I was a Conscientious Objector during the Vietnam War. As such I was assigned to do two years of “Alternative Service” work that was supposed to help the nation. I was placed to do my two years in the Indianapolis Goodwill Store. Unfortunately, I have no photos of the place or the people. The photo above shows how I looked at the time. Below are some of my memories of my experience there.
July of 1970 found me up in Indianapolis, Indiana’s state capital, looking for the Goodwill Store. I found it on West Michigan Street. It was a huge low building with a store in the front. I entered the store and asked one of the sales ladies where the office was. She took me through a “PERSONNEL ONLY” door, then directed me over to one side where there were some offices. Sitting at a desk was a secretary, to whom I explained that I was supposed to start working there the following week, and I was just reporting in to say I had arrived and was ready to start. She handed me some application forms which I filled out and returned to her.
After checking them over, she walked me to have a talk with the Personnel Director. After the introductions, I was told that I would be working in the Pricing Department, and phoned the Head of the Pricing Department to come, get me, and give me a tour.
Moments later, I was introduced to Mrs. Carnes, a grandmotherly-type woman, who was to be my supervisor. She was the Head of the Pricing Department. She led me down a hallway toward a pair of doors that held a strictly worded sign declaring: ’‘AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY”.
As we were walking down the hallway, I was glancing from side to side exploring my new worksite, in one office sat a woman in front of a typewriter, which at first seemed normal, until I noticed that she was hitting the typewriter keys by using a long stick which she held firmly by her teeth. She didn’t have the use of her arms. It was at that point that I started to realized that I was entering a world from which I had been sheltered, throughout the twenty years that was my life.
Pushing through the double doors, we entered a huge open warehouse looking area, full of noise, smells, and movement. We walked down the concrete floor on a walkway delineated by a yellow painted lines designating the border of the aisle.
On the right was the dry-cleaning area with pipes and big metal washers. Beside this area a long metal rail suspended from the ceiling, held clothes on hangers. This rail with clothes ended where a tall Black woman was inspected each piece of clothing, then after deciding on its worth, placed the piece on the corresponding price rail, where several other women were busy stapling price tags unto the sleeves of each of the garments.
On the opposite side of the walkway, there was a long conveyor belt. Donated items from Goodwill bags were dumped onto the moving belt at its the far end, then as the articles travelled down the belt, people seated on both sides of the belt would sort through the items moving past them. One man would pick off all the books, another, all the shoes, the clothing was taken off by another person who put it into wheeled canvas bins. The useless stuff that had not been picked off, travelled all the way to the end of the belt and fell into a wheeled canvas bin, which when full, was pushed out to the trash by a black man heavily limping on his artificial leg.
We approached an area in where all types of furniture were sitting. There were some straight wooden chairs, an old sofa, an arm chair, two ottomans, some bed frames, a tower of old box springs and mattresses, and a chrome legged kitchen table with 4 matching chairs covered in dark brown Naugahyde. Rolled up and laying on the floor beside a coffee table and a bookcase, were a couple of old carpets.
View my paintings: davidmarchant2.ca
Who is that"hippy"? That was a very interesting description of the goings on there.
ReplyDelete