MY BLIND FILE CLERK

BY

CHARLES L. LUNSFORD

All Rights Reserved

In 1967, I was a newly promoted branch manager of my company's office in Oklahoma City. Similar to a credit bureau, it was a subsidiary of the larger conglomerate, and specialized in the larger, in-depth custom-built credit reports of the time. In those days, credit reporters actually called former credit grantors for information, rather than pushing a button on a computer keyboard. It was my second branch assignment, after a year in between as a sales representative in the company's largest branch in Los Angeles, but Oklahoma City was a very big promotion for me. It was a large, well-established operation and I was anxious to prove myself there.

Moving to Oklahoma City was a major culture shock for me. I was a city boy, suddenly immersed in what seemed to me a very provincial environment, and the adjustment was difficult for me. Oklahoma City was where I learned that I would have to make myself over to fit the place, rather than trying to make the place over to fit me.

I was the new kid on the block, taking over an established, well-staffed branch office, and my performance there would determine whether or not I would continue to move up in the company. Additionally, my predecessor had been very well liked by the staff, a situation that made it difficult for me to step into his shoes. But well liked or not, he had been sloppy in his cost accounting and it took me a long time to straighten out the mess.

The branch was back in the black by the third month, mostly because of the three excellent, long term credit reporters I was fortunate enough to inherit with the job, and skillful enough to cultivate. Things were going very well and prospects for me and the Oklahoma City office seemed bright.

One problem remained, however. I had inherited a huge stack of newspaper legal records the previous manager had been sandbagging. They were an essential part of the information we needed to make those large credit reports, and we couldn't do that unless they were in the file. My predecessor hadn't been able to find the money to get it done, and concealing that from higher management was the straw that broke the camel's back. He was terminated.

As I said, those were the days before automation and most of the office consisted of thirty-five large five-drawer file cabinets, crammed to bursting with 8 ½ by 11-inch paper files. Most of it was on company paper, known as "eye-ease green" and this huge paper file had to be maintained on a daily basis. A good file clerk was worth his/her weight in gold, and a wise manager went to great lengths to keep the few who could do it well.

My full-time employees could maintain the file, but there was no way they could handle those thousands of legal records, so I applied for, and got, enough money to hire a crew to transcribe and file them. The job would take about a month to complete, so I ran an ad in the paper under the temporaries, in search of people to get this job done.

It was a minimum wage job, and the quality of the applicants wasn't the highest, but then it wasn't exactly demanding work, either. So I hired three of the best of them and put them to work. It soon became evident that these early Baby Boomers had a rather different grasp of what the term "work" meant, but they were all I could get for that price, and I was hopeful they would improve with time.

On the morning of the second day, a young lady appeared to apply for the job. She was very well dressed and obviously several cuts above the employees I had already hired for the job. As I ushered her into my office to tell her that the transcribing job had already been filled, I noted that only a large, and un-becoming pair of coke-bottle-thick eyeglasses marred her good looks.

I was completely disarmed when she began to weep at the news, and the only thing I could do was offer her my handkerchief. She sobbed that she really needed a short-term job, almost begging. This young lady obviously wanted to work – a refreshing departure from the three transcribers I already had, and although I planned to hire a clerk to file the records after the transcribing was finished, I asked her if she would consider doing the filing, instead of the transcribing. She brightened and said that she could, but she could only work for about six weeks, because she would be going to work at Tinker Air Force Base. She only needed a job in the interim.

This new development would fit perfectly with my plans for the legal records, and like most other men, I've always been a sucker for a weeping woman, so I hired her on the spot and told her to be to at work promptly at eight the next morning. I was pleased with myself for finding a file clerk who would work for minimum wage.

Was I a MANAGER, or what?!

I had some early sales calls the next morning, so I was late getting into the office. My reporters were busily making phone inquiries and my new transcribers were just as busily doing as little as possible. And best of all, my new temporary file clerk was busily filing those dammed legal records. The Oklahoma City Branch was humming like a fine watch and I plunged into the pile of paperwork on my desk.

The little cubicle that was my office was glass-enclosed, and all I had to do to check on my domain was look up. When I looked over at my new file clerk after an hour or so, I noted that she was still in the same place she was when I came in, at the front of the first drawer at the top of the first filing cabinet the beginning of the file. She should have been a couple of drawers farther on by this time.

As I watched, I did a double take. She would pick up a sheet to be filed and hold it about two inches from her eyes and scan it back and forth, then shifting to the files in the drawer, do the same thing to them. I watched her for a few minutes and she did the same thing to everything she filed.

