A Man With A Gun

I spent many hours working in the sporting goods department at the Sears store in Chesterfield Mall. It was a great job for a high school student in the 1970's. I started at a whopping $1.85 per hour and worked up to $3.15 per hour by the time I left the job after my Senior year of high school. I was thrilled to take home $48 on a big week during the Christmas Season.

Back then, Sears sold guns, pool tables and "cutting edge video game systems" in the sporting goods department. (I sold Dan Dierdorf a pool table shortly before Christmas one year. He was still playing on the offensive line for the St. Louis Football Cardinals at the time. I have never felt so small in my life as when I stood next to him.)

Sears hired off-duty police officers as security guards at the store. All of the employees knew them, of course, and they would often stop by to chat when the store was slow. One of the security guards was a very large man named Fraser who loved to come by the sporting goods department to talk about all things sports.

He was standing near the register chatting with me one evening when he suddenly stiffened as he heard a radio report of a large, black man with a gun in the sporting goods department. Now, seeing a black man at all in Chesterfield Mall in the late 1970's was a rarity; and a black man with a gun was certain to get a lot of attention from the entire security contingent.

A brief glance down confirmed Fraser's suspicions - the grip of his rather large handgun in its shoulder holster was clearly visible inside his open jacket. Apparently, a shopper had noticed an armed man poking around the register. We both laughed as he radioed in that everyone could stand down because the threat was, in fact, him.

He came by to chat many more times before I left that job, and almost every time he would make some kind of joke about a man with a gun in the sporting goods department.