Interviewee: Darlene Young
Interviewer: Amy Stevens
June 26th 2006
Eastern Fine Paper Oral History Project

Amy Stevens: This is Amy Stevens and it is June 26th, 2006 and I am at the home of Darlene Young in Alton, Maine and we are going to talk about Darlene working at Georgia-Pacific mill in Old Town and I’ll just have you say hello.

Darlene Young:Hello.

AS: Ok, make sure your mic’s working. It looks good. Ok, so Darlene can you tell me a little bit about when you got started at the mill and what you were doing.

DY: Well when I first got started that was March of 78’ and when I first got hired I was actually working in one of the worst jobs in the mill.

AS: Oh really?

DY: Yes, I was doing, it was what you called a repack. It was a facial repack where you had to take, you had to assort the colors and repack them into a box with assorted colors and it was quite physical work because my first week I had bruises from all up and down my arms from grabbing the boxes and everything. It was quite a difficult job. I threatened to quit the first week. My father begged me not to. He helped me out a bit, come on, you can do it dear, you can do it. You know and I did that job for about three months and went into another job but that was one of the worst jobs I think I had there and so I was glad to get out of that job. That’s where all the new people went, that was where they started and they moved into different areas but it was one of the worst jobs so

AS: So when you say facial repacking, does that mean like tissues?

DY: Yes like Kleenex you know that you blow your nose with, yes like that tissue.

AS: So would you be repacking actual sheets?

DY: No that they were packed into boxes and they had, back then they had assorted colors like they had the different whites and yellows and some blues and whatever and we had to put so many of each color into a box, so we’d have, you know all the different stacks lined up and you’re pulling them out. It was quite physical work and we had a quota we had to meet everyday so a lot of, especially where I was new, the newer ones they really pushed us. They would try, we would try to get our quota done maybe an hour early.

AS: Wow.

DY: So we could have a little break time but I preferred to pace myself but I had to you know when you’re working, it was like a production line so when you’re working you have to keep up or pay the consequences.

AS: I’m sorry. I’m going to stop you for just a second.

DY: Ok. That’s my oldest daughter. This is Amy.

AS: Nice to meet you.

DY: Daniel’s a, well she’ll be a sophomore at UMO.

AS: Oh great. What are you studying? [daughter]: Elementary education.

AS: Excellent. That’s one you’ll find a job for.

DY: Yes.

AS: Ok so you were telling me about when you started in 1978 in repacking, so how did you get started at the mill?

DY: Well actually, out of high school I had applied to a different, a lot of different places for a job and I actually worked in retail for almost a year before I actually got called at the mill and my dad, he’s the one that made me make out the application. I really didn’t have a desire to work there. But he says, oh dear you know of course you’re looking at the money and what not and so it was about a year later that I got called so it was actually dad’s doing that I, because he worked at what they called the [pipe light [Owens of Illinois] in town and so he’s done a lot of production work too so he’s the one who sort of got me to make out the application.

AS: So did he work at Georgia-Pacific?

DY: No, my dad didn’t. He actually worked at the, it was they called it, we always called it the pipe [light]. It was [Owns of Illinois]. They made paper plates. It was where the river front is now. That’s where it used to be.

AS: Oh ok.

DY: And so him and my mother both worked there for many years. But he’s the one that encouraged me to make out the application and when I got called for the interview, I was still apprehensive about working there but my dad encouraged me to so that’s why I took it. Which I’m sort of glad I did. I am. I really am. It’s been a good job. It’s been a good you know, good life really as far as my earnings go and what not and I enjoyed it because I did different things so

AS: So when you started there, were you sort of at the bottom rung and you had to work your way up?

DY: Oh yes, oh yes that’s what happened. You always start at the bottom. That’s where we went, repack and then we would progress, because I got hired into the converting department which was new, it was, the converting department started up in 1970 so it was only like, it had only been there for eight years when I got hired so it was still relatively new and small so the first place was repack then we went into the toilet tissue and paper towel area and then they had added on machinery. They had facial. Over the years, they had progressed, and kept adding machinery and I have run every piece of the machinery.

AS: Really.

DY: Just about, yes every piece of the machinery I had run over the years but I stayed in a certain area for a long time in the paper towel. That’s where I did most of my work was right there.

AS: So Georgia-Pacific produced mostly commodity grades. Is that what you would call that type of…

DY: Well commodity but yeah but also they had a higher end, an upper end on the fibers and the brightness of the paper. It was sort of like a higher end, a higher quality. So when we first started out before Georgia-Pacific took over, we were running like a lower grade tissue you know, whatever would sell. You know, whatever people bought you know but

AS: Did you do like writing papers or anything like that?

DY: No, it was basically paper towels, toilet paper, napkins, the Vanity Fair and basically that was it. We did facial for, I’m trying to think for how many years we did facial but then eventually that, I think maybe we did that ten years and that was fazed out. You know, I think some of the other mills took over that product but it was basically the Northern, the Brawny and the Vanity Fair. That was our biggest product.

AS: Ok.

DY: Well we did some off brands, no names you know but basically that’s what we did.

AS: Ok, so can you tell me a little bit about running the different machinery. What types of machines and

DY: Ok well when I first ok, when I first started after I got out of repack, thank god, I went in, I think I was running the TT. You had different pieces of equipment like you’d run a saw that would cut up rolls and you know back then before it got modernized, we’d have to pick out the cookies and throw them away.

AS: What’s a cookie?

DY: Its, the cookie, it’s the trim off the end of a roll. You know like you’d have a trim at the beginning and the end of the roll. That was the waste, usually that would go back out to the pulper and be you know repulped. You know so it was always recycled. Everything you know, nothing was thrown away. So I started out with that. That was a pretty good job and of course like I said when we first started out in machinery, it was a lot older and we got some newer machinery that was more modern and more efficient. You know that you could basically just watch the machinery and filled it. I had run, for a long time I was running the case packer that packed the product into a box and stuff and that was a real good job. That was you know, wasn’t real difficult. Then we went into a new line where we had to move up and they wanted us to learn how to run all the machinery. So I was a wrapper. I run different wrappers and different rewinders which I was really sort of intimidated by but once I started running them, it was like [sigh], why didn’t I find this job years ago because it was sort of fun. Yes it was fun and it kept you busy. Of course you had to learn how to multi-task, you know sort of problem solve when your machinery was giving you trouble or the paper was giving you trouble. So I really did enjoy that job because it’s like you weren’t just doing the same thing over and over. You know, you had your routine but you also had to problem solve and stuff so it was quite interesting. You know I really enjoyed it and sometimes you’d stick with the same machine for a long time but then you know people would move up or out and you’d change to a different line and every line was different how it ran.

AS: So a line would be like the crew that worked on a particular aspect of the production?

DY: Right, yes.

AS: Ok.

DY: Yes and so you basically, it was like a line of progression, you’d start at the bottom like a wrapper and work your way up to running the rewinder and then they had the truck driving jobs which is where I was forced into just before the mill shut down which I was terrified of but I, it was, I don’t know if I want to say this on tape but my first day I was so nervous that I went into the ladies room and threw up.

