Lester McAlister:  

Life When I graduated from West in 1974 I had the opportunity for a scholarship in electronics, but decided to pass on college. I was already working in a service station making good money and couldn’t see the need…. and…. didn’t have the desire. Early in 1975 I decided to make the move to a New Car dealership and went to work as a Used Car Technician at Northpark Mazda in Davenport, which used to be located across from the VW dealership on Kimberly. After a few months I was promoted to the New Car Department and spent all day overhauling rotary engines, which I enjoyed very much. Then in late 1975 Northpark Mazda was bought out by Volkswagen/BMW of East Moline and I decided to move across the river as the pay was much better than what I was making. Once I started working at East Moline I was making more money than I had before and could actually afford to move out on my own. I rented an apartment in Moline packed up my stuff and moved out on my own…. alone and single. A short while later I was swimming at one of my fellow Technician’s house and met his niece, Julie. We started dating and fell madly in love and got married on October 28, 1977. Little did we know at the time, but we had a little surprise in store and my son Joel (named after my best friend when I was a kid) was born on July 2, 1978 (you do the math). We bought our first little house on 18 ½ Avenue in Rock Island in 1979 and life was going well. I was promoted to Service Manager, won a few awards from VW and BMW, increasing my knowledge and experience over the next few years. In 1982 I was recruited by a large dealership in Corpus Christi, Texas and decided to make the move from Illinois to Texas. I lived with friends in Corpus while Julie was getting everything together back home, but it didn’t take long to realize that the “big” dealer had lied to me about many things. Fortunately, friends I made with Mazda over the years called an...Expand for more