Series: Transcripts

Akamatsu - Stoklosa

Toelle - Zalesak

Series: Interviews

Subseries: Akamatsu, Robert M.
Alternate Format: Digital reproduction available online.

INTRODUCTION

BIOGRAPHICAL BACKGROUND
Scope and Content Note: Born in Alameda, California, September 14, 1918. Graduated from the University of California-Berkeley. From 1940-1942 did graduate work at the University of California and worked part-time at the University of California YMCA.

AKAMATSU AND HIS FAMILY WERE EVACUATED FROM CALIFORNIA MAY 1, 1942
Scope and Content Note: Relocated to Topaz, Utah, where they stayed approximately 2 1/2 years. During that time, Akamatsu and his wife were able to get passes to visit her family, located in Gila Bend, Arizona.

SEASONAL LEAVES FROM INTERNMENT CAMP
Scope and Content Note: Companies in the vicinity needed workers. Akamatsu and others from the camp would go to Spanish Fork, Utah, and work. He worked for various companies, including California Packing Corporation, a canning company run by Del Monte.

AKAMATSU'S BROTHER WENT TO IDAHO
Scope and Content Note: A group went north to Idaho with the idea of setting up a model farm. However, no one in the group had any kind of an agricultural background; the majority of people at the Topaz relocation center had come from urban areas.

MORE ON SEASONAL LEAVES
Scope and Content Note: There didn't seem to be too much concern about potential security risks; “...it didn't matter, just so you were willing to go....” Akamatsu doesn't know how much checking was done on people. War Relocation Authority did have personnel in various areas, however, and Akamatsu assumes that they were watched.

TOPAZ RELOCATION CENTER
Scope and Content Note: The people lived much like migrant workers: in tents, with a centralized eating facility. There were Mexican workers living in Topaz.

MARRIAGE
Scope and Content Note: Akamatsu was married shortly before the evacuation, but his wife was not allowed to accompany him to the temporary relocation center. It was for men only.

MORE ON WORKING OUTSIDE THE CAMP
Scope and Content Note: His brother went to Salt Lake City to work in a hospital. Akamatsu suspects “that all these job opportunities, in the main, were areas where there wasn't any help available.” When not working at the canning company, Akamatsu did such work as picking peaches and beans, or harvesting sugar beets, all of which was hard work. “I still dream about it.”

AKAMATSU'S JOB AT THE CALIFORNIA PACKING CORPORATION
Scope and Content Note: He was a scale man; he weighed the trucks as they came in with merchandise. He was able to land this “plush” job because, while in camp, he had worked as office manager for the War Relocation Authority man who headed the employment office. Most of the Japanese-Americans working at the canning company loaded freight cars. None of them worked the production line; that was reserved for Caucasians. There were two crews, a day and a night. Akamatsu worked with the latter, which consisted of young, eager fellows who far out-produced the day crew.

MOST JOB OPPORTUNITIES FOR JAPANESE-AMERICANS WERE IN THE AREA OF AGRICULTURE
Scope and Content Note: Despite the fact that most of the people, at least in Akamatsu's group, had come from urban areas, people on the outside considered the Japanese-Americans to be excellent farmers; word was they had made the desert bloom in California. Their help was sought for such things as harvesting, although with reservation. In that respect, the Japanese-Americans were much like the Chicanos.

HOW EVACUATION AFFECTED ONE JAPANESE-AMERICAN FARMER
Scope and Content Note: This farmer had had a large operation in California. He had voluntarily evacuated to Spanish Fork, taking his entire operation with him. He would bring in his produce in semi-trucks.

AKAMATSU'S PARENTS
Scope and Content Note: They both were immigrants. His father had come to the United States first; he was in San Francisco during the 1906 earthquake. His mother did not arrive until about 1919. She had heard about Akamatsu's father through a relative of hers who had visited America. His father became a gardener, working for people in the Alameda area. When he first started, his only means of transportation was a bicycle, and he carried all of his equipment, including a lawn mower, on his shoulders. The children were expected to help him both after school and on Saturdays; Akamatsu hated it. His father worked regularly during the Depression. His mother had gone to high school in Japan; a rather unusual thing for a Japanese woman. Although most immigrant Japanese women in the Alameda area became full-time domestics, Akamatsu's mother did not work until the children were well into high school; she felt that she should be at home with them. She eventually did go to work as a domestic, but only on a part-time basis. She continued to work until she was about 80.

