Voris in 1966

Voris started working as a newspaperboy in 1965 at the age of 11. He originally had 45 customers, but they had a contest for the paperboy who got the most new subscriptions. He managed to almost double the number of customers taking the newspaper. However, he was getting new customers off of his route. His boss Don D. said that he appreciated the effort, but then gave these new customers to the boys who's routes were on these streets. Voris had hired his younger brother to help with these new customers, as he was too young. You had to be at least 11 to be a paperboy. His brother was 8. The contest was supposed to provide a trip to Washington DC to the paper boy who got the most new subscriptions. He didn't get the trip, but was given several prizes including a diving watch. He also purchased a red Huffy bicycle in Dayton Ohio to help with the route. It cost $60. He paid for it all in change. $60 in 1965 was an incredible amount of money, today's value of over $600 (see below). In the 1960's bicycles were expensive and less than half the kids had one. A bicycle was a status symbol. Other kids were often asking to ride it, but he never let any of them ride it. When he purchased it he didn't know how to ride a bike, but within about a month he learned. His route ran from McClung and Lafayette down Clay Street to Young Street. After the contest he had 55 customers. He really cashed in at Christmas time as he provided Christmas cards to all of his customers. He had several older customers. He would spend time talking to them and also offered to do odd jobs. His favorite was John D. He lived alone and had a dog, but couldn't read, so Voris would come over and read the paper to him. He had the Clay Street route until 1967 when his father had a brick ranch built in Heritage Hills. They then gave him a new route in this area. In the five years that he worked as a paperboy he never had a complaint.

Voris with his red Huffy bicycle and his brother in the fall of 1966.

If you were a kid in the 1960's this was the ultimate status symbol. Neither one of my brothers or sister had a bicycle. In fact I can't remember any of my cousins having one either. In those days your bicycle had to be inspected every year and had to be licensed like a car. You'd get a license sticker that had to be displayed on the rear fender. Only about 40% of kids had a bike and most were old junk. So a new Huffy was like a Rolls Royce to a kid in the 1960's, i.e. cost $617.10 in today's money, no gears and nothing but a coaster brake.