by Sam Childers
I thought I’d end up dead or back in prison if I stayed in Florida, but Minnesota was pretty rough too this time around. As usual when trouble came along, I didn’t run from it; I ran to meet it halfway.
One November night a friend was taking me home from a late party. Driving down a dark, deserted highway, we stopped and picked up someone walking along with his thumb out. I thought, This guy’s lucky to get a ride out here this time of night. He climbed in the back, and as we started up again he said, “Take me to Bena,” which is a little town up the road. I was almost passed out in the front, but I heard my friend say, “I’m not going to Bena. I’m only going to Cohasset.”
The news didn’t sit too well with our passenger. In an eyeblink he pulled out a knife, lunged up from the backseat, and held the blade against my friend’s neck. Messed up as I was, I noticed that move out of the corner of my droopy red eye. “No,” the rider snapped, “take me to Bena.”
I was not going to take any stuff from this guy. I reached my foot over the floor hump, put it on top of my friend’s foot and floored it. We started flying down the narrow highway. My friend tried desperately to yank his foot off the gas but I was mashing down with all my weight. He and the hitchhiker were both screaming, “Stop! Stop! Pick up your foot!” I screamed at the guy in the backseat, “Go ahead, stab him. Stab him. We’ll all die tonight!”
The hitchhiker started freaking out. He lowered the knife and said, “Let me out! Just let me out!” As soon as he took the knife away from my friend’s neck, I jumped into the backseat and started fighting him. I got hold of his knife and twisted it out of his hand. We kept going at it, and finally I stabbed him with his own knife. My friend turned off onto an old country road. As I threw the hitchhiker out of the car, he tried to grab my foot, so I kicked him a couple of times in the face. He quit moving, and I didn’t know at the time whether I’d killed him or not. I got back in the car, and my friend tore off toward the highway. The backseat was covered with blood. I found out later that the guy made it all right. I guess that night convinced my friend I was too wild for him; I’ve never seen him since.
My life was starting to get out of hand to the point where even I couldn’t handle it. Since I had moved back from Florida, I’d been sharing a house with a couple of other friends, a little cracker box of a house with a few steps up to the stoop and a couple of pairs of windows across the front. Later I moved to an apartment with my friend Delane Watson. On Friday and Saturday nights, Delane and I sold fifty to a hundred dime bags—ten dollars’ worth—of cocaine out of that place. Delane was several years older than I was, with shaggy brown hair and a full mustache. I was eighteen by then but still looked older than I was. I had a mustache too, the standard scraggly beard, and a sort of brown afro hairdo. If it had been straight, it would have hung down my back, but it was curly and kind of frizzed up. I thought it made me look cool, and the girls loved it. Those curls framed a face that was usually frozen in a self-satisfied smirk. And while I may not have been as tall as some of the other guys, I was all muscle.
For a couple of months I moved from the apartment to a house on a farm, where I knew a man who would eventually get arrested for big-time drug dealing while I was living there. When he heard the police were coming and didn’t have time to escape, he gave me a half pound of hashish. His bail was so high that he couldn’t afford to get out of jail. I figured this was a good time for a change of scenery. I had been going back and forth to Florida for years and decided to move there for good.
This time in Florida I had the first steady, decent-paying, legal job of my life, thanks to two hard-working people named Mr. and Mrs. Oliver. They were the first responsible adults who treated me with anything close to respect. They knew nothing about my private life before I got to Florida, and it was their style to give everybody the benefit of the doubt. They bought oranges on the tree, hired people to pick them, then sold the fruit and paid the tree owners and pickers. My brother George was already working for them, and I joined him after I moved. George and I got responsible jobs—we were field foremen who handed out ladders in the orange groves and organized the pickers into lines.
I’d been around trouble long enough to see it coming, and some of the pickers we worked with were troublemakers who needed supervision. The Olivers paid their workers in cash and brought as much as eight thousand dollars into the field some days, so I stood close by with a gun or a club on payday to make sure everything went smoothly. I whittled a club about three inches thick from an orange branch with a grain running so it wouldn’t break. Kind of a Walking Tall stick. I carried it until Mr. Oliver asked me to get rid of it because he was afraid I was going to kill somebody.