MORE ON AKAMATSU'S MOTHER
Scope and Content Note: His mother wanted to be able to give each of her four grandchildren $1,000 for when they married, money that she herself had earned working part-time. Akamatsu continues to hold on to the $2,000 earmarked for his two sons, neither of whom has yet married; one son is age 37, the other 32.

AKAMATSU'S BROTHER AND SISTER
Scope and Content Note: His brother became a landscape architect in New York, but he died of cancer when he was 28. Akamatsu also has a sister.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

AKAMATSU'S MARRIAGE
Scope and Content Note: He and his wife met at a church conference in Pasadena; they were paired during a grand march which was part of a mixer. They decided to marry despite the impending evacuation since his family was being sent to Utah; hers to Arizona. Four days after the wedding, Akamatsu was sent to the temporary relocation center--a racetrack stable.

INITIAL CONDITIONS IN INTERNMENT CAMPS
Scope and Content Note: The whole relocation process took about three weeks. Orders were to bring bedding and whatever could be carried. Those who arrived earliest lacked many necessities and wrote others, cautioning them to bring certain items. Akamatsu's wife lived in Santa Barbara and had to buy a heavier coat. Caucasian friends would send needed items to the camp. There was a central mess hall but most preferred to take their food back to family quarters.

EVACUEES' DISPOSITION OF THEIR PROPERTY
Scope and Content Note: Some people had as little as 24 hours to settle their affairs. Because Alameda was considered a military zone, Akamatsu's parents, as aliens, had to move to Oakland even before the evacuation to camp. Akamatsu and his brother, as citizens, remained in Alameda and maintained the family home and their father's gardening business. When evacuation occurred, the government offered to store belongings at the owners' risk. “We didn't have that much faith in our government at that time to turn everything over to them.” Stored some things at a church, some in the basement of their house. Able to rent the house, but some people had to sell homes at a loss. Sold car and truck. Belongings remained safe, but his wife's family's things, stored in their garage, were ransacked.

DESCRIPTION OF INTERNMENT CAMP AT TOPAZ
Scope and Content Note: At first his whole family, including his wife, had to share the same very small quarters. “Essentially an Army camp” surrounded by barbed wire fence and guard towers. Evacuees built a high school in the center of the camp.

EVACUEES DID VIRTUALLY ALL THE WORK IN CAMP

JAPANESE-AMERICANS, EDUCATION AND JOBS
Scope and Content Note: Japanese-Americans were generally well educated, largely because of the low tuition in the California state university system, but many professional and skilled occupations were closed to them before World War II. Akamatsu had done graduate work in history and social work, even though pursuit of the latter would have been a dead end occupationally in the pre-war period.

THE INTERNMENT CAMP WAS LIKE A SMALL CITY, RUN BY EVACUEES
Scope and Content Note: The Topaz camp had a population of about 10,000, making it the second or third largest town in Utah. Evacuees did almost everything to run the camp, thus being able to pursue occupations closed to them on the outside. Built a high school, even though building trades generally closed to Japanese-Americans on the outside. One friend became a policeman in camp so he could get outside the compound and search for arrowheads. “If they needed real police work, they had to rely on the Army.”

FURTHER DESCRIPTION OF THE INTERNMENT CAMP AT TOPAZ
Scope and Content Note: Central dining hall and laundry area. Frame and tarpaper structure. Six apartments per building. No ceilings at first; pot belly stove; Army cots.

AKAMATSU'S HONEYMOON
Scope and Content Note: First part was spent by himself in a stable where Japanese-Americans were held prior to relocation. Second part spent in a one-room apartment with his family at Topaz.

AKAMATSU WAS AN EMPLOYMENT PLACEMENT OFFICER AT THE INTERNMENT CAMP

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON CONDITIONS AT THE INTERNMENT CAMP
Scope and Content Note: Government provided food and shelter; inmates were paid $8 to $16 per month for their work in the camp. Cooperative store in camp, but mail order was used quite often. People his father gardened for sent the Akamatsu family needed items.

AKAMATSU'S FATHER
Scope and Content Note: Had been an elementary school teacher in Japan. Chose to do carpentry work in the camp and also did carpentry after release.

