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Anna Kreis

Anna Kreis
Marengo, Iowa
Don Hummer Trucking
Scholarship Won: TCA Scholarship - $2,000

My mother’s employment at Don Hummer Trucking has influenced my family in many ways. Before my mother started working at Hummer we didn’t know a lot about the transportation industry. Now we’ve become more aware of semi-tractor safety, terminology, and equipment. I now see how important the transportation industry is to our society. When the company has staff appreciation picnics a semi-tractor is always there to take people for rides. These short experiences with riding inside of a semi have given me a deeper understanding of what it would be like to drive one. The company also sponsored a day of my driver’s education class by bringing a tractor-trailer and placing cars in the blind spots. We were allowed to sit on the driver’s seat and be shocked when we didn’t see any of the cars. Both of these experiences have stuck with me through out the years. As you can probably guess my mom has brought her work terminology back home. I’ve become more aware of the many names that are unique to the transportation industry such as; “sixteen wheeler”, refer (refrigerated trailer), sleeper, daycab, dryvan, stepdeck, and flatbed. When I was younger I knew there were refrigerated and non-refrigerated trailers, but it wasn’t until my mom started working at Hummer that I learned how to tell them apart by the green light on the refrigerator unit which is located on the front of the trailer. I also hadn’t realized that some cabs were made with beds and some were not. I had always assumed that all had beds. We as a family now understand the importance of this industry. Without it we wouldn’t have food, clothes, houses, roads, jobs, community, and many other things we take for granted.