Before I handed it over to Mr. Oliver, that stick got plenty of use, although sometimes I took a more creative approach to dealing with troublemakers. Some of the Haitian pickers were big into voodoo and would put a so-called hex on me or the Olivers or anybody else who tried to keep them in line. One day—back when I was doing drugs every day—a big snake came crawling through the orchard. I chased it down, grabbed it by the tail and head, looked at the Haitians, and said, “Watch this!” Then I bit its head off. After that, not only did the Haitians leave me alone, they wouldn’t even look at me. And they never tried that voodoo hooey around me again.
The Olivers made good money and paid us well. I looked out for them, and they took care of me, including bailing me out of jail. They always seemed willing to give me another chance, which was the way they treated everybody. I didn’t allow anyone to make fun of them, or make fun of me being with them because they were black and I was white. Some whites warned me that residents there killed white people, and I knew of whites who came to buy drugs and wouldn’t get out of the car. Though no other white people lived in the neighborhood, I moved into a trailer in the Olivers’ backyard. They invited George and me to their Christmas parties and other family events as though we were their children. They were second parents to me. They were the first people who ever gave me a sense of self-respect, and the first to show by their own example that what matters in life has nothing to do with the color of your skin and everything to do with the compassion and commitment in your heart. I wish I could introduce the Olivers to every American and every African who has ever let race or tribe dictate how they feel about anybody.
Over the years I had completely adopted the biker lifestyle, and I had the leather, the chain wallet, the beard, and the tattoos to prove it. I made my own tattoos using toilet paper ashes and a needle, the way they do it in jail. I loved riding bikes, hanging with bikers, and giving out my opinion free of charge to all comers about anything to do with the biking world. Like every other bunch of guys who share a common interest, bikers have road trips, meets, rallies, races, and other events so they can get together and talk shop. One of the best biker events in the country was just up the interstate from us.
Bike Week in Daytona Beach was one of the highlights of the year for my buddies and me. What started back in the 1930s as a motorcycle race on the beach had morphed into a ten-day invasion of bikers from all over the U.S. and beyond. Daytona’s palm-lined streets were choked with hundreds of thousands of motorcyclists looking for a good time. In every direction there was row after row of bikes loaded with chrome and covered with incredible paint jobs: flames, skulls, girls, every kind of design imaginable airbrushed or painted on. A lot of the customized bikes sported tail fins, sidecars, roofs, and anything else a designer could dream up and weld together.
Of course where there are bikes and bikers there are biker chicks. They were in Daytona by the thousands, dressed to highlight their assets—one of the most popular outfits being leather chaps over a bikini. The scene was awash in drinking and drugs. Just the place for young Sam Childers to go in March 1981.
I was headed there in a van cruising up I-4 in Florida doing some pretty heavy partying, when a guy I knew pulled up alongside us on his chopper and hollered over that he wanted to buy some drugs. To do the deal, we
pulled off at a roadside rest area with some picnic tables and trees. He and the girl riding behind him got off the bike and got in the van. I didn’t really notice her that much at the time. As per usual, we all shared some of the drugs so the guy could make sure the merchandise was as advertised. I saw the two of them a few more times during Bike Week, but didn’t think anything of it.
A couple of weeks later I got hired as shotgunner on a drug deal. It was my job to carry a gun to the transaction and be ready to use it at the first sign of trouble. I wore a 9 millimeter pistol into the bar and carried a 12-gauge shotgun in a duffel bag for backup. The place was called the Fox Hole and it looked like any of a thousand grimy strip bars in Florida. Colored lights blinked around beer signs, turning the pitch black into frenetic images flickering through stale cigarette smoke onto dingy tables splotched in last night’s beer, scattered between well-worn plastic booths. As I sat down where I could keep an eye on the action, a waitress came up. I didn’t want to be distracted and waved her off, but she said, “Don’t you remember me? I sure remember you.”
