Taxi, Taxi.
In the early 1970's we, (Donna Cynthia and I) moved to Seattle from Klamath falls Or. and moved in with my brother Jerry and his family. Work was scarce and we all scraped to stay fed etc.I cant remember if it was an ad in the paper or how we got wind of an opportunity to stave off hunger. It turned out that the owner of a service station owned a taxi cab and needed to operate it 24 hours a day.
Enter Jerry Bell and Bob Bell. We were to operate it as if it were ours with a percentage of the income to be given to the owner. Can't remember the percentage but remember it was fair to us.
We each operated the cab 12 hours changing as we needed.
This gave us a job , an income, and a vehicle to use. All went well for a year or more that we were in the Taxi business And decided to move to Bellingham our hometown.
During one of my night shifts I had a male passenger that wanted to go to a bar in south Seattle, by the way our Cab was called 'South Town Cab' our call # was 45 we were given our customer address from a dispatch service in downtown Seattle. As I turned into the bar and parked to let the Gent out he pulled a knife and wanted some cash. I thought to myself 'something is wrong here' I'm the one should get cash
Before I continue I need to tell you that during my many nightime shifts I became friends with 'Red'
I never knew his last name, Just 'Red'. Oh! I almost forgot, he Was with the King County Sheriff Dept.
Now back to 'knife man', he was quite drunk and his knife was a pocket knife, but a real knife.I said "if you get out I will give you what I have" he opened the door and fell down, I quickly shut and locked the door and called dispatch. telling them my situation, the knife man was standing alongside my cab jabbering something when a Sheriff Car screeched to a halt alongside bandit man.
Red was not only a big man but very, very intimidating to those that didn't know him.
"Are you okay he asked me" "he hasn't paid his fare yet" Well lets see what we can do Red told me and frisked the man that he had in hand cuffs and lo and behold I got my fare plus a little.
I found out that Red was tuned in to the Taxis frequency and was nearby when I made the call.