AS: Oh my gosh.

DY: Because it was a big you know, it was intimidating driving the tow, the big clamp truck. But once, after the first week I was really comfortable with it because you’re picking up 2,000 pounds of paper with your clamp truck and you’re piling it up, you’re stacking it up three high, it was, that was one of the scariest jobs I had but once you got used to your truck and you respected that truck and knew what you had to do then it’s like wow this isn’t bad you know. So that was the job that I was doing just before the mill shut down and I must say that I had a work partner. There was two of us. We worked well together and it was, it was like wow. I really enjoyed that. It was just getting through that first week of getting used to it.

AS: Oh I can imagine.

DY: It was quite intimidating.

AS: Now when you say you were sort of forced into that, what does that mean?

DY: Well they shut down the converting department and so but my, we had what we called converting seniority and where I was one of the older people, well I don’t want to say older, but been there for, they went by our converting seniority and I was in the top twelve so, but we, it worked out for us because we were fortunate we got those truck driving jobs because a lot of the other people that got forced out of converting went over into the pulp side and the boilers and stuff so we were fortunate.

AS: So what is converting exactly?

DY: Converting is where you convert the paper product into a specialty product, you know like your paper towels or your toilet paper and that’s what they called converting. That’s where we converted all the paper products.

AS: So you’d have like a basic sort of paper that you used and then you sort of do things to it to make it into a paper towel?

DY: Right, right, yes it would start when the tissue mill would reel off the different types. We had different grades of product, towels or TT and they had a certain guideline they had to go by and we would bring it out onto our machinery. We called it like a back stand and we’d wind it up into the rewinder and we had mandrels that we would roll the product onto. Then it would go down into a saw and cut. Then go through the wrapper wrap, then through the case packer and packed into boxes.

AS: Interesting.

DY: It’s quite a process, you know and you always had like you said this is where your multi-tasking and problem solving comes into place is when you’re having trouble running the paper, then you know you had to make adjustments on your machinery and the same way with wrapping it and things like that. So you had your mechanics that would work on the machinery but ultimately we were, you know we had to problem solve before we got them so, and then sometimes we didn’t have to get them.

AS: So did you work shift work?

DY: Yes I worked what we called the three on, three off. It’s three twelve-hour shifts. We’d work like three, the front twelve which was 6am to 6pm, have three days off and then work the back twelve which was 6pm to 6am.

AS: Oh wow.

DY: So we were alternating, you know but we loved the three on, three off because when I first started there we were working eight hour shifts, yes eight hour shifts like you had your day, your evening and midnight. It was rotating. It was like you were working six days a week at first. Then we went to a seven day rotation which was horrible. It was like seven, you would have to work seven midnights like 12 to 8 and then have two days off, work seven evenings, have one day off, work seven days and have five days off. That was horrible because you were, you know it’s, it seemed like you were always working and so we were, when we went to the three on, three off we were so excited because we felt it was better. You were working four more hours a day but ultimately you had more time off and it wasn’t as, it didn’t seem to be as hard on our systems.

AS: I was going to say how did your body adjust to that shift work?

DY: Some people never adjust to it and some do. I didn’t really have too much difficulty with it but I think over the years, it does take a toll on your body. You know with your sleep patterns and everything. It really does. It’s just not normal to be sleeping during the day and working all night, not normal on your body but you adjust. You have to adjust if you’re going to do it.

AS: Right, right. Let me just pause you again real quick if you don’t mind. Ok, now were there many women that worked at the mill?

DY: When I first started, no. There really wasn’t. The majority of the work force was men and I think that way back when I got started I think the mentality was that you know this was a man’s job and, but I think that they were required to hire so many women.

AS: Really.

DY: Back then I think they had to require, yes, they were required to do that. But when I first got there, there was only a handful of women and that did increase over the years but still the men did out number the women. But and I’m not trying to brag up the women but I thought that the women were more conscientious workers. I mean I think we felt like we had to prove something because you know they just didn’t think women should be running that machinery you know. That’s why when I first went in there, the majority of the men were the ones that ran the rewinders which was the top job and which was a more intimidating job but it was, I think there was only one woman that was running the rewinder and the rest were men because I guess some women were intimidated by running it. But, so as the years went on that did change. Then the mixture was maybe half and half. There was as many women running it as men, because I think the women got more comfortable with it too. A lot of women that I worked with down there were stubborn. They were thinking hey, if a man can do it, we can do it.

AS: That’s right.

DY: And we could and I must say we thought we did it better. So you know, we had something to prove when we first were hired because you know we had to

AS: Hello.

DY: My husband, Ricky. So we had to you know just sort of prove to them that we could run that machinery just as well as they could. So my husband could probably attest to that too. He worked there for awhile. He was a mechanic. He’d probably tell you different; that the women couldn’t run the machinery as well but we could you know. So but yes at first, you know it was very rare to see a woman run you know a rewinder and then that did change. It was, more and more got comfortable with it and saw that it was one of the better jobs so that’s you know what we did.

AS: Was there a separation between production crews and like office staff? I mean did a lot of women go into office jobs?

DY: Yes, well there was a lot of women in the office jobs but there were men too like down in the converting department, we had a male secretary Paul who had just retired not too long ago. He had done that job for as long as I was there and he had, he might have been the only male secretary there. Boy but he did his job. He really did his job great. And but then you had up in the office, it was a mixture, it’s about half and half. You know you had your engineers and your you know upstairs. You had a lot of women involved in the salary part of it too. So it was about an even mixture really.

AS: So were you involved in the union at all?

DY: Oh yes, from the moment you start you have to be a union member or not work there.

AS: Right.

DY: But that wasn’t a problem. I never had a, the union has its pro’s and con’s and I’m going to leave it at that.

AS: Ok.

DY: Ok. I don’t want to say anything that’s going to get me in trouble.

AS: So now would salary people be in the union also or just wage workers?

DY: Well they had part of the salary like the secretarial pool, they were, they had their own union. But then you had your management, you know like your engineers and like we had our supervisors that were in charge of us. They were our management but I noticed especially maybe the last ten or fifteen years that I worked there sometimes you wouldn’t know who was a manager and who was a worker.

AS: Really.

DY: Yes because we worked, you know we all liked, it was team work, worked together you know and I would almost say that if somebody came into the mill they would probably not know who was the manager, who was in charge and who the workers were because we all pitched in and helped.

AS: That’s great.

DY: Helped each other, yes.

AS: So it really wasn’t like you had all these overseers that were commanding you. You really had a lot of say.

DY: Yes. Right, we did oh yes. And they did, they were very good about listening to us because we had, I’m going to say we figured if we ran that machinery twelve hours a day you know, we knew how to run that machinery and if there were things that we could do to improve it, they would listen to us. They really would. They would take, they would actually come down on the floor and talk with us and ask for suggestions and everything so they were really good about that.

AS: That’s great.