It was the girl riding with my buddy who’d stopped us to buy drugs a couple of weeks before. Her name was Lynn.
“I can’t talk now,” I said. “I’m busy.” To reassure myself I felt for the cold steel of the 12-gauge through the rough canvas of the duffle.
“You really don’t remember me?” She was persistent, I had to give her that. But I had work to do, and if my boss looked over and saw me talking to a waitress instead of keeping my eye on business, I was gonna be in big trouble. I was supposed to stay alert for when the buyer and seller walked in; I needed to shake this girl, but I had to do it in a way that wouldn’t attract attention or look suspicious.
“Okay, okay,” I said. “Give me your number, and I’ll call you tomorrow.” She scribbled her phone number down for me and finally got out of my hair. She went back to work, and so did I.
The next day I called her.
We fell in love real fast, and it wasn’t long before we were living together, moving around from place to place, landing wherever we could live really cheap, selling drugs to pay the rent. We never seemed to have enough money even for the basics, like food. There was one time when we were out of money and hadn’t had anything to eat for two or three days; we were staying in the hotel room where we lived in Apopka. For the first time in my whole life, I felt responsible for somebody; it was Lynn, and she was hungry.
There was a park not far from our hotel with a pond that always had ducks in it. I had some change in my pockets and a few rounds of ammunition. I went to the pond, shot a duck with a .38 pistol, and brought it home for us to eat. I also bought a loaf of bread and a dozen eggs with the change I had, and I told Lynn, “If you stick it out with me, I promise you will never go hungry again.”
We decided to move to Georgia and try to get a fresh start; we landed in Jesup, where I had done some roofing work. Right away I started selling drugs again. Marijuana. I’d go back and forth to Orlando every couple of weeks for half a pound at a time. We had an old car Lynn’s father gave us that we never titled. I just stole a different license plate every week, and we ran our drugs in that.
One good thing that happened in Jesup was that I met somebody else who had faith in me and treated me better than I deserved. Lynn’s uncle Larry had an auction house and paid me fifty dollars a week to come once a week and work for him there. He also let me sell used tools he had. I filled up our old car with them and sold them on the road. It made me feel good that he trusted me to go out and do that.
After about three months, when we wanted to go back to Florida and needed money for the trip, we sold our car to a fortune-teller. She wanted to trade the car for telling my fortune, but I wouldn’t even go in her house. Lynn and I took a Greyhound bus to Orlando and found a place to live at Mudd’s Trailer Park. And that’s what it was—mud, mud, mud! It was one of the filthiest places I’ve ever seen. I started doing roofing work, still selling drugs on the side, and Lynn got a job packing carrots. Even so, our pockets were usually empty because we spent every cent we earned on drugs.
One day Lynn was sick with a fever, probably from trying to work days on end without food. I told her I’d go ask my boss for some cash. I had promised Lynn we would never go hungry again, and I was feeling rotten about breaking that promise. I went to my boss and told him I needed twenty dollars right away.
“I don’t have it on me, Sam,” he said. “But payday’s tomorrow. I’ll give it to you then.” I got a little hot and told him I couldn’t come to work tomorrow if I didn’t have some money right then.
I decided to hitchhike to Orlando and sell some blood. I could get fifteen dollars for a pint, and then we could eat. I could have asked my parents for money, but I was too proud. I was going to make it on my own. Mom and Dad had moved to Orlando while Lynn and I were living in Jesup. In the middle of what had been hundreds of acres of orange groves, Dad had gotten a job at Walt Disney World building Spaceship Earth—an eighteen-story geodesic globe made out of metal triangles, set in the Epcot part of the park. The huge sphere would house a planned, futuristic city. While much of this type of work went to union laborers, many of the union ironworkers didn’t want to work at those heights; but Dad would work doing anything to provide for my mom.
