About us
It was 1955. The weather was hot and dry. Abe Christensen had corn in his field, and the corn was all dried up. With a wife and three children to support, he knew he had to do something, anything, to raise money. Living in Omaha’s 102nd & Maple area (which back then was rural), Abe took one of his cattle trucks, filled the slots in the sides, and drove to 40th & Cuming. Going door to door, he asked the residents of the community if he could empty their trash. He wasn’t even sure what to charge, saying “pay me what you want to.” Though it’s hard to believe in today’s health-conscious society, in those days, 95 percent of the population burned their trash. Sometimes, particularly on windless nights or if there was fog, smoke hung over the city “so thick you could almost cut it,” Abe said. So Abe would pick up the trash and haul it to his farm, where he would burn it in a below-ground silo. Soon he had set up a fee schedule – $1 a month for once-a-month service, $2 a month for once-a-week service. He went to factories and got 50-gallon drums for his customers. He carried water to wet down the paper trash to keep it from blowing away en route to the farm. His wife Arlene helped unload the truck when he got home.
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