Salesmen Stories, July 30th, 2025

Salesmen Stories, July 30th, 2025

In the spring of 1965, my Dad was the regional sales manager for Dorsey Laboratories in Lincoln, Nebraska. Dad’s sales territory was the Rocky Mountain area, based in Denver.

Dad’s salesmen had done well that winter selling Triaminic Cough Syrup and Triaminicin, so to reward his best salesmen, he invited them to Lincoln at the end of May 1965.

Dad had the company put up the salesmen in the Cornhusker Hotel downtown. This was the best hotel in Lincoln. Dad had bought tickets for all the salesmen and me to go to see the Cassius Clay vs. Sonny Liston fight on pay-per-view at Pershing Auditorium.

I was thirteen. I was excited to see the fight and be with my Dad and his salesmen for the adventure.

We all know what happened in the fight. In the first round, Cassius Clay threw the “Phantom Punch” that knocked out Sonny Liston. Our big evening was over in 20 minutes.

Dad improvised. “Let’s go back to the hotel and play poker.”

And that’s what we did. Dad rented a suite, had some cards and chips delivered, and the game was on.

I was in the poker game, too. And I was doing okay.

One of the salesmen told a story about his worst eating experience as a salesman. He was in Malaya. At a fancy meal with his clients, the chef came out and killed a snake right at their table. The chef then dripped snake blood into his soup. Yummy!

The second salesman piped up and told his story. He was in Thailand. His clients brought him to a big outdoor barbecue. In the middle of the outdoor restaurant was one of those big cast-iron kettles like you see missionaries boiled in the cartoons.

A live monkey was thrown into the cast-iron pot of boiling water.

“The monkey’s screams still are in my head.” The salesman said, “When the monkey died, the chef came out, pulled the monkey up, and sliced off the top of his skull. He then scooped out the monkey brains and served them up to us in a bowl. We ate it with chopsticks.”

The third salesman told his story. He and his wife were in Peking, China. He’d brought his wife along for the trip. She insisted on bringing her little lap dog with her.

The salesman and his wife went to a fancy restaurant. His wife brought the dog.

“Please take care of my dog.” The wife said to the maitre d.”

The salesman and his wife had a great dinner of Mongolian beef. As they came out of the restaurant, the wife asked the maitre d, “Where is my dog?”

“You ate him.”

The salesman’s wife was in therapy for months.
It was one of my favorite evenings in my life.

TJM