Levi Manz

2nd shift delivery driver picking up fuel at terminals and delivering to gas stations.

Ran local runs home every night hauling mostly steel to construction sites but anything and everything in between. Hauled over length loads up to 101ft and some over width loads. Typically delivered a load in the morning and then picked one up in the evening to deliver the next day. Ran electronic logs and worked through a dispatcher.

I worked for my uncle’s custom at spraying business for a summer. I drove a tender semi field to field and mixed batches of chemicals for the sprayer. I operated the hagie sprayer occasionally either spraying a field or transporting to a new field. When not spraying I drove flatbed, dump trailer, and did odd jobs around the shop.

I worked a for a tile factory who owned and operated a methane digester. Most of the time I ran a truck and tanker picking up wastewater or waste liquids and hauling them back to the digester. Occasionally I would run dump trailer picking up solid waste to bring to the digester. When things were slow I would deliver field tile to customers throughout Ohio. I worked second and third shift when needed for the tanker side. I also hauled the trash to the dump for Haviland drainage. Loading a dump trailer with a backhoe and then delivering to the county landfill.

Pivot manager for a dairy farm, my job was to oversee the irrigation pivots by turning them on and off, watching them, routine maintenance, checking and reporting weather, moving the pivots, and keeping track of the gallons of manure applied to the fields. Alongside this I did odd jobs on the farm operating equipment such as skid steers, front loaders, tractors, backhoes, and an excavator. I hauled feed between dairy farms and helped with silage chopping. I operated a lowboy transferring equipment a few times when needed.

I worked in the wire harness building after school and during the summer building custom wire harnesses. I crimped wires, soldered wires, tested harnesses, built plugs, applied heat shrink and plastic loom to harnesses, and plugged wires into plugs.

Milked cows during the summer on 12 hour shifts in the parlor. Herded cows in, hooked the milkers up, cleaned and sanitized the udders, and cleaned the parlor when milking was over. During school I did janitorial work instead. I swept and mopped floors and refilled paper towels and toilet paper as well as emptied trash cans around the dairy.

I worked on a bee farm for three summers from the age of 12 to 14. I spent most of my time in the extracting room, my job was to scrape the boxes that the honey frames were kept in to clean off all the bee wax and waste so they could be sent back out. I would also clean the extracting room after the work day. Occasionally I would go out in the bee yard and help bring the honey in, and when things were slow I would build new boxes and frames or do odd jobs around the shop.