Worms or something more sinister?

In the mid 70's both of my sons went to work at the local worm farm. They spent their time sifting their young hands through bins of soil, retrieving worms of varying length and boxing them up for use as bait.

After working all week payday finally arrived but their boss could only promise them money "tomorrow".

The desert was infamous at the time as a place scoundrels went on the lam and hid out. All of us sitting around at the T-Bird nursing Joyce's watered down drafts were immediately suspicious, finally concluding the worm farm was a front for the mafia.

My sons didn't go back and not long after, the "worm farm" packed up its inventory and left town. To this day there are some who still believe the old mafia story, though in retrospect one might wonder why the mafia would go to a town of 200 in the middle of the Mojave to raise worms...