DY: Yeah. They were really good to work with you know, it’s not like, you had, of course you always have your few that don’t want to listen to your ideas but the majority of the time they do.

AS: Were there many women in management positions?

DY: Actually there were.

AS: Really.

DY: Yes, I would say it was, I had a woman boss that I worked with well Janelle when I went over in the truck driving job but actually there were a lot of women. Had a lot of women working down in the wet end, the engineers and yeah, they were quite predominate all over the mill. They really were.

AS: That’s great.

DY: Yes.

AS: How about in the union? Do you feel that women were well represented in the union?

DY: Well we did have, it was a majority of it was men, majority of it. I can remember one lady Yvonne Parity. Yvonne was, she was I think secretary or treasurer in the union for many, many, many years for a long time and she might be one that you might want to talk to too, and I think she would. I think she would love to talk to you.

AS: Oh great.

DY: I’ll give you, I’ll see if I can find her phone number for you later but yes she was in, she was the only one that I can really remember and then Sheila Furrow was another one. She was one of our, one of our reps but it was a majority of it was men and I think that some women, it was time consuming you know and a lot of women you know of course had their families to raise not only besides their job so if you were involved in the union, it did take up a lot of your free time too so maybe that’s why more women weren’t involved. But I think that there could have been more women represented in the union but it was, I guess it was a choice you had to make but Yvonne Parity was in it and she was excellent and she could, she could argue with you on things. She could really you know, she was a good representative.

AS: Did the union ever deal with issues that were specific to gender or was that you know primarily just wages and things like that that they would deal with?

DY: I think that it was just primarily wages or problems you know inside the mill you know, personality conflicts or jobs, you weren’t doing your job and things like that. It wasn’t gender at all. It was basically just you know arguing your wages or if you were disciplined you know they would go up and represent you and what not but

AS: Do you remember any examples of like inequality or harassment or anything towards women while you worked there?

DY: Towards women, you know I’m trying to think if I can recall, as far as harassment or anything, I would say no. I mean we had rules that you know we had to go by you know like the men had to you know they had to be respectful and you know but when you’re working in a mill atmosphere it can be a little bit different as far as your talk and you’re kidding around. It’s a little less you know, informal. But women were never, we were never harassed or anything because if we were then we would go to our supervisor and say something. I can actually remember one person complaining to their supervisor and the union on a harassment issue. It was a man that was complaining about a woman.

AS: Really, that’s interesting.

DY: Yes. I think well this particular man I think was not, was offended by some of the woman’s language and he didn’t like it and she did get reprimanded. I mean we have actually you know like say if we didn’t like something that somebody was saying to us or whatever, we thought it was inappropriate, we would say, all right that’s enough. You know and that would be the end of it. I don’t think I can ever recall a woman you know complaining about an issue really. We were pretty fairly treated. I mean we could give it as well as take it. So you know but no, we, it was a pretty good atmosphere to work, you know it was almost like a, when you’re working with somebody for twelve hours a day, you’re working with a group of people you’ve got to try to get along and it’s almost like it’s your family. It’s your family away from your home. You know their your family and you’ve got your family at home so you, it’s we all pretty well stick together. You know, if we do have a problem, we try to work it out amongst ourselves but naturally there are some instances were you’ve got to seek help to try to resolve a problem but as a rule we all got along pretty good.

AS: Great, and the women would get along with each other well too?

DY: Well when I first worked there, when I first went there, because like I said I think I was only 19 when I got hired there and a lot of the women that were there were older women. They might have been oh maybe 20 years older than me or whatever and they were set in their ways and I noticed there were a lot of issues with some of the women against each other. You know, oh yes, you had your, I can name you some names but I won’t. There were a few that just did not get along so normally they would try to keep them in different areas, production areas. But there were a few women that just, you could feel the tension but you had that with the men too. You had certain men that just did not want to be bothered with, or did not want to work with a certain individual and you did run into, I did run into that, I personally didn’t run into that, I didn’t personally run into that over the years but I see other people did. They had issues with working with a particular person and then you would have to go see your supervisor and try to resolve the issue and maybe, how they usually did it is they would put them in a different area. But you did have, I would call them your cat fights, you know you just had people just did not click but they would try to resolve it and try to put them, if they couldn’t resolve it on their own, they would try to put them in different areas so they wouldn’t you know have to deal with each other.

AS: Did you ever sense being in such a male dominated atmosphere that there was competition between women or anything like that?

DY: I personally am a very competitive person and I, once I realized ok, all right, I can do this job and I can do this job better than they can. You know and that was, and I worked in the towel group for a long time and we would have, it was a friendly competition but we would have competition you know because you had, they would try to, you tried to have a certain quota of product you had to put out each day, each shift and we had in the towel area, we had quite a competition going. We tried, like I was A crew, you know we had A, B, C, D crews. I was A crew for a long time so I would try to beat everybody else. We had one supervisor which I loved, he, I thought it was a good incentive, he would put up weekly production records, you know what every crew was doing you know and just sort of seeing where the problem was or which crew was having a more difficult time and when I got up on the rewinder it was like ok, I’m going to show these guys. And I had a great crew to work with and I was very competitive and I wanted to be top dog. I wanted to show them that I might be a woman but I could do that job just as well as they could, if not better and I thought I did a pretty good job.

AS: I love your attitude.

DY: I was very, very competitive. It was just like I didn’t want them to tell me that I couldn’t do something. You know or that I couldn’t do it as well as they could because when I first went there, like I said, it was totally male, it was male dominated like on your rewinders, on your, you know more complicated machines and then you know then after awhile it sort of took over. A lot of us women, we can do that and we did. We moved up. I would say if you went back over the records you know you would probably see that the majority of the women that did operate the machinery, did it very well. Better than the men so yay.

AS: Were the crews that you were on a mix of men and women?

DY: Yes, they were. Yes, they were and I’ll tell you, like I said, I, actually the crew when I moved up to the rewinder to one of them, I worked with two guys and they were very conscientious workers too. They liked to do a good job and they liked to put out a good product in production so they, they were good workers. Then you had some, you had one crew like when I worked down on three tower it was me and another lady, it was a woman. We did an awesome job. You had some crews that just didn’t, didn’t seem to click as well but you know you had some that were all there, we’ve got to work for twelve hours. We want to do the best we can and get out as much production as we could; good quality production. So we all worked together and if we had a problem, we would all problem solve. You know it was not like, it was just, even if I was running the rewinder, they might have been running the wrappers and trucking out but if there was a problem, we all worked on it together. Some crews didn’t do that so, but we found it more effective to do it that way. So you had some crews that just didn’t get it.

AS: Were men and women paid equally for the same work?

DY: Oh yes. Oh yes, yes. Of course being in the union, being in the union you had a set, a set wage for each job that you did so oh yes, men and women got paid the same. You know they had a set, a set

AS: And would you have to bid on a job to advance?

DY: Well yes, some they would post jobs and it was the person that had the most seniority usually would get the job. That’s where your seniority, when it did come into your favor. There were some jobs that you had to meet certain qualifications for like, so it may not have gone specifically by your seniority.

