My dad grew up in a small farming community, raised in a family with nine kids and his father was a dairy farmer himself. Being one of nine and living on a farm, you don't really have a choice but to become a hard worker. So that's what my dad has been his whole life - a hard worker.
When my dad was a teenager, he got a job working at Junkans Motors - a small local business that repaired farm machinery. He was a Senior in High School and he walked up to Dick Junkans and asked if he had any part-time work. No application, no interview. Dick said he did and Dad started right away. The summer after he graduated, Dick said, "You're sticking around, right?" Dad said he had planned to if he could work full-time that summer. The next school year he commuted to college and put in a semester or two. After that, he was a full-time workin' man. At the ripe old age of 20, my dad married my mom. He needed a few days off for the wedding and a quick honeymoon getaway. It was probably the first time he had asked for time off since he had started at Junkans. His boss told him he could have the time off, but he needed to find someone to cover his work. He asked his friend, Kevin Monson, to fill in. When Dad came back to work, Kevin stayed.
A few years later, my dad thought it might be time to look for a different job. He landed an interview at a local food processing plant (then called Land O' Lakes). My dad thinks that somehow his boss found out about the interview and that he was looking for a different job. It is a small town, so that's completely possible. So I believe it was the next day (or shortly thereafter) when Dick approached him and said something to the effect of, "I'm looking to sell my business. Do you want to buy it?" And so that's what happened. In their early 20s, my dad and Kevin decided to buy Junkans Motors and go into business together. They took on a third partner, one of their co-workers named Lawrence Hanson. Except no one called him Lawrence. His nickname was Squirrel (for reasons unknown to me) and I didn't know that his "real name" wasn't Squirrel until I was a teenager myself.
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| A newspaper clipping from 1975. My dad is the second one on the left. His name is spelled wrong. Next to him is his oldest brother. Then there's Squirrel (his last name is also spelled wrong) and Kevin is on the far right. |
Since there was no one with the last name Junkans in the business picture any longer, the business was renamed. The three co-owners had last names of MonSON, HanSON, and PaulSON. I believe they had a contest to rename the business. A local woman submitted the name "Son Equipment." If you said it fast enough, it kind of ran together and sounded like "Sunny Quipment." Amongst my family and many of the Monson family, it became referred to as "The Shop."
A new building, just on the edge of town, right on the highway, was built and it became my second childhood home. I spent hours at Son Equipment. My dad ran the garage part of the business (the shop), Squirrel ran the parts counter, and Kevin ran the office and sales part of the business. That's not to say you wouldn't find Kevin back in the shop or my dad in the office...they both pitched in with all aspects of the business.
My entire childhood my dad pretty much worked a 50-60 hour work week. He worked every other Saturday. He unlocked the door and turned on the lights every day. He fixed on tractors and farm equipment. Many times he drove out to farms and fields to repair a broken down piece of machinery that a farmer had tried to get going but needed help.
My dad's hands were pretty much always stained from grease and motor oil. He smelled like "shop" when he came home. His work boots were a fixture in our entryway. The Shop was a big part of our lives, of course. Squirrel eventually retired, selling his part of the business to Dad and Kevin, leaving them as the sole owners. It was a good fit as a partnership, Kevin being a bit more of a risk-taker than my dad, my dad being the one to always carefully weigh the pros and cons of business decisions. And both of them were willing to roll up their sleeves and do the hard work of running a small local business, serving their community they raised their families in.
In the 1980s, small family dairy farms were struggling as the farming industry was taking a big financial hit. So in the early 90s, the business switched over from farm machinery sales and repair to used car sales and repair. And the business name changed from Son Equipment to Son Auto. We still called it The Shop.
As a teenager, I did odd jobs around Son - mostly washing cars, getting them ready to go out on the car lot. I showed that pressure washer who was boss. I vacuumed out the interior, I scraped off window tint, I ran through a checklist to make sure all radios and blinkers and windows were in working order, and I checked oil and windshield fluid levels. Sometimes I drove all around the countryside, picking up parts at other stores and garages. One time I was sent to a town about 25 miles away, in a pickup truck without a speedometer that didn't work, to haul back a piece of farm machinery. I think it was a disk. It was wide and took up the whole lane and then some. The farmer hooked it up to the pickup truck and off I headed back. But the thing swayed so much that the pickup truck would start to rock if I got going too fast. But I had no idea where the threshold of beginning to sway was because I had no speedometer. I held up traffic for miles on stretches of two-lane road where I couldn't be passed on the highway. I got a lot of honks. I don't think I could go much over 25 mph and it well over an hour to get back to Son. As a teenager, this was a highly embarrassing and stressful situation I found myself in. One guy passed me and as he drove by, he mocked me by swaying his shoulders back and forth, rocking like I was inside that pickup truck.
Once I got my license, I always brought my car to Son to wash it. I was out of college before I drove through a car wash for the first time. I was married before I ever took my car anywhere to get an oil change - my dad always did it for me in the shop. It has been quite handy and fortunate to have a dad that knows "all things cars" and can fix it. And if he can't fix it, my sisters, husband, and brothers-in-law call him and ask if the price quote we got from another garage is reasonable or inflated.
Once I got my license, I always brought my car to Son to wash it. I was out of college before I drove through a car wash for the first time. I was married before I ever took my car anywhere to get an oil change - my dad always did it for me in the shop. It has been quite handy and fortunate to have a dad that knows "all things cars" and can fix it. And if he can't fix it, my sisters, husband, and brothers-in-law call him and ask if the price quote we got from another garage is reasonable or inflated.
