Charles (Chuck) Kensinger

Police, fire, teaching, medicine, general business, and manufacturing. Some of these are ones that children think of when they are asked what they want to be. These and many others are the jobs that some of us have spent our lives involved in.

As we approach Labor Day, I would like to give you a short history of my work experience. My first real job was as a fry cook at Dog ‘N Suds in Springfield, MO. I also learned how to take orders, prepare sandwiches, change and fill fountain tanks, pull drinks, and do anything else that needed to be done.

Thanks to that experience, I was allowed to be a closing manager. About a year and a half later, I was offered a job working at Zenith Radio Corporation, working on the final line while building televisions. It was a very interesting job.

I installed five screws and hung the tuner. That’s all. I tried to help the guy before me and the one after me until the supervisor told me to do my job and no one else’s. My Mother had been worried that I might decide to stay and drop out of school. I told her I never wanted to work in a factory again.

When school started, I took a job at the local Denny’s Restaurant. This was after I had tried my hand at selling fire alarms door-to-door. My intention was to leave town next fall when I started Journalism school at the University of Missouri. I thought that I would look for a job when I arrived in Colombia.

I ended up transferring to Southwest Baptist in Bolivar, MO, and did not return to the workforce until February of my senior year. Then I returned to food service by joining the opening staff at the first Wendy’s in my hometown. When I graduated, I was offered a chance to enter their management trainee program, and I accepted it.

Cindy and I got married, and two weeks later, we moved to Joplin. We opened the first store there, and by September, I had left them and gone to work as an assistant manager at a local convenience store. Then Cindy’s boss offered me a job as marketing director.

My job and Cindy’s ended six months later. I learned a new set of skills while marketing new products and helping organize a new division of the business. Opportunities were short on supply in our new town. We packed up after a week and returned to the third-largest city in Missouri.

I applied for unemployment and was approved, and had two weeks to wait for the payments to start. The unemployment office referred me to an interview for a sales job at five dollars a week less than their payments would be. I had to take it. I was selling pet supplies, which were new for me.

I read everything I could on the pets and products, and in three months, I became the store manager for a different store with the same company. A few months later, I was moved to a position at the wholesale warehouse owned by the same man. My next promotion with them was to a purchasing agent. This launched me on a completely new career track.

A few months later, I moved to a new company as a P.A. After changing jobs every few months, I wanted stability. I stayed there twenty-five years and moved to office manager, outside sales, and finally operations manager. After waiting four years for another promotion, I decided to take a buyer’s job at one of my customers.

 A few months later, I was advanced to purchasing supervisor. It was the best job I ever had. It ended in less than five years, and I spent three years drawing unemployment and working temp jobs. I finally found a job as a purchasing manager and ended my career with that manufacturer a few years later.

My careers spanned four decades, and then I began a new one as a writer. You get to witness this firsthand as I write columns and books and see where my talents and interests can take me. I hope you enjoy this ride as much as I have all of mine. I can’t wait to see if this one is a roller coaster or something less intense.

©Copyright 2025 by Charles Kensinger