Yes, a soda jerk can become president

They called him Maggie.

Ernest Marsh came by the nickname as a teenager working in Clovis’ Elite Confectionery downtown more than 100 years ago.

Slaughter Murray, the ice cream parlor’s owner, had a phonograph for his customers’ entertainment.

“When no one else was playing a record, Ernest would put on his favorite tune, ‘When You and I Were Young, Maggie,’ and soon Murray and his buddies were calling him that,” Clovis historian Don McAlavy wrote in the history book “Curry County New Mexico.”

Ernest arrived in Clovis in 1909 when he was about 6 years old. His father brought the family to town from Virginia to build the community’s first brick school house, where Clovis Area Transit operates on Seventh Street today.

The younger Marsh did not spend much time in school himself. His father died when he was 9, so he had to help provide food and shelter for his mother and three siblings.

He sold newspapers, delivered the “Saturday Evening Post,” shined shoes and “did about every kind of job a widow’s boy could do around a small town,” the Clovis News-Journal reported in a 1968 profile. That included a series of jobs selling soft drinks and ice cream at competing drugstores.

When Maggie was 15, he went to work for Clovis’ Santa Fe Railway as a file clerk. Then he worked his way to the top.

“He went through all of the jobs in the division offices, ending up as division auditor,” McAlavy wrote.

“When that position was discontinued he moved to Amarillo in 1937 as auditor for the Santa Fe’s Western lines. He rose through the ranks to become president of the Santa Fe system in 1957, a position he held until 1966, when he was named chairman of the board.”

Today is a good day to remember the rags-to-riches life of Ernest S. “Maggie” Marsh because this week marks the anniversary of his passing, on Oct. 9, 1975.

His story provides a good example for us all.

“A soft-spoken man, deliberate in thought and speech, Mr. Marsh never forgot his beginnings nor friends made in those early years in Clovis,” the newspaper reported in memorializing him upon his death.

And it wasn’t just the work ethic and business acumen that earned him such respect.

“(Santa Fe employees) still active today recall with pride bowling with Mr. Marsh and stories of his expertise in the sport are legend.”

Thanks for the inspiration, sir. Or as the song put it:

“To me you’re as fair as you were, Maggie,

“When you and I were young.”

David Stevens is editor for Clovis Media Inc. Contact him at: [email protected]

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