And so it went for many years - Dad and Kevin selling and fixing cars at Son Auto. They tried to be as fair as possible to employees and customers, helping as many people as they could. My dad would get early morning calls and phone calls on Sunday at the house from people needing him to figure out their car problem from over the phone. And he could do it. Sometimes it was someone broken down on the side of the road and they needed rescuing. Sometimes it was a brother or friend who was working on a car and needed some advice. Dad got good at doing diagnostics without even looking at the vehicle. So much so that when my husband and I were dating, we were at a birthday party at my parents' house and he wanted to ask my dad for permission to marry me. His plan was to use his Jeep as a ruse to get my dad out of the house for a private conversation. He told my dad that he wanted him to look at his Jeep because he was having an issue with the air vent blower not working correctly. My dad asked him a couple of questions then told him what the problem was and what needed to be done to fix it, all without leaving the living room. And thwarting my husband's plan that day.
Eventually, the business sold and fixed speed boats and pontoon boats, in addition to cars. A couple more locations were added. Then they opened a couple auto parts store around the area. Several years ago Dad and Kevin were approached by a friend and local businessman who wanted to buy their business. The business was sold and they stayed on as employees, having a boss for the first time since the mid-1970s. My dad had his very first performance review (insert an eye roll by me). Without going into specifics, shortly after the business was sold, circumstances out of their control changed. Kevin left to find another job and it was the strangest thought to me that my dad and his business partner for almost 40 years wouldn't be working together any longer. Change is hard. At least for me, it is.
Another change happened when the "auto parts" part of the business was sold off and my dad went along with it. He moved to another store in a different town. It was another change that was a bit hard to get used to...knowing I would never be in the old Son Auto - the building I spent hours and hours of my childhood in. Knowing that Dad wouldn't have access to a shop to fix cars in, no access to trailers and skid steers and other equipment used to get things done. Again, change is hard. Eventually, Dad returned to a job back in his hometown, just down the road from the old Son Auto, at another location of the parts store he worked for. He no longer had any association with what was Son Auto. It was a new business name, with a new owner, with a new business plan.
My dad is the hardest working person I know. And today is his last day of work. He is retiring after working five days one week, six days the next, for about 50 years. I'm sure that there were times during his time as a business owner that he wanted to quit. But so many people were relying on him and Kevin. I'm sure there were a ton of hard-to-deal-with situations I never knew anything about - things that kept him awake at night. I'm sure Dad and Kevin didn't always agree on everything. But they changed with the times, pivoted their business, served the community, employed many people through the years - all without college degrees. They put in the long hard hours as business owners and made a lot of sacrifices. I'm so proud of my dad. He is one of the most fair, reasonable, responsible men I will ever know and I'm so grateful he raised me and worked hard for me, my mom, and my sisters.
Enjoy your retirement, Dad! Your kids and grandkids are excited that you now get to sleep in, nap when you want, come to ALL the activities, and spend more time with us. When you're not doing yard work, working on home improvements, working up at the cabin, or helping us with projects at our homes, that is.
Oh, and P.S. my dad was at our house a few days ago and replaced a couple of parts on one of our cars. Some things never change.
Eventually, the business sold and fixed speed boats and pontoon boats, in addition to cars. A couple more locations were added. Then they opened a couple auto parts store around the area. Several years ago Dad and Kevin were approached by a friend and local businessman who wanted to buy their business. The business was sold and they stayed on as employees, having a boss for the first time since the mid-1970s. My dad had his very first performance review (insert an eye roll by me). Without going into specifics, shortly after the business was sold, circumstances out of their control changed. Kevin left to find another job and it was the strangest thought to me that my dad and his business partner for almost 40 years wouldn't be working together any longer. Change is hard. At least for me, it is.
Another change happened when the "auto parts" part of the business was sold off and my dad went along with it. He moved to another store in a different town. It was another change that was a bit hard to get used to...knowing I would never be in the old Son Auto - the building I spent hours and hours of my childhood in. Knowing that Dad wouldn't have access to a shop to fix cars in, no access to trailers and skid steers and other equipment used to get things done. Again, change is hard. Eventually, Dad returned to a job back in his hometown, just down the road from the old Son Auto, at another location of the parts store he worked for. He no longer had any association with what was Son Auto. It was a new business name, with a new owner, with a new business plan.
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| Dad and grandkid #6 at his job in 2014. |
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| Dad and grandkid #7 at his job in 2017. |
My dad is the hardest working person I know. And today is his last day of work. He is retiring after working five days one week, six days the next, for about 50 years. I'm sure that there were times during his time as a business owner that he wanted to quit. But so many people were relying on him and Kevin. I'm sure there were a ton of hard-to-deal-with situations I never knew anything about - things that kept him awake at night. I'm sure Dad and Kevin didn't always agree on everything. But they changed with the times, pivoted their business, served the community, employed many people through the years - all without college degrees. They put in the long hard hours as business owners and made a lot of sacrifices. I'm so proud of my dad. He is one of the most fair, reasonable, responsible men I will ever know and I'm so grateful he raised me and worked hard for me, my mom, and my sisters.
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| My kids and my dad on his last day of work. I decided spur of the moment to bring him balloons and lunch to celebrate (and because I always need closure on life changes). |
Enjoy your retirement, Dad! Your kids and grandkids are excited that you now get to sleep in, nap when you want, come to ALL the activities, and spend more time with us. When you're not doing yard work, working on home improvements, working up at the cabin, or helping us with projects at our homes, that is.
Oh, and P.S. my dad was at our house a few days ago and replaced a couple of parts on one of our cars. Some things never change.
