'Better than sitting around'

0 Comments | La Crosse Tribune, Apr 6, 2009 | by Jungen, Anne

In September 1946, Walter Marx applied for a part-time job at Kroner True Value Hardware and was hired on the spot.

Back then, he was 20. Today, he's 83 and still working 40 hours each week at the downtown La Crosse store at 319 Pearl St.

Marx is the most senior of the store's four employees--by a landslide.

"What turned out to be a part-time job turned out to be quite a long time," he said.

Marx picked up the job as a student at the LaCrosse Vocational School, the predecessor to Western Technical College, when he had hopes to work at a tool shop or Trane Co. someday.

"I had no general knowledge of the store, but I always had an interest in tools," he said. "On my first day, I broke a window when a toy wagon I was building rolled away."

Sixty-two years later, Marx hasn't even considered retirement.

"It's better than sitting around," he said.

Marx was born Jan. 15 1926, the last in a string of three boys. He grew up on a rural Cashton farm and moved to La Crosse at 16 years old.

"You'll go one hell of a long way before you fundsomewhere with the scenery of La Crosser he said.

Marx joined the U.S. Marines in 1944 and traveled during World War II laying telephone lines. He returned to La Crosse in April 1946 and was hired at Kroner's five months later.

A friend introduced Marx to his future wife, Pat, when he was 26 and she was 19.

When I met him, I thought he was an old man," she said.

They married June 27, 1953, and have three grown children, Steven, Greg and John, three grandsons and a granddaughter. The couple said they enjoy Sunday car rides and dining at Applebee's, Ardie's and Schmidty's restaurants.

Pat Marx sighs when her husband mentions his collection of antique tools stored in the basement of their home on La Crosse's North Side.

"They go completely from wall to wall," Pat Marx said.

Walter Marx favors any tool that drills holes in his set that's only for looks.

He fills the 40-hour work weeks helping customers, answering the phone and managing the tool department of the rare old-fashioned community-oriented hardware store.

"He's an authority on a lot of subjects," said Edgar Kroner, who ran the store from 1946 to 1993. "He's a very good gentleman and a trusted gentleman. He's been an asset for the company for a long time."

It's his love of tools, the business and its customers that bring Marx to work every day. The medical benefits don't hurt either, he said.

Marx claims he doesn't pull his weight at the store and said he's slowed his workload some since undergoing bypass surgery at 67 years old.

"People have been good to me here," he said. "I can't imagine going to a job and hating what you're doing."