MORE ON THE HIGH SCHOOL BUILT AT TOPAZ
Scope and Content Note: The Army provided supplies and supervision, but the building, including a basketball gymnasium, was actually built by people who largely had no prior construction experience.

EXAMPLES OF PREJUDICE AGAINST JAPANESE-AMERICANS
Scope and Content Note: Most “aliens” were not aliens by choice. “Aliens” could not own property in California. Akamatsu's parents had to buy their home in his name when he was only about 12 because he was a citizen.

JAPANESE-AMERICANS AND JAPAN
Scope and Content Note: Many wanted to visit Japan after the war. He finally took his mother there in the fall of 1979. Vast changes in her home town.

JAPANESE IMMIGRANTS AND WORLD WAR II
Scope and Content Note: While many probably had come to the United States intending to return to Japan, most had become assimilated, and their loyalty during World War II was to the United States. They resented the loyalty oath (to renounce the Emperor) because no other group of people were required to renounce their old country rulers. There were some who were pro-Japan, like those who intended to return and those who had sent their children to Japan for education.

AKAMATSU'S CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR STATUS DURING WORLD WAR II
Scope and Content Note: He had filed for a CO when he first registered for the draft in the late 1930s. He renewed this classification when the government began to solicit loyalty oaths and soldiers from the relocation centers. This was not a popular position at all. “If you were to ask me now, I'm not so sure at this point whether I would feel positive about my conscientious objection.”

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

AKAMATSU RETURNED TO ALAMEDA, CALIFORNIA
Scope and Content Note: He wanted to visit his home. A group of University of California students, affiliated with the YMCA Akamatsu had worked for, visited camp as part of an educational, good-will visit. Although the West Coast was still closed, Akamatsu persuaded the Army to let him accompany the students back to California. While in Alameda area, he visited a Jewish woman his father had worked for. Upon seeing him, she gave him a hug, which did not mean very much to him at the time. Ultimately, Akamatsu decided not to return to California permanently.

WHY AKAMATSU CHOSE MADISON IN WHICH TO SETTLE
Scope and Content Note: The presence of the university and the state capitol afforded educational and other opportunities, and Akamatsu felt it would be a good place to raise children. Only in the last four or five years has he discovered that, because of racism, “things weren't all that hot in Madison for my son.”

GOVERNMENT FURNISHED TRAVEL TICKETS WHEN INTERNMENT ENDED
Scope and Content Note: Akamatsu decided to get his money's worth, so he traveled east, visited Madison, and continued on to New York to visit his brother, who warned him that Madison had a humid climate. Akamatsu was not familiar with humidity or hard water.

AKAMATSU LEFT HIS WIFE AND SON IN CAMP
Scope and Content Note: The plan was to find housing and a job, then send for his family.

FINDING HOUSING AND A JOB IN MADISON WAS DIFFICULT
Scope and Content Note: More than one place he found to live would not accept him. He did not have the required qualifications for many jobs and could not get a job with the state because he was not a resident.

FINALLY FOUND A JOB AT PIGGLY WIGGLY SHORTLY BEFORE THE WAR ENDED
Scope and Content Note: A Japanese-American man left the store to return to school. Management was under the illusion Akamatsu would be a good produce man, but he never worked produce. After he began working there, there were a few instances of customers complaining about his presence, but the store manager and a butcher defended his rights.

AKAMATSU WORKED AT VARIOUS PIGGLY WIGGLY AND EAGLE STORES IN MADISON AND MIDDLETON THROUGHOUT HIS 35-YEAR CAREER
Scope and Content Note: Worked the longest at the East Washington Avenue store. “Supervising management was essentially the same” before and after Piggly Wiggly became Eagle.

EAGLE HAS A POLICY OF GIVING A DIAMOND FOR EACH FIVE YEARS WORKED
Scope and Content Note: The last tie tack Akamatsu received has seven diamonds on it.

AKAMATSU WAS HIRED AS A GENERAL CLERK
Scope and Content Note: He began by stocking shelves. He had no desire to be a produce clerk. Because of his California background, however, he was familiar with some of the produce coming into the store which the produce clerks had not seen before.

