Screwing up the courage to write about my last factory job, snared the summer after graduating college.
As mentioned in the previously published Memoir, “In a Bind,” composing my Contemporary Women’s Fiction novel, ‘An Enlightening Quiche,’ necessitated delving into the Industrial Revolution and subsequent rise of mills along the Blackstone River in northern Rhode Island. Hence, I construed the fictitious Brulé Bookbinding Co., nourished by memories retained from seasonal employment at Sidney-Higgins Bookbinding Co. during my freshman and sophomore college years.
And, now, I’ve screwed up the courage to write about my last factory job which I snared the summer after graduating college, prior to beginning my teaching career: H & H Screw Products. Long gone after the company moved south and left a legacy of soil contamination in its wake on a tract of land off the Eddie Dowling Highway.
Besides the auditory assault of deafening decibels, the stench of oil permeated my hair and formed black gunk under my fingernails. But, that wasn’t the worst of it. No siree! It was the tag team of horrible bosses I’ll tag Frick and Frack.
Slight-of-build and bespectacled, Frick put on the front of a jolly, good fellow sympathetic to the work force. Yet, he spent most of his day sequestered inside a glass-enclosed booth, spying on everyone. He’d turn the pages of a ledger and jot down behavioral notes, presumably to dissuade any offender from getting a raise.
Then, there was Frack—my nemesis! Of stockier build, he sported a steel-barbed crewcut, constantly chomped on his pacifier of a cigar, and always manifested a stern demeanor. He clearly had it in for me. But, having identified the enemy as a misogynist who got his jollies from bullying women, I stood my ground with a Goliath by driving him nuts.
Our first run-in came from my having to constantly call him to adjust the output of a machine. He’d make a macho show of bravado each and every time until I got up my nerve to tell him I no longer wanted to work the machine because “he was making me sick.” Well—out loud, he sarcastically repeated what I’d told him so everyone in the area got wind of it. Ha! Guess I told him, because he put me somewhere else.
There was the time he ate crow when the head secretary came out of the office onto the floor to ask me why I hadn’t applied for an office position with my credentials and typing ability. I just didn’t want to get all dressed up every day. Within earshot, Frack’s cigar dangled from his mouth, and he shook his head in disbelief. But, I think he got the message that I didn’t have to be there if I no longer wanted to.
Though I could regale you with more incidents, the straw that nearly broke his back occurred when he saw me getting organized for quitting time. It was an unspoken rule amongst the women at my bench that we got ready at 4:05 so we could hit the floor running when the buzzer went off at 4:15. Frack stood across from me, and shouted at his scapegoat, “What time do we quit work, young lady?”
Without blinking an eye, I replied, “4:05!”
For everyone’s benefit, at my expense, he yelled, “No, we don’t! We quit at 4:15!”
For all of Frack’s intentions to put the screws to the women he lauded it over, he taught me a valuable lesson. He who yells loudest, doesn’t always get the last say!
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You brought back two memories: when my brother and I worked on the line in a mobile home factory, although the plant superintendent, Crash Krashnewski rejected us on the first day waiting
in line to be hired for being too small, after my father's intervention, he put us on. By the end of that first summer, Crash begged us to stay on and not go to college. Pacesetters were hated by the old-timers, but loved by the bosses.
When we worked in finishing up the mobile homes out in the yard, we used rachet screwdrivers to drive screws. I had the bad habit of running my finger over the screw after I had slipped with the screwdriver on it. A good way to get a metal burr in your finger! I never did, but was having trouble with my new contact lens, and when I went to an eye doctor, he cut a burr right out of my eye with the scalpel, telling me to, "Look straight ahead, and don't blink." Don't know how I got that in my eye.
Ron74