AS: And did men and women have pretty equal opportunity advancements?

DY: Yes, I think, yes I think, oh in our area they did in the converting area. On the pulp and boiler side I’m not sure if that would be true. That’s another instance on the, and this is where talking with Sheila, you’ll be talking with her. She will probably straighten you out on that aspect because she worked on, I think she worked on the crafts side. Over on the other side of the mill it’s more demanding I think physically in some jobs and so I think women would not sign the jobs because they knew your dealing with a lot of heat, a lot of chemicals but as far as in my area, converting area, you know the men and women, you could advance equally. It was not an issue but on the other side of the mill there might have been. So Sheila can probably answer that in more detail you know but she’s been over there so she might be a little bit biased.

AS: Did you have to have any training for the different jobs you did or was it mostly on the job training?

DY: Well a lot of it was on the job training but we had, over in converting we had a safety, a group that, trainers that first we would do like a week or so of classroom you know that would sort of specifically tell you what the machinery did, how it operated but the classroom, I’m not a classroom person. I have to have on the job training. That’s how I learn and that’s where you get most of your experience is on the job. But they do, as far as, they had a safety, safety was always number one so they said and so they would take you through the classroom first. Do the classroom work and then you’d do on the job. But back when I first got started, you know safety they always, safety was there but it wasn’t and then when the laws got more stricter and everything and you had to abide by OSHA rules and everything. Then the rules were there for a reason. I mean safety, you did, I mean you’re running high speed machinery and you’ve got pinch points. You could be dragged though a machine and this and that. So you had to be really careful and at first when I was there, they could have been more stricter but thankfully nobody really got hurt really bad but then the OSHA rules got stricter, and stricter and sometimes that did hinder our operation.

AS: Really.

DY: Because you, yes, you had certain procedures; you had to shut down your machinery. You had to lock it out, take out if you had a jam, you know or whatever. Certain procedures we had to follow and that could cut down on your production time but they were there for a reason and they were there for a good reason. Maybe not everybody abided by them you know strictly but that’s where our supervisors came in to make sure that we did enforce the rules for our own safety.

AS: Did you ever get injured at the mill?

DY: Yes, I got a scar here. Yes, actually I had a little scar there, it was from my vaccination but me and the case packer one of the machinery and it was my own fault really, partly my fault. I didn’t shut, like I said sometimes you tried to save time which is, they always preach to you, don’t do it. I didn’t shut off my machine to pull out, I had a box that jammed and I tried to pull the flap back and the arm come back and hit me in the arm. I didn’t break anything but it bruised it really bad and then it scarred, of course scar tissue. But that’s the only thing that had happened to me. Other people had gotten, had lost some fingers, you know I know about three or four different people that had lost fingers and so you have to be very, very careful and you know, I’ve been in situations where I had one woman, one of my real good friends, we were working together and she was hung up, in between one of the rollers and that was quite scary.

AS: Oh my gosh.

DY: I had to help her. I’m screaming for help for them to go get a mechanic to help us get her out but luckily she just bruised it and pinched her arm but I’m trying to; that was scary. You know I’ve been in a few situations where people have been hurt.

AS: So how did that happen with her?

DY: Well actually she, it was, she was working on the rewinder and she was going to thread up a roll and you have rollers. She had, there was a guard that should have been down but sometimes you put the guard up to roll your paper through and when she rolled the roller, her arm went through and got jammed right in there and we could not, so the guys had to loosen up the bolts so they could get her arm out, could not budge it.

AS: Wow. That must have been scary.

DY: It was. Here I am trying to hold her and I thought she was going to faint on me. I did real good until after, then I was shaking like a leaf.

AS: I bet.

DY: But you know I’ve been in other instances where one of the girls got her hand caught in one of the belts and I’m you know, had to go shut off an emergency stop to stop the belt and had to go get somebody to get her out. So I’ve been in situations where other people have gotten hurt, but nothing real serious. I’ve been fortunate but it’s always there. It’s always in the back of your mind, you’ve got to be careful. You know you’ve got to really practice your safety every day because you’ve got a machine going 2,000 feet a minute or whatever and you’re trying to adjust something, you know and luckily, all your guards are suppose to be there so you won’t get caught. The only other time I got injured but it was on my way into work, I had stepped into a pot hole and was in a cast for two months.

AS: Oh no.

DY: Broke my ankle, yes.

AS: Oh wow.

DY: That wasn’t fun.

AS: So did they give you paid leave for that?

DY: Well when that, I did, yes I got workman’s comp. for two months. No, I was actually out for three months because I was in a cast for two months then I had some therapy but yes, I was a midnight shift, stepped in a pot hole and down I went but yes, I got workman’s comp. and then the other time, when I was on maternity leave and stuff.

AS: They did have maternity leave?

DY: Yes and you got, whenever, if you was out for an illness other than work related you got, it was like a medical. We’d get medical pay. It was not quite what you would make a week but it was a paycheck. Even if you were out ill, you got paid.

AS: So how long would they give you for maternity leave?

DY: They, for paid they gave you six weeks but I had C-sections with both my children so I, you get a little extra time with that. So I think I got 8 to 10 weeks with that.

AS: Wow.

DY: So yes, they give you enough time. They want to make sure you’re ok when you come back to work.

AS: Right.

DY: So yeah, and they had the family leave act. I mean you could take up to, was it up to twelve weeks paid, I think with no ok with women I think it was up to twelve weeks paid. If a husband took leave, you know when his wife had a baby or whatever I think they only got paid a couple of weeks and then it was unpaid.

AS: Really.

DY: But they could take up to a certain amount unpaid but, so it was pretty good. I mean if you were hurt or anything, or just ill you know they, you would still get a pay check.

AS: That’s great.

DY: Yes.

AS: Did they have any kind of child care or anything like that?

DY: At the mill, no. No, they didn’t. So you’re on your own there.

AS: So did you meet your husband at the mill?

DY: Yes I did.

AS: You did.

DY: Yes I did. He, I had gone through a divorce. He was just going through a divorce shortly after he got there and his cousin which was a friend of mine was the one that introduced us.

AS: Really.

DY: Yes, so, we’ll be married twenty years this year.

AS: Wow, congratulations.

DY: Yeah, so

AS: And you said he was a mechanic?

DY: He was a mechanic when he got hired. He ran a napkin line for awhile and then he was in what they called the adjusters crew. They would come out and problem solve the machinery if it had a problem or fix it you know, repair it. He did that for ten years and then he got done and been self-employed ever since.

AS: And you stayed at the mill?

DY: I stayed at the mill, somebody had to have the insurance.

AS: Yes.

DY: We had four kids. You know, well when he gave his notice, we just had our third child, no, yeah. No, we had had our third child and he got done and a month later I found out I was pregnant again.

AS: Oh wow.

DY: I was like oh my god, what did you do?!

AS: So they had good insurance for families?

