The Story Of Three Truck Drivers

This happened many years ago, probably about 15. At that point, I was the executive VP and general manager of Floral Glass on Long Island. We were the largest fabricator/distributor in the New York city metropolitan area. We had our main plant on Long Island and additional plants in New Jersey and Connecticut.

On most days we had transfer trucks going or coming from each satellite plant. On one average day, there were trucks in from each plant, and when one of the drivers from the main plant wandered by, this conversation took place. Now, I didn’t hear this directly, but three different people told me about this and their stories were about the same.

The driver from New Jersey said he had the best manager in our system. Steven Brenner, the manager, he said, could sell anything to our customers and keep them happy. He closed by saying that Steven was so smart about glass, that he could speak for a half-hour on any topic about glass. The driver from Connecticut started talking about Alan Freeman, the manager of his shop. At that time Alan had been in the glass business over 50 years and really knew his stuff (isn’t stuff a wonderful word?) about anything that had to do with running a glass business. He closed out by saying that Alan could speak for a full hour about glass and the glass industry.

The New York driver, quiet until now, finally spoke. He was a really good driver and loved his job,.and felt it was his responsibility to speak up on my behalf. He said that Steven could speak about glass for a half hour, so what. Alan could speak for an hour about glass and the business. So what. My manager, Paul, can speak for two hours about nothing!

I haven’t stopped laughing to this day. I was so proud of our driver in defending me.

While I am going through this cancer business I take time each day to think of great times in my life. Thought you would enjoy this one.