Email: "Sandhill Auto Salvage stays in the family"
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TAMA NEWS-HERALD - “I can remember it like it was yesterday. I was 13 and working for Bill Shaller on this farm. One afternoon Bill was in Pete Blazek’s tavern (now the Town Pump in downtown Tama.) Bill and (Tama car dealer) Floyd Tower. Floyd had three cars to sell to Lester Petermier who was in the junk car business then. They haggled on price - ‘Pete’ wanted to pay $15 and Floyd wanted $25.

“Lester wouldn’t budge. So Floyd said, “I’ll start my own junkyard.” And they brought those first three cars out here to the farm.” Joe said the cars “were a couple of ‘48 Chevys and a 1954 Plymouth or Dodge.” -

Those were the recollections last week of Joe Waterbury on the origin of Sandhill Auto Salvage, a place he has worked at for 55 years and owned for the past 39.

That era is coming to an end on Jan. 1. Sort of. Joe and his wife, Ellen, are selling the business to their son and daughter-in-law, Mike and Mitzi Waterbury. But Joe plans to continue to be there and Mike and Mitzi said they depend upon that.

Like his father, Mike has worked at Sand Hill virtually all his life. Mitzi has been in the business for the past four years.

Mike and Mitzi say they have no plans for any big changes and will continue with the 12 current employees. Among those is Carl Tomlinson, Tama, who has been working for Joe since he bought Sandhill.

There was an update underway last week, however - Mitzi was busy getting an upgraded computer inventory system ready for use.

And Inventory points up one of the biggest change Joe Waterbury says there has been in the salvage business since it began on the hill just south of Tama in 1954.

“When we started, I cut up cars under a tree using a chain hooked on a limb,” he said. Now, vehicles are taken inside a building where all parts are numbered and items like the engines and transmissions are tested. Each is entered into a computer system and most are stocked in large warehouses dotting the 46-acre property.

“The way we sell parts” is the biggest change, though according to Joe. “When I first started, it was by telephone lines and speakers - called “hoot and holler.” Anyone who had been in the Sand Hill office or most any other salvage yard can recall the constant patter of the call for parts echoing through the room. The inventory then “was in your head” according to Joe.

Now, of course, the computer locates the parts being sought.

Joe says the demand for used parts remains strong but the parts themselves have changed. “In the 1970s, we sold whole front ends,” he said. Now, it’s a single fender or bumper.

Demand for parts to be shipped out resulted in building a new shipping area addition recently. Joe said the parts go all over the midwest primarily, with some going to other areas of the U.S. as well as to international destinations.

As a testimony to the success of Sand Hill Salvage, the business was named one of the top 10 Green Auto Recyclers in the United Stares and Canada in 2009. Joe said he has recycled over 60,000 vehicles in his years in business.

“Everything is going green,” Joe said. He said when a vehicle is brought in any gasoline in it is removed and used in equipment used in the salvage yard. Oil is drained and used in furnaces to heat buildings there. Anti-freeze is re-sold.

All salable parts are removed and what is left eventually goes to the crusher for recycling.

All those fluids “are under containment” so if something is spilled it does not go into the ground, Joe said.

Mike Waterbury is the current president of the Iowa Auto Recyclers Association. Joe is a past president of the organization.

Joe said honesty in dealing with customers and careful attention to ensure vehicles are being bought from their rightful owners has been keys to the long success of his business.

Mike and Mitzi Waterbury live on an 80-acre farm southwest of Tama where he has a 30-plus cow-calf herd. Mike is a 1990 graduate of South Tama High School Mitzi is a graduate of the university of Northern Iowa and has an M.A. from Iowa state University.

Joe Waterbury and Sand Hill Salvage have long been active in the community as members of the Tama-Toledo Area Chamber of Commerce, South Tama Athletic Boosters and Economic Development and for a special event - “The Sand Hill Nickel Scramble.”

That event has been featured at local celebrations for years - youngsters get to join each other in a big sand pile where coins have been hidden.

Sand Hill has also furnished vehicles to the local fire departments for many years to use in training exercises.

Even though he plans to remain active in the business, he recently told members of his 1959 Chelsea High School graduating class “I have a ‘honey-do list a mile-long to keep me out of trouble.”

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