DY: Yes, yes see and that’s sort of one of the things, the wages have been good you know. I mean comparable to the area, they’ve been very good but as time went along of course we had to pay more for health, health benefits and everything else, our wages weren’t quite keeping up with the cost of living but we still made a very good wage. And talking with other people since I’ve gotten done, we thought, we were complaining because we had to pay more and more of our health insurance but we realized we were very fortunate. We weren’t paying as much as other people were so actually we had it very good. So, but that’s why I stayed was because having a family and everything. He was self-employed so it was the benefits that kept me there.

AS: I’m just going to flip the tape over.

DY: Ok.

AS: Ok, something else that I wanted to ask you about was, lets see, I just had it in my head. Oh, do you think that many men and women sort of met up at the mill? Was it... My god yes. It was like a [paintin’] place there. I shouldn’t say that but you know it’s true. A lot of men and women did meet at the mill and did marry, divorced, remarried. I think it’s, I always called it a pain place but I think it’s sort of every work place you work at, you’re going to run into these issues you know. Like I said, you work at that mill twelve hours a day. You know, we was working there every day, you know which ever shift you worked on and it’s like your second family. So that could cause some problems but then that could also be a good thing. I’ve known a lot of people that have met there and married, have stayed happily married and you have others that haven’t. You know, it’s a cycle. It’s a cycle. I noticed that first when I first went there, there was a lot of shenanigans going on but as I think the older we got, you know and everything, things sort of settled down and a lot of people have met there and married. I was married once before I married my husband and I met him through one of my best friends and then he actually worked there for awhile. And then we went our separate ways and then I met my second husband there too so it’s, it’s been nice. I’ve seen a lot of, met a lot of nice people that have met and have stayed married and there’s others that haven’t. I think that just goes with any workplace. You know.

AS: Right.

DY: I’ve got to let my baby in again.

AS: Sure.

DY: Ok, she can’t make up her mind, come on. But it’s like you said, it’s a big family. We’re all a big family and we go to bat for everybody. You know you don’t mess with our family. So, but it’s been, this has been the most difficult time since I’ve been out of work because like you said you’re used to seeing the people that you work with every day, you’re wondering, and of course you do, you know I call and talk with them a lot but it’s been difficult not being at work right now and not knowing how everybody is doing and what they’re doing with their life now and it’s been difficult. I miss that you know. Hopefully I’ll get back to that, but if I don’t, I don’t.

AS: Did you have any concerns when you were pregnant at the mill that you know it was a dangerous environment to work in or anything?

DY: Well you know I didn’t have as many concerns as my supervisors did.

AS: Really.

DY: They had a lot of concerns. They actually, with my first pregnancy, they actually encouraged me to try to get done a little bit early because they were concerned, I did have a few health issues with my blood pressure and I did have one instance where the mill nurse said Darlene, ok, you have to get done.

AS: Really.

DY: I was doing, I was packing and you had to reach up and you had to fold your box and I fell, [phone rings]

AS: Do you want to pause?

DY: Yes, ok when I was pregnant, ok, and I was reaching up to make a box and I had slipped and fell onto the conveyer.

AS: Oh no.

DY: They made me go see the mill nurse and I did feel like I had pulled something, strained something but they were the ones that sort of, ok Darlene you know, maybe we ought to see about you getting done a little bit early. You know because they were more concerned than I was because I was very careful, very careful and actually I also, was that, I think that was my first pregnancy but I think that’s also when I signed a spare job on the other side of the mill. I was working in the lab over there and I had to go over to, I had to go up to the craft, I had to take, get liquor samples and this and that and I’m going to tell you, they freaked out over there. They didn’t want me going up to get my sample. I had some of the guys would literally get my samples and they would have them in a bucket and bring them down to the bottom floor for me so I wouldn’t have to go up and get my sample and over in the liquor too. The liquor prep, they didn’t think, and they were probably right because over there it’s, you have a lot of you know fumes and stuff and what not. So the guys over there sort of took care of me. They didn’t want me to go up and do that. So there were some issues, all depending on what you were doing for work but I actually did get done early, a little bit earlier. I was having some blood pressure problems to but they had issues. They wanted me to be safe so that was nice they were looking out for me.

AS: So can you explain a little bit more what you did in the lab? That sounds interesting.

DY: Well it was. I had a spare job. For a few years, I would fill in for guys on vacations and stuff and it was basically you’d go over to the stock prep and you’d get a sample of your brown stock and you had to do different tests with that to make sure that they were within specs and you had your black liquor. You know, different tests I had to do to all my samples to make sure everything was in spec, everything was, they didn’t have to, if things were off spec, I had to let them know and usually they would have to adjust chemicals or what not.

AS: What do you mean by the black liquor? What’s that?

DY: That’s part of the whole process of making the pulp. I couldn’t really tell you the whole, Sheila might be able to tell you more about the process but it’s just you know different stages where they add certain chemicals to start the process of making the pulp and we had a certain amount, then we had wood chips we had to do testing on. You know it was basically testing things and then letting them know if things didn’t look right, you know whatever and then of course they knew too because they had all the gauges and stuff but, just basically making sure that things were kept in spec. It was a good job. I liked the job but then it got, of course they cut back and I got, I was one of them that got cut so I went back to converting but it was an interesting job. And I tried to apply to that job just before I got done again but somebody beat me out. But it was interesting you know. It was different.

AS: So you still keep in touch with a lot of folks from the mill?

DY: Oh I do, I do. Of course we meet every, like tomorrow we meet at the career center again tomorrow. We’ve been trying to meet with the same group. We try to stay with our group but and yeah I call and talk, you know certain real close friends just about every day and we’re trying to keep in contact on what’s going on and what everybody’s going to be doing. This week, it’s supposed to, I think Friday we’re supposed to have an official announcement.

AS: Oh really.

DY: Yeah, we’ve already been told that it’s been sold.

AS: Really.

DY: But it won’t be official until the end of the week, but it doesn’t sound good for me.

AS: Oh really.

DY: No, from what we’ve been told and like I said, this can all change but I think they sold it to Cascade but Georgia-Pacific put certain limitations on what they could do and from what I was told GP didn’t want them to run the tissue machines. They didn’t want competition. They didn’t want them to make tissue paper and I think from what I was told for three years they couldn’t make tissue paper. So if they don’t run the tissue machines and I worked off the tissue machines, I loaded trailers with paper. If they aren’t allowed to do that then they’ll probably only bring back maybe a little over half of the work force.

AS: Really.

DY: So I can’t, I don’t understand everything but I can’t imagine why anybody would want to buy just the pulp mill because you’re not going to make money on just running a pulp mill. You’ve got to make your tissue paper. You’ve got to convert your tissue paper but GP made the stipulations. So GP has fed me for quite a few years but they haven’t been good to the state of Maine at all so I’m not going to bite the hand that feeds me but I think they could have been a little bit more lenient but I understand from a business aspect, you know competition but hello, we’re just a small mill. I mean how much competition could we be?

AS: Right.

