At the end of the summer of the second year when the research was completed, we packed up and headed north again though we now drove a Toyota station wagon and paid to have a mover. Our son, Andrew, just over a year old, was in the back in his car seat. Embry and I had made a deal. Since she now had a master’s degree from UNC in bio statistics, which she got at UNC the second year when I was writing the Clay Street book, we agreed that we both would apply for jobs and whoever got a good job first should take it and that would determine where we lived. We applied for jobs in Atlanta, Boston, New York City and in Washington, DC. Naturally she got the good offer first, as a research assistant for a noted professor at Georgetown University, who was studying maternal and child health. So, the city we would move to would be Washington.
While in Chapel Hill we saw an ad in The Washington Post for a “old granny house” priced at $41,000 in Washington in a neighborhood called Cleveland Park (located near the National Zoo). I immediately drove up to Washington to take a look, liked the house and the neighborhood; and with some help from my parents plopped down money for the down payment. In those days, starter housing was much more affordable than it is today. Before we moved in, the house had been an illegal rooming house for about a dozen Thai Embassy employees, had dark drapes, dark walls, smelled like an Asian restaurant, and was showing its age. No wonder that it had been on the market for over six months! But it had good bones and potential. We loved living in that “old granny house” and lived there for over 40 years!
Now it was my turn to find a job. I tried again with public sector planning and housing jobs and made little progress. I was reluctant to try the private sector, but when I heard about a position with a private, city planning consulting firm owned by several North Carolina planning school alums, this seemed to be a natural, especially since most of their clients were cities and towns. I was able to schedule an interview with one of the partners, a guy in his mid-forties, who greeted me warmly. The interview went well until he asked me to describe my job doing the research in the Clay Street neighborhood. (At the time of the interview I did not have a publisher.)
The interview went like this:
Him: So, what were your specific policy recommendations?
Me: Actually, I did not make any specific policy recommendations.
Him: You must be kidding. None?
Me: No, I am not kidding. My “report” was about the people who lived there, hoping I suppose to better understand the needs and issues of working class white people.
Him: That was it? No policy recommendations? And the study was financed by a grant to my alma mater? This is a disgrace! First, you will never get it published. Second, I am embarrassed that UNC would undertake research without policy recommendations, and finally there is no place for you or people like you in this firm, or any legitimate city planning firm. Now get out of my office!
His smile was replaced by a frown as he pointed to the door.
Well, I thought, that did not go well.
So here I was with no job and no job leads. What to do next? There was one other planning consulting firm owned by a North Carolina city planning school grad. This firm, Gladstone Associates, called itself an “economic consulting firm” focusing mainly on private real estate developers, helping them make money. Good heavens, how could I ever work for a firm like that? It would be a sellout. After a couple of more leads resulted in disappointing interviews, I decided to send them my resume and to my surprise got an interview. My interview concluded, when the interviewer responded, “What you have been doing up to now hasn’t gotten you anywhere, Joe. And here you are talking to me about an entry level job. I am the executive vice president of Gladstone Associates. I am 29. You are over 30 years old. Buddy, you got a long way to go to catch up!” He said he would think about it and get back to me. And I had not even mentioned my Clay Street “report.” That would have killed any possibility.
Days passed and no response. Failed again, I concluded. I was beginning to get the idea that maybe I was in the wrong profession and that I should have stuck with becoming an ordained priest in the Episcopal Church. Oh well, I told myself, I did not want to work for a money grubbing firm like that anyway, helping private real estate developers get rich.
Several more days had passed when I received a thin envelop in the mail from Gladstone Associates. Just as I had thrown the Doubleday letter in the waste basket, I was ready to toss this one as well but with stoic resignation opened it to find to my complete surprise that I got a job offer for a position as associate in the firm.
I accepted immediately.
And it turned out to be one of the best decisions in my life. Why that was the case and how it changed my life will be the subject of the next post.