I caught the eye of my senior reporter and unofficial assistant manager, Joyce, and motioned for her to come in. I nodded toward the new file clerk. "What do you make of that?"

Joyce grimaced. "I don't think she can see, Mr. Lunsford. She's been working hard, though, since she came in this morning," she said. "Didn't even take a break."

I thanked Joyce and she went back to her desk, probably very sure that her new Branch Manager was an incompetent idiot.

I watched the new file clerk for a few more minutes. She was obviously diligent, but at the rate she was going, it would take her forever to get all those legal records into the file. I would have to find someone else. I recalled something my division manager had said when I complained about a problem that was troubling me. "If managers didn't have these little problems, we wouldn't need managers. That's why we pay you the big bucks."

Yeah, right – big bucks!  Well, now I would have to earn some of them. I called the new clerk into my office and asked her to sit down. The look of apprehension on her face was pitiful, but I tried to smile to put her at her ease, but it didn't work, so I plunged on.

"Are you having trouble seeing the files?" I asked as gently as I could. She burst into tears and I gave her my handkerchief again, and after a few minutes she calmed down enough to talk to me.

"I know I should have told you, Mr. Lunsford, but I really need a job and I was afraid you wouldn't hire me.” She hesitated a moment, then went on. "I'm – I’m legally blind, Mr. Lunsford. I can see a little, so I thought I could do the filing for you – but I guess I can't."

I felt like a dunce. Some manager I was, boy!  I had hired a blind file clerk.

"Oh, please, Mr. Lunsford," she said.  “Couldn't you find something for me to do?  I'm a very hard worker, and I really need this job.”

She looked at me with tears in her eyes and my heart went out to her. I didn't know if she could see me or not, because I felt very small just then, but I could feel her anguish. And so could my reporters. I glanced up to see Joyce and Marie and Ermaline listening, waiting to see how the new kid on the block was going to handle this little dilemma.

"I’m so very sorry,” I said. "The last thing I want to do is let you go. I need help with these legal records," I said, "but I don't know what you can do here if you can't see."

Her upper lip seemed to stiffen. "I can do that," she said pointing to the table where the three temporary workers were leisurely copying the very small print of the newspaper records by hand onto sheets of "eye-ease green" paper. It was hard to read fine print in those records with good vision and this young lady had just told me she was legally blind.

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see my three reporters hanging on every word.

"You can?"

"Yes, sir,” she said.  “I have a big magnifying glass I use for reading, and I can see to write. That's how I got through college."

She wasn't crying anymore and gave me back my handkerchief. I could see she had gathered herself up and the intestinal fortitude was apparent. This young woman had guts and she had just hit the ball back into my court.

The Oklahoma City office seemed paused in time, waiting to see how the new manager would handle this little problem. "All right," I said. "We'll try it. Do you have the magnifier with you?"

Her face brightened. "No sir, but I can go and get it and be back by lunchtime."

She stood up and thanked me, then walked out to get her purse from which she took a collapsible white cane. The cat was out of the bag. "I'll be back as quickly as I can," she said, and walked out the door.

I stared at the closed door for a moment, a little dumbfounded. This blind young lady was displaying a degree of courage that seemed refreshing. As I turned back to my desk, I noticed my three reporters were all smiling at me. Were they smiles of approval or were they laughing at me for making such a stupid mistake? I couldn't tell, but either way, I was embarrassed, so I put on my hard-boiled manager's face, and looked them in the eyes. "If you ladies don't have any work to do, I'll see if I can find some for you." It wasn't their fault I was an idiot, but I took it out on them, anyway.

True to her word, my blind file clerk was back before lunch with her big, letter-size magnifying glass, and wasted no time getting to work with it. It had extendible legs and stood about four inches above the table. She put it on top of the newspaper and began to transcribe, writing clearly and legibly at a speed probably three times as fast as the other transcribers.

The next morning, I selected the best of the other three temporaries, and put her to work doing the filing. We had to make up a card with the alphabet so she could keep the letters in the proper order, but she did a passable job, even improving her speed as time went on.

My blind file clerk was so good at transcribing that I let the other two go, and she finished the job alone and ahead of schedule.

We all hated to see her go when she left to take her job at Tinker – which, we later learned, was a job in a civil service program for the handicapped. She was the type of employee with which all managers seek to surround themselves – the ones who make managers look like managers. She certainly made me look good.

I never heard from her again, but I suspect she did well in life. She certainly had the necessary courage to do whatever she wanted --blind or not.

My blind file clerk was truly a diamond in the rough.

CLL – November 30, 2000