Many of the toughest passages were those where I struggled in the channel between “want” and “need.” My account may provide you with some understanding of the challenges of money, and the need for caution. I didn’t know what money was when I was a kid on Cat Island. In Nassau, want became much more acute as a sense of my family’s poverty began to dawn on me. What I wanted most in those days was to go to the movies, which led to my first economic venture, one that I undertook with Yorrick Rolle—my friend who later had the misfortune of being sent to reform school. A tall kid for his age, with an easy smile and willing demeanor, Yorrick seldom had the sixpence—about a dime in American currency—that movie tickets cost. Nor did I. Together we devised a way to earn the money in an entrepreneurial fashion by buying raw peanuts, roasting them, and selling them outside the theater to get a penny here or a penny there. But often there weren’t enough pennies. This was the era when I had to stop school at age twelve and a half to go to work.
