This story originally appeared in the August 15, 2011 edition of This Land.
In 1973, author and two-time Libertarian presidential candidate Harry Browne published How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World. When he was 32, Jeff Hiller read the entire book, to the last lines: “They’re your dreams; it’s your life. No one else is going to make things right for you. Only your actions can provide the kind of life you want. Your time has finally come. Make the most of it.”
Hiller closed the back cover and converted an old school bus with a king-sized bed, a fireplace, and hammocks for his five children. He was in the driver’s seat when he saw a roadside sign for a Renaissance Pleasure Faire in northern California. Normally he’d take his family hiking or scuba diving, but the faire offered kids’ tickets, so he figured the worst that could happen is that they’d return to the bus disappointed, the kids with plastic swords peace-tied with rope around their waists.
The Hillers spent most of the day at the festival, slack-jawed. They ate turkey legs, rode rides and gawked at women in tall, cone-shaped hats and heavy brocade gowns. Hiller said it was one of the best days of their lives. And then, for a while, he forgot all about it.
A university professor by training, Hiller’s father had landed a gig as a higher-up with the Veterans Association in New York City. After Jeff was born, he asked to be transferred to the first hospital in a city with a population under 50,000. He landed in the city in northeast Oklahoma called Muskogee, named for the Creeks that relocated there after Indian Removal. He didn’t stay with the VA for long, opening instead a side-by-side convenience and liquor store operation near the railroad tracks north of town. One summer, he got the idea to set up a card table and use it as a place to sell fireworks.
Jeff trained to be a high school teacher, but eventually shunned the public school system to start a Montessori school he named Children’s House. His father’s fireworks business had caught on and was outgrowing the store, so Jeff opened a showroom across the street, using the proceeds as a fundraiser for the school.
“He had five school-age kids then, including me,” said Matt Hiller, Jeff’s son. “He decided it’d be easier to teach them at home, but home schooling wasn’t cool back then. So, he just made a school. It wasn’t long until there was a waiting list to get in.”
Soon even the new space began to strangle the growth of the fireworks business. Hiller made an offer on the Muskogee Elks Lodge, which hit the market downtrodden and empty after chain pubs gained the right to serve alcohol by the drink. Jeff and his children, each of them with a hand in the family business, warehoused the fireworks in the metal building that stood behind the lodge. After vandals sliced through it with shears, Jeff decided he’d let them try their luck on a false facade of concrete blocks.