THE BUTCHERS TOOK GREAT DELIGHT IN WATCHING AKAMATSU EAT RAW OYSTERS

MAJOR CHANGES IN THE GROCERY BUSINESS
Scope and Content Note: Going from manually unloading deliveries to using conveyor belts. Palletized groceries. Computerization of ordering procedure.

TYPICAL WORK DAY IN 1945
Scope and Content Note: Store was open 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. six days a week; no evening work or Sunday work. However, “if there was work to be done, they expected you to stick around....” Deliveries were unloaded and shelves were stocked during the regular work day.

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

EQUIPMENT CHANGES
Scope and Content Note: Primitive compared to today. Method of marking the price on the merchandise. Hauling stock into the store. Shopping carts.

CHECKOUT COUNTERS
Scope and Content Note: At the Piggly Wiggly store in which Akamatsu worked, there were initially three or four. Of the three Piggly Wiggly stores in Madison at the time, the East Washington Avenue store, with seven or eight checkout counters, was the largest. All three of the stores had the basic characteristics of a self-service supermarket.

MECHANICAL BELT AT ONE CHECKOUT COUNTER
Scope and Content Note: It was not actually a part of the checkout counter. It was only used when the store was busy; it was quite a production and very fast.

THERE WERE NO HOME DELIVERIES; BUT DELIVERIES WERE MADE TO A FEW INSTITUTIONAL CUSTOMERS

TIME OFF FROM WORK
Scope and Content Note: It was difficult to get time off, especially to look for another job, as Akamatsu occasionally tried to do. He does remember taking a couple of civil service tests; “I must have given some song and dance in order to get off a couple hours.”

VACATION POLICY WHEN AKAMATSU FIRST BEGAN WORKING
Scope and Content Note: One week; two weeks required a great amount of seniority.

PIGGLY WIGGLY AND UNIONIZATION
Scope and Content Note: Akamatsu remembers the employees attempting to unionize themselves before the Retail Clerks International Association (RCIA) was much of a factor in town. The meat cutters/butchers were already unionized, and there was a great contrast in working conditions between meat cutters and clerks.

MEAT CUTTERS
Scope and Content Note: Their situation is now rather precarious with the increase in mechanization. Ultimately, the meat cutters could go the way of the clerks: one really doesn't have to know all that much, just where to put the merchandise.

WOODMAN'S
Scope and Content Note: With its trend toward computer check out, all that will be required is someone to unload the truck and place the merchandise on the shelves. No ordering or price marking will be necessary.

ORDERING IN STORES NOT FULLY MECHANIZED
Scope and Content Note: General rule is that the clerk in charge of a specific department does the ordering; or the stock chief or an assistant.

DELIVERIES
Scope and Content Note: Used to be once a week, if lucky. Now Eagle receives deliveries at least two or three times a week. Overnight ordering.

MORE ON PIGGLY WIGGLY AND UNIONIZATION
Scope and Content Note: An attempt at self-unionization was made between the late 1940s and the late 1950s. They tried to organize themselves either as an independent union or as part of the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen (AMC&BW). All three of the Madison Piggly Wiggly stores were involved in the attempt. The union lost the election by a small margin because the management got the office personnel involved in the voting, and they voted against. Akamatsu was the only one who attended the union meeting the night of the election.

RCIA DID NOT ORGANIZE THE MADISON PIGGLY WIGGLY STORES UNTIL THE LATE 1950s OR EARLY 1960s
Scope and Content Note: Piggly Wiggly was one of the last to be organized, probably because the company was small; therefore, management was influential. Employees of Piggly Wiggly knew who the president of the company was. Also, Piggly Wiggly had an office in Madison.

END OF TAPE 3, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON PIGGLY WIGGLY MANAGEMENT
Scope and Content Note: Piggly Wiggly had both a profit-sharing plan and a pension plan. Management was personally involved.

WHAT UNIONIZATION MEANT
Scope and Content Note: With the union, everything was in “black and white”; 40-hour week, vacations, work schedules. Although stores began to be open both at night and on Sundays, without the union there would not have been any overtime, Sunday or holiday pay. Many of the provisions evolved over the years.

ANECDOTES ABOUT TWO UNION MEMBERS
Scope and Content Note: One, an active member, was transferred many times and finally “squeezed out.” Another, who had helped organize Piggly Wiggly, later worked against the union in an unorganized store.

