Working for Pratt & Whitney & Women in the factories We worked for Pratt & Whitney, and Pratt & Whitney was working for the Navy. They did not make any money. It was cost, what do you call it? Cost, where they just paid for what it cost them. They didnít make no money off of it. All my expenses in Hartford was paid by the Navy. Even out here was paid by Navy. We did get a bonus check at the end of the year. The people who was head of the departments if they did good work. And that was pretty nice at the end of the year.

Working for Pratt & Whitney & Women in the factories

We worked for Pratt & Whitney, and Pratt & Whitney was working for the Navy. They did not make any money. It was cost, what do you call it? Cost, where they just paid for what it cost them. They didnít make no money off of it. All my expenses in Hartford was paid by the Navy. Even out here was paid by Navy. We did get a bonus check at the end of the year. The people who was head of the departments if they did good work. And that was pretty nice at the end of the year.

We had started out all men. Gradually, we lost the men and turned over to women. And before we was through, we had all women running the big machines.. And the women was much better than the men. They did a hell of a lot better job than the men did. You could tell them what to do and theyíd do it. A man, you tell them what to do and heíd do it for awhile and then heíd start figuring out how he could do it easier or do it a different way. But the women they did exactly as you told them, and they did a very good job.The only thing is about the women, we didnít know how to scold them if they did something wrong. Nobody knew how to handle women. So we just figured out the best way to do is to give them hell or whatever it is and then run. Get clear away. Donít let them, get the last word in. And we was okay then.

Post-War I was a general foreman. I took care of the three shifts later on. But, I started out as a foreman. And well like I say I started out in the crank case division. And then I went on over to magnesium parts, which still was in the crank case division, and I stayed in the crank case division until the war was over.

When the war was over, they kept me for three months getting the department, in other words, all the tools and stuff, getting them out and they put them on barges and sold them and stuff like that. And the poor parts, they hit them with sledge hammers, and throwed in a box car and away they went. Big old crank cases, and all the parts that we made. The oil seals which we worried so much about on them crankcase, thatís what we hit first. And just then broke them up as best we could. Everything went in the boxcars.

Women leaving jobs after the war The women, oh the, women was very good. Theyíd have one department there when I moved over into the magnesium department, the burring department was holding me up. That was where the part was all done, but it had to be put on there and bearings put in and the edges all had to be smoothed up and burrs taken off. I couldnít get anything out of the department, much. And it turned out to be that they had all men in there. And so I said, "Well, thatíll never do." And so I told employment, " I want you to hire all women. Old women, that never worked in their life and they spent all their time just in the kitchen cleaning up pots and pans and stuff like that." They thought I was crazy, but nevertheless they got me some women with knuckles all bent up and everything. So I give them crocus cloth and emery paper and they got in there. Hell, they was making money for the stuff which they did at home, cleaning pots and pans and stuff. And they was really happy. I had one man that would lift the part up and put it on the table for them. And they would get in there and just clean the thing all up. The women did a good job. And they did something which they had been doing all their life and didnít get any money for. But they really did a job.

Pratt & Whitney affect Kansas City?

A lot of people worked out there. And the farmers that came in from all the little cities around, they was good. They was very good. In fact, the people that come to work at Pratt & Whitney turned out better craftsman than in Hartford, CT. And that was hard to believe because they figured that Hartford had the best mechanics people. But we did a much better job than they did. And we put out an engine faster, more engines, cheaper, and better than what they was doing in Hartford, CT, the parent plant.

Listening to the radio I always listened to the radio. In fact thatís all there was. Wasnít any TV then. It was just strictly radio. And actually I didnít know what the radio would do when the war was over because thatís all they talked about. And the Star, their front page was nothing but war.

Security in the Plant

As you went out the door, you opened your lunch bucket up, just to show them as you went out that you didnít have half the tools in your lunch bucket or something. And there was that, see. Yes, but then when the war was over. They never looked in your lunch buckets. ëCourse there wasnít very many people working there when the war was over. They let everything go. And there wasnít very many. And that was it.