DY: But I don’t know. This is not a done deal. I won’t know all the facts until things are situated but I think half of us probably won’t go back so

AS: So what do you think really led to the closing of the mill in the first place?

DY: Competition.

AS: Competition.

DY: Competition within GP.

AS: Really.

DY: Right, we were told way back in 2003 when they shut, when they were going to shut the converting down then because they could make it cheaper in their other, some of their other mills and we were one of their smallest mills but I’ll tell you we were a good mill. We, our production and our quality was, we thought were excellent compared to some of the other mills but it was basically the cost, you know but the governor struck a deal and got things up and running again but we always had that cloud over our head that we were basically competing with the [Flatsberg] mill in New York because they got some of our machinery when we shut down in 2003.

AS: Really.

DY: Yes and of course their wages from what I understood was lower and their electricity costs were lower so we were basically in competition within GP to stay alive and we knew it was going to happen sooner or later. GP’s not done yet. They’re still consolidating. They’re still, from what I was told, I heard that the Flatsberg mill was in trouble now too.

AS: Really.

DY: Yes. That they, I think they wanted to sort of get everything out of the Northeast. They have new mills and bigger mills down in the south and the western part. That’s where the new tissue machines just went.

AS: Really.

DY: Yes so it was basically competition in between, in GP.

AS: Wow.

DY: So, you know. So we were downsized. We’ll see what happens. I’m still optimistic but I’m also moving forward.

AS: So what types of things go on at the career center now?

DY: Well we’ve been actually having, they’ve been talking to us trying, well we got accepted for the trade act which is a big help to us because now we have the opportunity, we can do on the job training. We can do schooling and the trade act will pay for our schooling. They are going to pay for up to 65% of our insurance which ever plan we stay in, which was a big plus.

AS: That’s great.

DY: and but right now we’re just going through all the motions of getting set up for the trade act, getting set up for some classes like tomorrow I’m supposed to meet and I think we’ll be, I actually am looking into going to school so there’s different avenues we have to take there and it all depends on which direction you’re going in, it will be different steps which ever way you go. So they are sort of leading us in a process right now in making a decision, which way we want to go; which a lot of us are still not sure. It’s hard to make a decision when you don’t know if you’re going back to work.

AS: Right.

DY: So and you hate to, and I’ve been honest with them. I said well I will do the steps. I’m planning on maybe taking some classes but if I get called back to my job, I’m going back to my job because I have so many years invested in it. And so

AS: So what career path are you looking at now?

DY: Medical but I’m not 100% sure. My heart wants me, I want to be I think like a medical assistant. It’s basically well like the nurses that set up for the doctors in a doctors office, that’s sort of what I was looking at but I don’t know if I am capable of doing that and I’m not giving my self enough, I guess enough confidence here but so I’m also looking at like in the background, medical secretary, billing, coding, things like that. That’s what I’m really sort of looking at. I’m going to Beal’s college later today.

AS: Oh great.

DY: Talk to them about different avenues so.

AS: Now is that paid for you?

DY: It will be.

AS: Through the trade act.

DY: It will be.

AS: That’s great.

DY: Yeah, so I might as well take, my husband said you’re crazy not to take advantage of that so that’s what I’m going to do but I’m very intimidated. I’ve been out of school for thirty years so it’s just like well but

AS: Are a lot of people going back to school?

DY: Well you know I think a majority of us are but there are you know, but we are all an older workforce. I mean everybody that’s been at that mill has at least 25 years or more.

AS: Really.

DY: So we’re all an older workforce, so we’re all sort of in the same situation. Of course you’ve got a lot of people that have certain trades that they had in the mill that they could utilize and probably find another job. But there’s a lot of us that have done specific you know, like I’ve run machinery all my life. I’ve converted product. I mean I don’t know where else in the area that I could, I could probably go up to Lincoln or I could go to IP but I don’t know if I want to. So I don’t know if I want to do something different but I know that’s where some people have gone to some of the other mills. But the wages aren’t as good as what we had but we’re not going to find anything as good as we had so we’re going to have to make some adjustments there, you know.

AS: Was the majority of the workforce in this sort of like 30s, 40s, 50s age group that weren’t quite close enough to retirement?

DY: Majority of us but there were, I think, what did they say their prediction was, I think within the next two to three years. I think maybe there was close to a hundred of them that would be retiring so you do have some that were close but they still had maybe three years to go.

AS: Wow

DY: So like I said it was an older workforce you know so and a lot of them are intimidated. I’ve had a lot of them saying they’ve got three years to retire who wants to hire them but you know, and do you want to waste two years to go to school. They are sort of in a different predicament then I am. I mean I’ve still got a long ways to work so I can be trained to do something else. I’m still crossing my figures that I might get a job back but if I don’t, I don’t. It is nice to be able to sleep all night.

AS: Oh I bet. So you were still doing the overnight shift work?

DY: Oh yes, three on, three off, yes. So it was an adjustment. I’m a night owl really. It was an adjustment trying to get my sleep patterns back in sync here.

AS: I bet. Did you have any like any groups, women’s groups or activities either within the mill or maybe a group of you from the mill would go out and do things outside of work?

DY: Oh yes we had a lot of us women that we worked together on the same crew. We always had shopping trips. We’d plan a day or two, we’d go away shopping. The big thing was to is we had Christmas time a majority, we’d try to get as many people that were there, and people that had retired, we tried to get together for a Christmas party. We would go out usually to the Chocolate Grill or we’d meet in Bangor at some restaurant and have a get together and also a big thing at work too was like at our major holiday’s we’d always go around, Darlene, I was the one I’d go around with a list. Ok whatcha you going to bring. We’d have a big supper or dinner whatever, you know for the holidays.

AS: Inside the mill?

DY: Inside the mill.

AS: Would that be like a department thing?

DY: Yes, well like converting, like the whole of converting but we’d invite all the guys from the tissue mill down too you know, they’d take their breaks and try to come down and eat.

AS: Oh great.

DY: And actually they were pretty good about like at Christmas time and especially Christmas and Thanksgiving too, we’d have a big meal and they would actually let us all shut down.

AS: Wow.

DY: For a half hour and have dinner together.

AS: That’s great.

DY: Yes, they were very good about that. So but it was quite, everybody looked forward to it. You know we all knew we were going to have a big get together and have a meal together. It was nice but we also did that outside. You know a lot of us, it wasn’t just the women too, some of the men you know would get involved and come to our Christmas party and what not. So we had a, you know not only did we do things in work but out of work.

AS: Any like sports teams or clubs?

DY: Well they had like in the summer time, they would have like softball games you know and a lot of the guys, people at work they would get involved like at the Y with volleyball. A lot of them liked to play the volleyball and they had the softball team; the bowling. We had bowling leagues. A lot of them, some I can, I did it at first when, well I was in a bowling league but then once I started having all the kids and stuff and some times my shift work wouldn’t allow it so I sort of got out of it. But you had your die hard's that did their bowling league every year; have done it probably for over 30 some odd years you know, tried to swap their shifts and do it.

AS: Men and women?