MORE ANALYSIS OF THE SIGNIFICANCE OF UNIONIZATION
Scope and Content Note: Unorganized stores, in the long run, have a detrimental effect on union stores. The RCIA may well be faced with takeaway demands in the near future.

AKAMATSU'S PROMOTION TO ASSISTANT MANAGER
Scope and Content Note: Did not have much store experience at the time. Meant more money, but longer hours.

WOMEN IN FOOD STORES
Scope and Content Note: In the past, women employees mainly ran the cash registers and did related work. They did not do any heavy lifting. If they stocked shelves, they would only stock lighter items. Changes came with time and by choice. Women began working on the night stock crew and as baggers and carry outs. They also occasionally help to unload deliveries.

MORE PART-TIME WORKERS TODAY
Scope and Content Note: Very few checkers are full-time. Management prefers using part-time workers because it is cheaper; cheaper fringe benefits, low seniority. Department and discount stores operate almost entirely with part-time workers, who are anxious to work and thus are willing to work the rotten hours. Since many of these kinds of stores are non-union, the pay scale is much lower.

CHANGES IN OVER 34 YEARS OF WORKING IN FOOD STORES
Scope and Content Note: Akamatsu began working for $35 a week; when he quit, he was making about $400 a week. In the Eagle and Piggly Wiggly chains, there is now an impersonal corporation. The president used to visit the stores and, even though he was not well liked, he knew your name, and that meant something to the employees. Hours, vacation time have changed. Personal holidays and sick leave are now available. At the end of a year, an employee may be paid for sick leave not taken.

MORE ON CHANGES
Scope and Content Note: There is a lot more pressure now and fewer employees. The nature of the relationship between employee and customer has changed. The work is faster now and therefore harder.

END OF INTERVIEW

Subseries: Breithaupt, Harold W.

INTRODUCTION

BREITHAUPT'S FATHER WAS A STORE MANAGER FOR A & P AND KROGER
Scope and Content Note: A & P, Lake Mills, Wisconsin, 1924. At that time, A & P paid managers a certain amount and out of that amount had to come the wages for any hired help.

IN MID-1930s, FATHER OPENED HIS OWN STORE IN BELOIT
Scope and Content Note: A neighborhood store, located across the street from the Kroger store he had been managing. Drove Kroger store out of business within three years. One thousand dollars a week volume was considered large enough to show a reasonable profit at that time. No employees, just Breithaupt and his parents. Not self-service. Cash register did not add; orders were tallied with a pencil on the outside of the grocery bag. At first, ice was the only refrigeration method. Full line of dairy products. Butter was packaged, but flour, sugar, beans, etc. were handled in bulk. Credit purchases, which naturally caused some problems since this was the Depression Era. Since few people had refrigeration at home, customers made purchases daily or even more often. Groceries delivered to the store once a week; meat and produce twice a week. Most items secured locally, but meat came from Madison and produce from Milwaukee. A decade earlier, grocery stores did not carry meat and produce.

DESPITE THE LONG HOURS AND LOW PAY, BREITHAUPT ALWAYS THOUGHT HE WOULD BE A GROCERY MAN
Scope and Content Note: When he was making $20 a week, men at Fairbanks-Morse were making $30 a week, but the latter would be on layoff for half the year. His father's store was open from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m., and he was there the whole time. While in high school, his father paid him 25 cents a week. After graduating from high school, he worked full-time and eventually got up to $12 a week; worked six days every week plus every other Sunday. Father was doing well if he made $35 a week.

HAD HIS OWN STORE IN BELOIT, 1946 TO 1949
Scope and Content Note: He and his wife (married 1942) ran the store. At about the time the store was beginning to pay off, the owner of the building asked to buy it, and when Breithaupt refused, the rent was raised so much he had to sell. The store was about 30 feet by 60 feet, and it had one of the first open frozen food cases in town, a walk-in cooler, double-duty meat case, and a refrigerated produce rack. Other people in the grocery business would visit his store to see all the innovations. At the time, he was very disappointed that he had to sell, but in hindsight, it was probably good because the trend toward larger stores which the chains were beginning at the time would have made it difficult to sell his store if he had held on to it three or four more years.

