An American Success Story

Everybody loves a Damon Runyan rags-to-riches success story. In America anyone with a good idea and the willingness to make an effort to make it work can succeed... and you don't have to be Bill Gates to get ahead. I suppose you're wondering what a roach coach has to do with success- so I'll tell you.

Billy (I'm not sure about his last name) Faye or Fahey worked at the corner store, I guess what you call a convenience store now- we called them Mom n Pop stores back in the day. Billy was probably 14 or 15 when I met him. He was practically running the place for "Matches" Sullivan. "Matches" had a propensity for cruising around in high-end cars, vettes, Jags, Caddies, etc. and after a couple of months he'd get tired of them and light them on fire and collect the insurance. So, he didn't have a lot of time for running the store. Then "Matches" went to jail (yup, for arson) and Billy lost his job. Matches bought the ground floor of a highrise in N. Cambridge and put in a store. It didn't do very well so... Anyway the cops told me that he put so much gasoline in the place, it imploded and almost took the building down. It was bye-bye Matches.

Billy got a job driving a roach coach. I don't think he ever finished school, but that wasn't a setback for him. Billy was smart enough to run a store at 14, so running a roach coach wasn't much of a challenge. he drove for someone else for a couple of years- until he was 18 or 19. Then he got an idea. Now if you've ever eaten off one of those trucks, I probably don't have to point this out; but, if you haven't, the food is pretty nasty!

What Billy figured is that if you gave people good food for a fair price, they would keep coming back... not because they had to, to buy a minimum- but because they wanted to to actually spend some money. Billy saved his money and first, he bought the truck. Then he hired a lady from the neighborhood to make really good sandwiches. In the winter, she would make good homemade soup as well. Well, Billy turned out to be a pretty smart guy after all. The last I heard he had about 15 trucks. He hired a whole bunch of the kids that had grown up with him, from the neighborhood and a several women to keep the trucks supplied. Billy is a millionaire... Matches may be out of jail by now.