You know the deal to buy Crown was a real sweet deal, Dick Carl just had mother nature on his side. You guys ever worked in a hurricane. It's nothing pretty. That southern route that dick carl had was nice. It was a full two unit southern route. Some spots just paid the bills,but if we could have got all the spots in that first year I wouldn't be here on this post talking to you people, I'd be on the midway ginnin!!! Jeff wanted Crown to be Pugh. He started his first year with Crown and pugh, the next year crown pugh, then finally we had four solid units of pugh shows. Jeff tried to build rome in a day and if Hurricane Floyd had not come about he might have pulled it off.
Enron and martha stewart were not good comparisons because they were wrong and jeff just had bad luck. Or you might say it was bad karma. All shows have been guilty of messing people over, jeff just seemed to do it more. J& J amusements hired me as green help last year in dublin. I went in and talked to the unit manager. Told him my experience and told him I might consider a position if the pay was fair. I tore down the entire kid land, which on this unit was about seven rides beofre the first major was on the truck. Their kiddie land foreman couldn't lead a trianed dog let alone a bunch of dopes they had to work with, so it was a real treat to do this work. I figured if i tore down 7 rides i'd at least get 10 dollars a ride. Right wrong. we started at 11 and i was down at 5. i got 5 bucks a hour. I see the reason to pay true green help this but not a guy whose trying out for the team. hell i used to kick out of my own pocket for guys that snapped on tear down to get them on my team. Of course they were always taken away shortly after but i got their talents and attributes for the good of the team. Anyway the point i'm trying to make is jeff always payed well, some say too well, but he took care of his help. He respected people who deserved it. And I personally didn't like some of his judgement calls I still feel he is a carnival icon like red woods and jim day and will always have my upmost respect and envy. So if you hold hatred for the man let me ask you this, What are you doing to make the carnival industry a better place? And what are you doing now??? Jeff was very innovative in the way we move our shows and a lot of people copied him. So all I can say is good luck Mr. Pugh in all that you do, and the rest of you who think differently. When I see you down and having a bad season. Maybe I'll kick you.