HIS WAS BASICALLY A SELF-SERVICE STORE
Scope and Content Note: Set it up with his savings and a bank loan. Became aware of grocery innovations through trade magazines. Meat display case, no custom cutting. One checkout counter near the front. Grocery carts, which were also new to Beloit. People about 60 years old and older resented the self-service concept and still insisted he fetch items for them. Because the operation was small, the self-service aspect did not result in lower prices. Did result in heavier volume and a little more profit. He, his wife, and a high school boy were the only workers in the store. Made a bed for his baby daughter under the counter. Despite all the self-service innovations, it was still considered a neighborhood store.

PHYSICAL LAYOUT OF BREITHAUPT'S STORE
Scope and Content Note: Description of layout. The layout involved no sales psychology; it was designed so that damageable items would be picked up last. His father's store, on the other hand, had no rhyme or reason to its layout.

THE WORK DAY AND WORK WEEK AT BREITHAUPT'S STORE
Scope and Content Note: Located near Fairbanks-Morse factory, and work day geared to trade from factory workers. Opened at 6 a.m. so men could purchase lunch and tobacco products before starting work at 7 a.m. Stocked meat and produce, 7 a.m. to 9 a.m. Took telephone orders 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. and made deliveries 11 a.m. to noon. Very busy with factory workers over noon hour. Stocked shelves 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. Very busy again for two or three hours when the factory let out at about 3:30 p.m. Stayed open til 9 p.m. Unlike father's store and most other neighborhood stores, was closed Sundays. Received deliveries once a week, usually early or mid-week. Would spend most of delivery day stocking. Prices were marked on shelves, under each item, not on each item. Prices stable enough that he knew price for every item in the store. Potatoes came in 100-pound bags; rice, beans and a few other items still came in bulk. Peanut butter, lard and butter no longer bulk.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON HOME DELIVERY FROM BREITHAUPT'S STORE
Scope and Content Note: Deliveries were done at 11 a.m. and 3 p.m., sometimes twice in one day to the same residence. People knew what time they had to call in orders to make delivery deadlines.

AFTER SELLING HIS STORE, BREITHAUPT WENT TO WORK FOR CACCIATORE'S MAIN MARKET WHICH WAS NOTED FOR ITS MEAT
Scope and Content Note: Cacciatore was an independent with four stores in Rockford, Illinois, and one in Beloit. Did the largest volume of meat business in Beloit. Although known mainly as a meat market, carried a full line of produce and groceries. Located downtown, but kept live chickens in back of the store; butchered chickens once a week. Three full-time meat cutters; glass-enclosed meat case; meat pre-cut, but not pre-wrapped; custom cuts available.

MEAT AT BREITHAUPT'S OWN STORE
Scope and Content Note: For a while he cut meat himself. Would buy and cut a pork loin but did not do large enough business to cut a whole side of beef. Bought beef at a discount from other retailers and sold it for their retail price; this done as a convenience for customers.

DESCRIPTION OF MAIN MARKET
Scope and Content Note: Sales area was about 30 feet by 75 feet. Three checkout counters. Considered a supermarket by the standards of the day. In addition to the meat cutters and Breithaupt, there were three or four women employed. Checkers did the stocking, but Breithaupt would carry out. Closed Sundays. Neither meat cutters nor clerks were organized, and there were no attempts to organize them while Breithaupt was manager.

BREITHAUPT'S RESPONSIBILITIES AS STORE MANAGER COMPARED TO STORE MANAGERS TODAY
Scope and Content Note: Basically responsible for seeing that things ran smoothly. Ordered all groceries and produce and was in charge of hiring and supervising clerks. Meat department operated independently. Had full authority for ordering (how much and from whom) and pricing. Today merchandise comes from a central warehouse pre-priced. Formerly, even chain managers had some purchasing leeway.

MEAT IN THE 1950s
Scope and Content Note: Ordered from various big packers, depending on where the bargains were or which packer carried preferred items. Most stores carried Utility grade, which people would not even eat today. U.S. Good was generally the top grade carried; Choice was extremely rare, and Prime was unheard of. People would not buy Choice because it had too much fat. Meat came to the store in either full or a half beef. At Main Market, there was no head meat cutter; the three meat cutters worked as equals and did their own ordering.