I was walking down the road with my thumb out, and who should come driving along but my mother. Mom pulled alongside me and stuck her head out the window. “The Lord woke me up this morning and told me I should come to your house today,” she said. “He even told me to come this way instead of the route I usually take. Why aren’t you at work?”
“I’m going to Orlando to give blood because I need to buy some food.”
Her eyes flashed with fire. “No, you’re not,” she said. “Get in this car. I’m taking you to the store to buy groceries.” And that’s just what she did, though I only let her buy enough necessities to get us by for a few days. She kept putting things in the cart and I kept taking them out. I was only going to accept essentials.
Not long afterward, I met Clyde Carter. I’d been working as a roofer, and Clyde hired my boss to subcontract a job. Clyde was balding, wore wire-rimmed glasses, and lived his life in a wheelchair. He was a respected contractor and a fair boss. He also claimed to be President Jimmy Carter’s cousin, but I never found out if he really was or not. One day he stopped by the job site where I was working, had a look around, and said to me, “Things are looking good. I’ll come by tomorrow when you’re finished and pay you.”
I said, “I’ll be finished today, and I want to be paid today.”
“I don’t think so,” Clyde said. “There’s more to do than you can get done in a day.”
“Nope,” I said, “I’ll be done today.” I could tell he thought I was crazy or showing off or didn’t know how much work I had left.
“All right. I’ll be back at four this afternoon and see how you’re doing.”
When he got back I was sitting under a tree with the ladder and tools beside me and all the work was done. He paid me and then handed me his card. “If you want to change your life, call me.”
What was up with that? I wondered.
The next day I did call him and he invited me to his house in Longwood. It was a nice one-story ranch painted off-white with a little covered porch and a big tree in the front yard branching over most of the house. Clyde met me at the front door in his wheelchair. Instead of inviting me inside, he handed me a twenty-dollar bill. “If you really want to change your life,” he said, “take this and go get your hair cut and come back.”
Nobody, and I mean nobody, told me what to do with my hair. I had long biker hair, and that’s what I wanted. My gut reaction was to say, “Up yours, buddy!” and spend the money at the nearest bar.
But there was something about his honesty that grabbed me. Why does he care about me? Why does he want me to change my life? Nobody had ever talked to me like that before. I decided it was worth a shot and went back to my car.
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What have I got to lose? I turned the key and headed toward the barbershop. I’m broke and on drugs, I figured. I’m living in a filthy trailer full of rats and roaches. The hair will grow back. Besides, I want to see what’s next.
Getting cleaned up felt weird and good at the same time. As soon as I got back to my car, I went straight back to Clyde’s house. This time he invited me in.
“I need some help running my jobs,” he said. “I can’t get around so good,” he continued, gesturing toward his wheelchair, “and somebody like you could be a big help.”
“You got a deal,” I said. And for the next two or three months I was his legs, his gofer on job sites, running errands and checking on things. Trust grew quickly between us; he had been waiting for the right person to bring into his business, and I enjoyed working with someone who needed and appreciated me.
Clyde trusted and appreciated me so much that he called me in one day and asked if I wanted to be his partner. I couldn’t believe it. I was a success! I was so proud. He changed the name of the company to V. M. Carter and Sam Childers Roofing, but his investment in me didn’t end with that. He continued to patiently and expertly teach me the ropes of the roofing trade, giving me business pointers that have helped me ever since.
Way more important than any business advice, Clyde taught me that God doesn’t make junk.
“God made you in his image,” Clyde said, “and he doesn’t make mistakes.”
Clyde taught me to look at myself from the inside out. He said the important thing is not—as I had been taught—to worry about what other people think, but to look deep within ourselves at who we are in our own minds. He taught me to stop trying to show and tell people who I am, and look deep inside my own heart at what was there. He said what I saw would make me want to change the kind of person I was.
“Don’t tell the world who you are,” he urged. “Be who you are, and the world will see it.” This didn’t all register at once, but he planted seeds in rocky soil that slowly, slowly began to take root.