DY: Men and women yes. Yes and we had a lot of get-togethers too, like service projects we would do. We’d help out with, like with the United Way or with, we’d go and volunteer time to help one of the camps, fix up. We’d have spruce up week. There was a lot, you know GP as a whole, we tried to, they always had projects, community projects, we tried to be involved in so I would say quite a few of the people at work, especially like in Old Town with the Riverfest, you know we’d get involved in helping out with different activities you know in the community.

AS: Great.

DY: So yes, it was good. I’ve been involved in a lot of the different projects. It was fun you know. A lot of them did it. See you always seem to have the same ones that did it but you know you had a good crowd to represent the mill.

AS: Do you remember if any of the women or you yourself did anything like knitting or sewing or swapped recipes or anything like that?

DY: Oh god, recipes, we was always bringing, like you said it seemed like we was always cooking, bringing something in and you know we always swapped recipes, different dishes and we’d have, some of the women yes, a lot of them would bring their knitting. Some women did knit. During their breaks, they’d knit and what not and I’m trying to think of some did have cross stitching that they brought in. You know some of them would bring in their different projects they were working on and during their lunch break or whatever would work on it but cooking was one of our big things. We was always, it seemed like we was always bringing in something to try you know.

AS: Were there any like traditional recipes that you would do at the mill over and over again?

DY: Oh well yes at our Christmas dinners you know and our holidays, well New Years Eve, if we was working New Years Eve, we had certain party foods we’d bring in and Christmas too. Christmas and Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving, one of the, I’m trying to, yeah it was Thanksgiving, they, one of the things that it seemed like I always had to make was my pumpkin roll; had to make my pumpkin roll.

AS: Pumpkin roll, that sounds good.

DY: Yes. Yes, you know there were certain, a lot of the guys, oh you’re going to make this, certain things that we always had to make for our functions.

AS: Did you have integrated like lunch areas or break rooms or restrooms or were they separated by men and women?

DY: Well we had, of course we had our men and women bathrooms you know those were separate but our break rooms; we had like the adjusters break room and we had one down in the North end and the South end but they were for everybody you know, it wasn’t men’s room or women’s, you know, it was all integrated and usually we all didn’t take our breaks at the same time. We had you know we had like a break person who would go around help giving breaks so you know you might be in there, you might get lucky and have somebody in there with you during your break and you might not you know but they were all integrated. We would, so certain people would try to get their breaks together, you know like a couple of us women. We’d try to, if we had two break people, oh ok we want to go to break together and we’d you know do it that way but it was never, it was all integrated, except for the bathrooms.

AS: Right, would you bring your lunches typically or did they have a cafeteria?

DY: They did have a cafeteria and it was canteen food so the majority of us brought our lunches but sometimes we’d you know get something out of the snack machine or whatever and this was way back. I’m trying to think of what the name of the store was. There was a store at the top of the hill and a lot of us would order out, would order or, that was a big thing the adjusters were always, I would say they ate so unhealthy. They would order out every day, of course we had our menus. They would deliver. They were always ordering pizza, Pat’s Pizza or the Chinese restaurant or whatever, the adjusters always ordered out and I said you guys my god. You know, they didn’t eat healthy but we had a little store at the top of the hill where some of them would go up during their lunch break to get something to eat and they were sadly disappointed when that place closed because they did do a pretty good business from the mill workers. I personally brought my lunch most of the time.

AS: You did?

DY: Yes. A lot of us did. We had microwaves and what not and you know

AS: Now when you say adjusters, what did those people do?

DY: They were the mechanics.

AS: Oh ok.

DY: They were the mechanics. They were the ones that fixed all the machinery but they had, they were called a pm crew. They did preventive maintenance on the machinery. Like say I worked on one TT, toilet tissue machine, they would have, they had a monthly schedule that each day one of the pieces of the machinery would be worked on and they were the day crew. They were the pm crew so they were the ones that were always ordering out. So it was always the day crew. Then you had your on shift adjusters too but they worked rotating shifts like we did, but they ruled the rooster. They thought they ruled the rooster. So those, and I shouldn’t stereotype but those guys were the ones that sort of made us women feel like we couldn’t do our job.

AS: Really.

DY: Yes, because they were the mechanics and they would, I know they would go back and say oh my god she didn’t know how to fix that, and you know. They would say that about, and it wasn’t just the women, it was the men too. But by god we showed them. We showed them later on you know once a lot more women got involved with running the machinery, repairing their own machinery. We were allowed to do so much you know and then we had to call the adjusters but they would intimidate us some what, make us feel ok, maybe we can’t do this. But we knew we could, you know but it was like some of the men too. They’d harbor at them too but I think they were, if anybody was going to stereotype it was them. They were the ones that sort of made us feel like oh god, maybe we can’t do this. But that got turned around, that really, this was like the old guys when I first started and that turned around when it got bigger, converting got bigger and a lot more women were running the machinery. Then you know, they can do it and there were certain ones of us that could do it a lot better. We actually even had a couple of women that actually, that was one of the groups that you did not see any women in, you know involved in. There were a couple of women that did break that cycle that actually went in, they were spares on the adjusters crew.

AS: Great.

DY: And they were darn good. I’ll tell you there was one lady Cynthia Pike, oh Cynthia might be another one you might want to talk to. She is one that you would want to talk to really. She took the test for the adjusters. She was on the day crew and she would, I’ll tell you a lot of the men had the utmost respect for her because she did her job and she did it well and she didn’t you know, she was one of the guys. She held up her share you know. She was really good to work with. She was you know I don’t think you’d find a guy that didn’t, wouldn’t say that she was not a good adjuster; she was. And she was an awesome, I worked with her for awhile, she was an awesome person to work with. She really is. So she’s one of those that broke that stereotype and I think Brooke, Brooke is no longer with us but she was, I think she did the adjusters job for awhile but then she took on a supervisor job too. You know a spare foreman which I had the opportunity to do.

AS: Oh really?

DY: But I turned it down.

AS: Why is that?

DY: Well I didn’t give myself enough confidence. They really wanted me to do it but I was a little bit intimidated by a few people. I didn’t know if, what crew I was going to work with and what issues, I knew what issues there would be so

AS: What types of issues?

DY: Personalities, personalities so I did turn it down and I regretted it. I said that if it ever come up again I would take it because I do have a pretty good report with everybody and I can get along with everybody but I was a little intimidated and you did have some women supervisors, spare foreman that were awesome so, and that was another area that you didn’t really see too much of, you know women foreman. We did have our mix and they were good.

AS: Great.

DY: Yes.

AS: Did you have a dress code or hair code or anything?

DY: Yes, not so much a dress code. You had to you know, well you just had to make sure like I say if you had on like an outer shirt you know, like it was cooler in the winter time, you’d wear a flannel shirt or whatever, just had to make sure that nothing would hang, you know that could get caught in a piece of machinery. Your hair if it was past your shoulders, we were supposed to tie it back up; even the guys. Because we got some guys there that had long hair. They had to tie their hair back up too. They were sort of strict with that. It all depended on how long your hair was really and it was just common sense. It really was and as far as your clothing you know you just had to be, you didn’t have anything real loose that could catch in the machinery but they were pretty relaxed you know. Amy Stevens: So what would you typically wear?

