The Craftsman Screwdriver Story

1956

A true Story

Written 4/ 2013* 823 Words*

#156 By Howard Yasgar

I was 16 years old at the time this story took place.

It was 1956 and I was living in Westville Connecticut.

I had just recently received my driver’s license, and I had also just bought my first car, a 1940 Ford convertible.

At the time I was aspiring to be an automotive mechanic, so every time I had a few extra bucks I would go to Sears and Roebuck and buy some Craftsman tools.

I liked Craftsman tools because they looked and worked perfectly, and Sears and Roebuck tools had a lifetime guarantee.

Sears advertised that they would cheerfully replace any tool that broke, providing it wasn’t abused.

I thought it was one hell of a good guarantee, although I had never broken a Craftsman tool in my life, and I didn’t know anyone that ever had.

It was a bitter freezing cold that Saturday morning in December when I decided to see if my car would start.

I knew the temperature outside was well below freezing, probably below zero, but if I got the car started, I could then run my cars heater.

While I was waiting for the car to heat up, the cars generator would also be charging up my battery.

I dressed warmly and went outside to start the car.

I got into the driver’s seat, and tried starting it, but it didn’t start, the battery was stone dead, and it was freezing cold.

I had a spare battery in the garage, and I also had jumper cables in the car’s trunk.

I went into the garage and went in my Sears Craftsman toolbox.

I needed to find something like a pry bar to force the trunk latch to open.

Fortunately, I found the right tool, it was a jumbo Craftsman screwdriver, it was a tool I rarely ever used because it was so big.

The screwdriver was about 15 inches long and its shaft was made of ½ inch square hardened steel.

I took it outside, then I put the key in the trunk lock, and I forced screwdriver between the trunk lid and the car’s body.

As I turned the key, I pushed down hard on the screwdriver and the screwdriver simply snapped in half.

I knew that at extremely low temperatures metal became brittle.

I also knew I should never have used that screwdriver as a pry bar in such cold weather.

I wondered if Sears would give me a new screwdriver under their lifetime warranty.

I was planning on heading to Hamden Connecticut that morning and I knew there was a Sears Roebuck store there.

I put another battery in the car, and then I took the two pieces of the broken screwdriver with me.

At the Sears store I parked in their large parking lot, which had been freshly plowed.

I was one of only a few cars at Sears that morning, because it was so freezing cold.

I went up the escalator to the second floor where there was a Craftsman tool section.

There was a salesman standing in the tool department and I handed him the 2 pieces of my broken screwdriver, and I asked him for a warranty replacement.

The salesman looked at the two pieces, then he looked at me and said, “How the hell did you ever break this god damn thing?”

He said, “I have worked for Sears in the tool department for 20 years and I never saw one of these big screwdrivers broken like this”.

So, in all honesty I said, sir, all I did was turn a screw, and the screwdriver just broke in half, I knew, that he knew I was lying.

He looked me in the eye and said, you must be kidding, you can’t break a screwdriver like this turning a screw.

I said, it has a lifetime guarantee doesn’t it, and I said it with a straight face.

Yes, he said, but the warranty excludes misuse, or if you abuse our tools.

The salesman looked extremely disgusted at me, but he went to a cabinet and took out another big jumbo screwdriver and handed it to me.

He was shaking his head as he did it.

I said thank you, and I went down the escalator and out of the store into the parking lot.

It was still freezing cold outside, and I again tried opening my trunk, but it still wouldn’t open.

I put my key back into the trunk lock and put the screwdriver under the trunk latch

and I pushed down on it, and again the jumbo screwdriver snapped into two pieces, just like the first one had done.

I think if I went up again to the Craftsman tool salesman with the second broken screwdriver, he would have strangled me.

The next day, the temperature warmed up, and my trunk lid popped open, just like it always did.

I never had the nerve to return that second broken screwdriver.