“Living out at my house in town all alone was just too much for me to take care of,” Byrne said. “I had hired everything done.”
He also feels secure here, knowing that if he experiences serious heart problems, help is close by. This daily possibility of a threat doesn’t get his goat though.
“You gotta live a good clean life,” Byrne said. “That’s all I know.”
On Sunday mornings, he attends All Saints Catholic Church in town. Years ago, he attended a little old church out in the country.
“That’s just how I was raised,” Byrne said.
When taking a walk down his career memory lane, the conversation trail takes many twists and turns. Once graduated from high school, he worked for his neighbors as a farm hand.
“After both of my folks had passed away, the neighbors more or less took over,” Byrne said. “I had to do something, so for four years, I did whatever needed doing like making hay or thrashing.”
The farming bug out of his system, he enlisted in the Air Force for four years.
“I went down to Texas and then Kansas,” Byrne said. “That’s as far as I got. I didn’t get overseas or anything.”
Primarily working with medical supplies, he enjoyed every minute — with an eighth-grade education, no less.
“When I came out of the service, jobs were hard to get,” Byrne said. “A friend of mine’s dad had a house-moving business, so I worked in Wells for the summer doing that.”
Back breaking work, this job was. First, he would dig a hole underneath the house itself. Step two involved jacking it up and then, finally, he found the strength to lift it onto wheels. All done with help, of course.
“It took three to four days to move a house,” Byrne said. “It was all work back in those days. We didn’t have hydraulics or loaders.”
Shortly thereafter, an auto mechanic job landed in his lap. The duties involved didn’t send him jumping for joy, but a paycheck was a paycheck.
“My boss would say to me, ‘Change the oil. This needs spark plugs changed,’” Byrne said. “So that’s what I did, and after about six months of that, I had had enough.”
Next on his job resume is Shurson Trucking, a workplace he found a lot more endurable. Even so, the 60 to 70-hour weeks grew to be tiresome after a decade’s worth of clocking in and out.
“Back in those days, I drove to Milwaukee and turned right back around,” Byrne said. “I would also haul a load to the Cities, come back right away and leave again the next morning. They weren’t as fussy on the rules as they are now.”
Last but not least on his repertoire: working for the county. Offered a little better benefit package and a normal 40-hour week, he knew he had to hold onto this job tightly.
“I plowed snow, hauled gravel and other things for 30 years,” Byrne said. “For about the last six to seven years, I ran the road grader.”
The itch to retire hit him hard at the ripe age of 65, as the old ticker needed a good long break. The added fringe benefit? He now had ample time to devote more time with those on the family tree.
“I wasn’t ready to retire, but I had to for health reasons,” Byrne said.
With Christmas Day approaching, he hopes to see the beautiful faces of his two children, Debbie and Brad, their spouses; his grandchildren, Rebecca, Kristy, Megan, John and Nicole and one great grandchild, Taylor.
“It would mean a lot,” Byrne said.
