COLUMBUS — They could hear the incessant circus melody of Chilly Billy”s ice cream truck from the other end of the street.
“Stop! Stop!” the girl and two boys yell as they come running from their backyard, their feet smacking the hot pavement.
Billy Thomas slows the lime-green Ford E-150 van and puts it in park while Wesley Lake, a senior at Immanuel High School, leans out the window, ready to take orders.
“What can I get for this?” asks the girl. She plunks a $1.15 in change down on the window sill.
“About eight Freeze Pops,” Lake says.
The girl nods enthusiastically and waits while Lake digs in the freezer. He hands them to her along with the extra 15 cents.
“Bye!” says the girl as she runs off with a fistful of popsicles, holding them out of arm”s reach from the two boys.
“Have a good day!” Lake calls after them.
In this heat, a popsicle will turn into a puddle before you can say “lickety-split.” That”s why the kids eat them fast, fighting through the brain-freeze, before the sticky droplets from their frozen treats have a chance to run down their fingers.
Thomas, a volunteer basketball and track coach at Immanuel High School, started the ice cream truck business three years ago as a way for his players to make some money during the summer and learn life lessons about interacting with customers and working hard. His students enthusiastically signed on and came up with other ideas for summer jobs such as a mobile car wash and shrimp stands. Thomas calls the informal program “Young Men At Work.”
“It teaches them to not only take the money and be personable but to have fun, too,” Thomas says.
Thomas drives the van at a crawl, hovering between five to 10 miles per hour with the windows down and his eyes peeled for customers.
“You know you”re going slow when a bicycle passes you,” he laughs as a man pedals past the truck and wipes the sweat from his face with a rag.
A man in a beat-up sedan starts to drive by but pulls up short in the middle the road. He leans out the window and asks Thomas what”s available.
“You want a popsicle?” Thomas asks.
“How much?” replies the man.
“A dollar.”
“That”s all?”
“That”s all.”
The man opens his door, steps into the middle of the street and hands a bill to Thomas while other drivers wait patiently for the transaction to finish.
“People don”t really get mad at you for blocking the streets,” Thomas says. “They”ll find a way around you.”
Police officers have stopped the ice cream truck frequently in the past, not to question Thomas, but to give him a few bucks and tell him to give some free ice cream to kids around the next corner. Each time, Thomas tells the kids who paid for the treats.
“Kids need to know when they”re young that the police officers are their friends,” he says.
In some cases, Thomas even gives Freeze Pops away for free because he trusts customers to come back and buy something the next time.
It”s not all fun and games in the truck. The dark vinyl seats get hot, and with all of the windows open it doesn”t do any good to turn on the air-conditioning. Thomas and Lake keep water bottles on hand to rehydrate themselves after sweating so much.
“This is a lunch-til-dark kind of job,” Thomas says. “You”re drenched by the time you get through.”
The song pauses for a moment, teasing Thomas and Lake that it might mercifully end once and for all. But after a couple of seconds, it starts again from the top.
“It catches its break and takes back off,” Thomas laughs. “It”ll drive you crazy. We changed the song one time, and you wouldn”t think it would be that big a deal, but it really mattered to the people on the street.”
People look forward to hearing the sound of Chilly Billy approaching, Thomas says, and they know exactly when the van should arrive on a given day.
“Something about that crazy song must make people smile,” he says. “Very few people ever come up to that window mad. For maybe just a minute it makes them happy.”
And it”s that song that draws children and their parents out of their hot houses. Business is better at the beginning of the month when people have money to spend, but Thomas doesn”t seem to be in it for the dollars.
“In whatever area you”re in, they all kind of help take care of each other,” Thomas says. “I”ve seen where some older teenagers would have money, and some little bitty something will come up and not have any money, and they”ll buy them something. To me, I think that”s very neat.”
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Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 39 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.