DY: Jeans and a t-shirt.

AS: Great.

DY: Jeans and a t-shirt. We had to wear safety shoes. They had to be steel toed and we had to wear safety glasses but it was basically, most everybody jeans and t-shirt’s.

AS: Great.

DY: And in the summer time, you’d see a lot of men and women would wear shorts too. They couldn’t be the short, short shorts you know they had to you know, because we didn’t want to distract people.

AS: That’s right.

DY: But yeah so as far as the shorts they had to be, they couldn’t be distracting but usually you just wore, it was for comfort anyway in the summer time because it would get extremely hot in some areas but in some areas they wouldn’t allow you to wear shorts because of contact with pipes and what not. But in our area we could but they had to be reasonable but most people just dressed for comfort you know.

AS: Any like funny stories about jokes or pranks or anything that you remember?

DY: Well at first, when I first went there because I was new, of course I don’t know if you get initiated into the club or what but all the new people, that was their thing. They had to pull pranks on you and this was that job, a repack job and it was just like you know you’ve got a great big long conveyer belt and you know, you’ve got two people on one end I think, two people on the other end and you’re filling like half the box with a certain color and you’re sending it down to the other people to fill the rest of it with the other color and, of course they’d like to bury you; like to get that conveyer belt all full so you get behind right but then I had this one guy, he just thought it was great. He was down on the first end. I was on the second end and the biggest joke going there was greasing things. Taking you know like your grease that you, black grease or green grease that you grease your machinery with, he thought it was so funny, I paid him back. He had greased the flap on my box and it was tucked in so I didn’t know there was grease on it until I tucked it out to put in the rest of the, and there I am, I grab the box. I’ve got grease everywhere and of course then it slows you down because you’ve got to take everything off. He thought that was so hilarious. Well I got him back because we would switch, after lunch we’d switch our sides and so eventually I got him back but that was a big thing, greasing things. You’d go to different parts of the machines, you know like on the saw, you always have to press the start and the stop button. Well that was the big thing too, is to put grease on the start and stop button. You know, you not know about it so there you go and we just thought that was hilarious. Because this is when I first got there, you know I mean, then afterwards they were pretty stringent, you know safety. You had to be careful what you did and that was one of the big things, was putting grease on things. People were getting all grease, and the other thing was especially during the summer time, you know because it was hot and we had, we had bottles of that, with water or oil, a lot of them had oil in it to grease up, to restart our mandrels because especially in the summer time, they would get so dry and you’d have problems. Well some of the guys would, well they did it with oil a couple times but we made them stop that. They’d squirt you with the oil. That was disgusting but in the summer time it was water. They would fill up their bottles and you’d be working along and all of a sudden you’d get zapped in the back of the head with water. You know so that was another big thing. They just loved doing that.

AS: Did you ever do that back to people?

DY: Oh yes, of course I did. Of course I did. There was one guy, Mike Willcock he was notorious for squirting people and so during our breaks, we’d try to sneak up around our machinery and zap him back, you know but me, personally, I was a very jumpy person, so they just got such a kick out of jumping me, you know I mean I was so jumpy. I mean I had one guy that went to such an extreme, this is when we used to all shut down for breaks. We’d go to breaks together. It was one of the adjusters. I was running a case packer and of course we shut everything down. We’d go on break and I had walked up to the case package to turn on my machine and there’s the adjuster underneath the case packer and he grabbed my ankle.

AS: Oh my gosh.

DY: Well of course what did I do? I screamed. I screamed and I almost fainted. I just went completely white and it scared him because I thought I was going to faint. I started to go down. I was so, you know that was the last time he did that but they would take great pride and thrill. They would just love to just come up and try to jump me. They knew I would scream so that was the big joke, to see how many times they could jump me a night. Sometimes I would get after them. Say ok, enough, enough but yes we always used to, you know nothing that would hurt anybody but you know it was always a lot of pranks going on.

AS: Did you have a nickname or anything or did other people have a nickname?

DY: Well one of my supervisors, Teresa Ghoul, because my maiden name was Smith, she always, and she was the only one that called me this but she always called me Snuffy Smith. That’s what she would always call me and that was the only nickname I really had but she was, Snuffy Smith.

AS: That’s cute.

DY: Yeah.

AS: Well let’s see. What else do I have? I guess this is the big open ended question, was there something different about being a woman in a paper mill and if so, what?

DY: Well I think, when I first got started like I said, there wasn’t a lot of women in the paper mill and you did have that stereotype when I first went in there that women probably shouldn’t be doing this type of work and some men felt that but I think as more, as it got bigger and more women did get involved in the mill and we did run a lot more of the machinery, there was a newfound respect, you know ok, of course they can do it. Of course they can do it and a lot of us did it better but at first it was difficult because you almost felt intimidated like, ok maybe I shouldn’t be here or maybe I can’t do what they’re doing. But after a few years that mentality did go away because it did get bigger and like I said the women did prove that we could do as good a job as they could; if not better in some aspects. I’m not saying in all aspects of the job, but in a majority of and we really could. And so it wasn’t really looked at as, you know later on as if, ok you know it was normal for the women to be there as well as the men. They knew that we could do it just as well. It was the first few years trying to get through those hurdles you know. Once a lot more women got introduced into the workplace that mentality went away. You know and it was just working together. It was basically, you know you didn’t look at who your work partner, if it was a man or a woman. It was just basically we all worked together and you know I don’t think men really thought of us as being weaker or anything. You know we all just worked together. That was our main goal, was to get the job done and to do it together and not you know, think that we couldn’t do it. So its, I’ve seen a lot of changes over the years. I really have, now it’s common place I mean to see a woman doing, to be working side by side with a man doing heavy work and I’m telling you in the converting department, we had a lot of heavy work. We had a lot of heavy lifting and I mean we proved that we could do it just as easily. I mean some of us women, we might, we might have found different ways to do it than the men did, that would be easier on us you know as far as lifting a lot of heavy chucks and tearing down things but everybody did that. They did whatever worked best for them. You know its, now I can look back and it’s just, you don’t think about who, you know you don’t think about if it’s a man or a woman you’re working with, just you know how well you work together. So I’ve seen a lot of changes, for the better, for the better really. We can do it.

AS: That’s right.

DY: Yes, we can. We can.

AS: Well I think I’ve asked you all my questions. Is there anything else that you want to add?

DY: No, not really. I think pretty well covered it. You know hopefully I can get some, as I’m, as you were asking questions there were certain people that I thought oh you’ve really got to talk to them because they could enlighten you more about women in the workplace too, more so than I could. Cynthia is definitely somebody you need to talk to.

AS: Great. I definitely will.

DY: Ok.

AS: Well thank you very much.

DY: You’re welcome.

AS: It’s been great talking with you.

DY: Yes, thank you Amy.

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