Peter Kultgen now runs the Waco car dealership where he started working as a teenager.
Duane A. Laverty / Waco Tribune-Herald

Who

Peter Kultgen, 58, president of Bird-Kultgen Ford.

1st summer job

Cleaning up trade-ins, mostly pickups, at the dealership his grandfather, J.H. “Jack” Kultgen, acquired in 1936 with investor Arthur Bird. Some of the old trucks could be well cleaned with just a scrub brush and a water hose, but others required a high-pressure approach or steam cleaning. Kultgen said many vehicles “slobbered oil,” so the engines needed a lot of attention. It was his job to provide it.

Age

At 14, Kultgen received his driver’s license. He needed spending money, and his family decided a teenage boy needed something “dirty, nasty and hot” to help him burn off excess energy. Kultgen worked at the dealership after school and on Saturdays, and then all day every day it was open the next summer, when he was 15.

Pay

“Whatever the minimum wage was at that time,” Kultgen said with a laugh. The federal minimum wage as of July 1, 1968, was $1.60 an hour, but Kultgen went on to say he does not remember if he made that much. He joked that being the grandson of the founder, he might have been paid whatever his grandfather thought he was worth.

Loved

The camaraderie of the workplace and listening to the older men, most of them veterans of World War II, talk about their life experiences. Many of those employed at Bird-Kultgen Ford came from small communities such as Leroy and Axtell, and they often would say, “This sure beats the heck out of picking cotton and hauling hay.”

Hated

“I don’t really remember hating anything,” Kultgen said. He worked at the dealership in some capacity every summer until he graduated high school and went off to the University of Texas.

Even during college, he would come back to Waco during holidays and the summer to make money at Bird-Kultgen Ford.

He went to work there full time after college and took the reins as president in 1986.

Lesson learned

Follow the examples of people who really know their jobs.

Advice on summer jobs

Show up on time and be ready to do whatever is asked of you.

mcopeland@wacotrib.com

757-5736

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