Graham wraps up last workday
Name a job and the retiring senator has probably done it. Now, he looks back on what those experiences have meant.
ISLAMORADA - Bob Graham is a much better politician than a gift wrapper.
On his 408th - and final - workday Wednesday, Graham struggled as he wrapped diapers, a stuffed frog, a basketball and other gifts he would later help distribute to poor families in the Florida Keys.
As he contemplated how to approach a Lego-shaped box, a Girl Scout wrapping nearby suggested that next year he simply make a donation.
"That kind of hurt my feelings," Graham mumbled as he proceeded slowly, turning the box upside down and folding a huge sheet of paper over it.
While Graham may have had a little difficulty on this assignment, there's no question the workdays he began in 1974 helped propel a political career that will end early next month. Graham plunged into a new job each month on his way to becoming a two-term governor and three-term senator and he'll retire as one of Florida's most popular politicians.
What he achieved as a politician isn't an easy feat in Florida, where Democrats from Miami have a hard time gaining support from conservative North Florida voters. His work days helped him earn their trust.
"The formation of the workdays was brilliant," said Florida Democratic Party Chairman Scott Maddox. "He was a Harvard-educated person form South Florida and it showed that he was completely in touch with the people and he's continued to show that through his career."
The workdays were a "a stroke of genius," much like "Walkin' " Lawton Chiles' walk from Pensacola to the Florida Keys to help win a U.S. Senate seat and later two terms as governor, said Lance deHaven-Smith, a Florida State University political science professor.
Graham also compared his workdays to Chiles' 1,003-mile journey and wondered aloud why neither have been repeated.
"I don't know why there hasn't been other efforts, either to emulate a walk or workdays or some other way to establish a special relationship with the people," Graham said.
DeHaven-Smith speculated it's because of the tremendous effort. "It takes an enormous amount of time," he said. "It's one thing to do it once or even a few times, but he's done this for years.
The first workday was actually a semester teaching a civics class at a Miami high school when he was a state senator. The next was nearly three years later when he worked as a construction worker while gearing up his campaign for governor. Job No. 3 was as a Hialeah Park stable boy.
The list kept growing: No. 26, fish cleaner; No. 47, phosphate miner; Nos. 83 and 85 and 387, busboy; No. 94, chicken plucker; No. 160, a film grip; No. 230, pea picker; No. 251, train conductor; No. 317, student loan processor; No. 359, park ranger; No. 399, hurricane relief worker.
But he's still a politician. As he wrapped a pair of boxer shorts for a 16-year-old boy, he refused to list his favorite jobs or express any regrets over any of the assignments.
"I will say I think I had the physically most difficult job here in Monroe County working on the Boca Chica bridge where I was a concrete cutter," he said. "And then I had probably the best smelling job when I worked at Key West Fragrance. They actually made a fragrance that was named for my wife called Adele."
"I've done just about everything you can name, from doing your job as a reporter to being a garbage collector to an iron worker to a college professor," Graham said.
Graham also reflected on what the workdays meant for his career.
"This has been a very important part of my development as a public official, my learning at a very human level what the people of Florida expect, what they want, what their aspirations are and then trying to interpret that and make it policy that will improve their lives," Graham said.
And each December he tried to pick a job appropriate for the season.
"I've been Santa Claus. I've been an elf and on a number of occasions, as today, I've been a Santa Claus helper," said Graham, who wore a red shirt instead of a red suit. "I was going to put on the uniform, but Santa Claus himself has decided that's he's going to come to Islamorada today and you don't want to try to bump the real thing."