Radishes, Onions, and the Stupidity of Debt

Connecting the Dots: Radishes, Onions, and the Stupidity of Debt

By Tony Sagami

My father was fiercely religious, but he only went to church twice a year: Christmas and Easter. It wasn’t that he lacked faith; there was just too much farm work to feed his family of five.

My father wore dungarees and threadbare flannel shirts 363 out of the 365 days of the year, but he proudly wore his only suit every time he went to church. My siblings and I hardly recognized him in that suit, but we knew it meant it was an important occasion.

I distinctly remember one spring when I was eight or nine years old. I saw my father in his suit, but it wasn’t Easter and it definitely wasn’t Christmas.

“Why are you all dressed up, Daddy?” I asked.

He said he was going to the bank.

The bank?

Every spring, my father would shave, dab some Vitalis in his hair, put on his church suit, and go to our local bank to ask for a loan. He needed the money to buy seed, fertilizer, and fuel.

If the weather and crop prices cooperated, he would return proudly in the fall to pay back the loan in full. If not, he’d ask for an extension, his head hanging in shame.

The bad summers seemed to outnumber the good ones, but my father held bankers in high esteem. In fact, I think the only people my father revered more than his local banker were the minister of our Methodist church and my teachers.

My father told me how his banker helped our family through tough times—and times were almost always tough. There were the low wholesale prices of radishes and onions, the expensive fertilizer, and the negative cash flow between spring planting and summer harvests.

To my father, bankers were very important people.

Despite his gratitude and respect for bankers, my father also loathed the idea of borrowing money. Making a living as a farmer was hard enough, but it was even more difficult when you had to pay interest on borrowed money.

Although I am sad to say my father…