher closets always smelled horrible because of the soda/popcorn combination in all the trash cans. The floor in the concessions area was always a mess by the end of the night, and the hours were pretty late, especially for a high school student.

“At the same time, though, it was a pretty amazing first job. We had a large staff, so I got to meet a lot of people I wouldn’t have otherwise, making friends from different schools and backgrounds.”

She said there also were opportunities for advancement, and by the time she was 17, she was manager.

“That made it easier to find better positions when I was in college,” she said.

Her starting pay was $5.15 and she said she thinks she was making about $10 an hour when she left when she was 18.

Nelsen said she has fond memories of her “Harkins days” and keeps in touch with a few of her former coworkers.

“In a lot of ways, it was the perfect first job,” she said. “In part because of how tough and sometimes gross it could be. Once you have worked a job where you regularly end up working until 4 or 5 a.m. or having to clean up other people’s vomit, all the less-than-ideal things about other jobs suddenly don’t seem to matter as much. It definitely has made me appreciate the jobs I’ve had since.”

Dave Ott, Fountain Hills Rural/Metro Fire Chief, had a specialty job when he was six years old. His father was a pharmacist and developed a way for his children to help him fill prescriptions.

The younger Ott, along with two of his sisters, had an assembly line where Dave dropped a pill in a plastic cup, his middle sister put a paper lid on the cup and wrote down what was in the cup, and the other sister put the filled cup in a box, readying the medicine for delivery to patients.

“I think my dad paid us a quarter or something,” Ott said. “But a quarter went a long way.”

Another job in his young life was mowing lawns, raking leaves and shoveling snow for neighbors.

“One guy would ask me to do work while he was gone,” Ott said. “One day he had gone out to play golf and died on the golf course. He owed me something like $120. I never got paid. It was devastating.”

Ott said he learned then that he shouldn’t just trust that someone is going to take care of their debts.

“It was kind of a hard lesson,” he said. “But everything turned out okay.”