I learned a great deal about Mormons during the ten months I worked at Geneva Construction Company in Columbia from October, 1973 – August, 1974. I was intrigued by their religious beliefs, the Book of Mormon, their missionary program and of course I had always loved the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. I thought the fresh ideas of the two young men who owned the company created amazing energy in a fun workplace environment. This company was cutting edge and on the verge of great innovations in the commercial construction industry.
Unfortunately, we were also on the verge of disaster. As the Controller for the company I saw suspicious signs and fielded collection calls. One Friday afternoon, payday for the crews on the construction sites, fifty subcontractors crowded in our parking lot looking for their paychecks. These were very big unhappy men. My boss Nancy Haas and I were the only ones in the office that afternoon so we opted to sneak out a back door. Not my finest moment, I admit. The end came swiftly following that incident. I went to work on a Monday morning in August, 1974 and the doors were padlocked. The Internal Revenue Service shut us down for nonpayment of payroll taxes which led to a lengthy bankruptcy process for the company and its key employees. My personal salvation in the IRS inquiry was I didn’t have the ability to sign checks.
I was twenty-eight years old when the company collapsed, had worked for seven years for five different companies in three different states since my graduation from college in 1967: three CPA firms and two private companies as controllers. I thought about this checkered career path and wondered what I would do next. What did I want to do, more importantly what could I afford to do? I was a rolling stone who not only gathered no moss but also saved no money.
My partner Janie threw me a lifeline with her connections at the South Carolina Baptist Convention where she worked. She referred me to the pastor of Blaney Baptist Church, a small rural church in Elgin. I met with the pastor Jim Salter who asked the church to hire me as a part-time minister of music and youth. The church “called” me, and I accepted their call for a salary of $50. weekly. Elgin was ten miles outside of Columbia which meant my drive time was never less than twenty minutes on winding country roads from my apartment. I was expected to be at the church for the morning and evening worship services each Sunday, youth choir rehearsal on Sunday afternoons, Wednesday evening prayer meeting followed by adult choir rehearsal, funerals whenever the church was responsible for the music. I never calculated the hourly wage, but I suspected it was below the minimum.
I loved pastor Jim and the people in that little church in the country. Often a family in the church invited me for Sunday lunch after the worship service, and I got to know those folks as people of good will and very good cooks. The meals usually came from vegetables in their gardens plus fried chicken with cornbread or biscuits. Those were the good times in my brief church work experiences. The youth choir was a special group of teenagers who were excited about the new music opportunities while continuing their weekly teenage dramas. My adult choir was amazing – they worked hard for me – they were my first choir, and I was their first female director.
A crisis in my family in Texas also took place in August of 1974 that required my being there frequently for the next two years, but I’ll save that for our next story.
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Today I see the true gifts that were priceless from this period in my life. The monetary uncertainty was real, but I made friends who have kept in touch sporadically for the past fifty years. My friend Brenda is a Mormon whose father Tom was a subcontractor at Geneva Construction and then worked with me on her dad’s books when I became his CPA; Rex was the pianist for my youth choir at Blaney Baptist, and my friend Dot was the daughter of one of my favorite families in that church. Nancy who was my next level boss at Geneva continues to make me smile when we email each other for a chat. They remain a connection to another time and place that now seem to belong to a different person a lifetime ago.
I'll Call It Like I See It 