This week's Summer Listens starts where we sincerely hope you are while you're listening,

the beach, specifically the boardwalk, where we join our former colleague Mike Wolo to learn about

the art of the pitchmen.

Growing up in northern New Jersey in the 1970s and 80s,

I would make regular trips down to Atlantic City with my family when school was out.

There are certain sounds that stick out in my memory from those summers on the boardwalk.

The ocean, of course.

Seagulls screeching overhead just outside the planter's peanut store. The ocean, of course.

Seagulls screeching overhead just outside the planter's peanut store.

The arcade.

Oh, yeah. And this guy.

There's no pumps. There's no motors. There's no batteries.

It works direct from a bucket.

Wash your car, your boat, your camper, your trailer.

That's Billy Mays pitching the amazing washmatic, a portable cleaning system.

If you weren't a professional pitchman, you might call it a 10-foot hose, a simple siphon with a one-way valve. It helps you save water.

One bucket to wash, one bucket to rinse. Mays would set up on the boardwalk with a washmatic and a minivan door and pitch that product all day.

It earned him the nickname Bucket Billy.

Mays says he learned from some of the best pitchmen, we'll never know,

guys selling everything from fishing gear to facial cream,

and he counts himself among the last of the old mold.

He even uses the jargon of the hard sell during conversation.

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