COMPARISON OF BREITHAUPT'S STORE AND MAIN MARKET
Scope and Content Note: Main Market cash registers did addition. Major difference was Main Market had no heat, which was common for meat markets; gas heater near checkouts added in later years. Had to cover produce with gunny sacks at night to prevent freezing.

MORE DESCRIPTION OF MAIN MARKET
Scope and Content Note: Forty to fifty feet of meat case. Frozen food cases; no parking lot; shopping carts; no conveyor belts at checkout.

CRYSTAL FOODS, 1956 TO 1966
Scope and Content Note: The largest independent in Beloit. Was building a new store, 15,000 to 20,000 square feet, the largest store in Beloit. Owner hired Breithaupt to manage this new store. Breithaupt bought all merchandise and planned layout for the new store. Had five or six checkouts. Had 45 employees--six in meat department, four women in deli, three women in bakery, balance were checkers and stockers. Managerial structure was new. Breithaupt had little to do with the meat department; head meat cutter had invested in the store. Deli, bakery and produce were separate departments with heads that answered to Breithaupt. There was also a head checker and a bookkeeper. Non-union and no attempts to organize. Breithaupt would have favored unionization because the wages and benefits were so low he was limited in the type of person he was able to hire. “You filled your store up with people that were inefficient as a general rule.” Krogers were only organized stores in Beloit.

EXTENT OF UNIONIZATION WHEN BREITHAUPT WENT TO WORK FOR THE UNION IN 1968
Scope and Content Note: Janesville was well organized, but in Beloit, only Kroger and Kohl's were organized. A & P was non-union. Eagle was organized in 1968, on the second attempt. Top hourly rate for a clerk in a union store was $2.87.

WAGES, HOURS, FRINGES AT CRYSTAL FOODS
Scope and Content Note: Clerk wages were between $1 and $1.50 per hour; 40-hour week. Department heads made more money but worked 60-hour weeks. Prestige and higher weekly earnings prompted people to become department heads; hourly wages may have actually been less than clerks; six- and seven-day weeks and 12-hour days were common. Eventually, company paid half of hospitalization insurance. full-timers got one week vacation after one year and two weeks after two years, but that was the top.

COMPARISON OF FOOD STORES--1960 VERSUS 1980
Scope and Content Note: Two-thirds of Crystal employees were full-time, and part-timers were mostly students. The ratio is reversed today. Half were male, often people who simply could not get better jobs. If business was slow, full-timers would clean shelves and the like; people worked the same schedule the year round. Today, if business is down one week, hours are cut the next. Stock rotation and cleaning are of less concern today. More supervisors today, with each department having a head.

WAGE DETERMINATIONS IN 1950s TO 1960s NON-UNION STORES
Scope and Content Note: Rarely were raises granted because of longevity. Increases usually granted only when individual employee “hollered.” If manager wanted a particular person to work in his store, he could give that person a higher rate than what people who had worked in the store for ten years were making.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON WAGE DETERMINATIONS IN NON-UNION STORES--CRYSTAL FOODS
Scope and Content Note: An employee could get fired for telling someone else how much money he made. Management's attitude was that the people who had been working for the store for 15 years would not leave no matter what they were paid. “You were paid what the company felt they had to pay you to keep you there....”

FURTHER DESCRIPTION OF CRYSTAL FOODS
Scope and Content Note: Physical layout. Profitable items now being placed near front. Conveyor belts at checkouts; deliveries unloaded onto roller ramps; prices stamped on items; carts to haul stock around the store. Stocking done during the day. At Main Market, customers unloaded their own carts even though checkouts did not have conveyors and checkers would bag own groceries. Crystal had bag boys.

BREITHAUPT FIRED AS CRYSTAL MANAGER
Scope and Content Note: Was hospitalized for a week with stomach problems caused by nerves. Was given one week's notice of termination the day after he returned to work. Sold automobiles for a while and worked on the assembly line at Chrysler's Belvidere plant for six weeks. He was 46 years old at the time.

GOT A JOB WITH EAGLE
Scope and Content Note: Interviewed with Eagle Foods for managerial position and said he did not want to leave the area. Was hired as a stocker and after three months was offered a manager's position in Iowa, which he refused.

ATTEMPTS TO ORGANIZE EAGLE STORES IN BELOIT
Scope and Content Note: Three other employees approached him about forming a union. Because of the circumstances surrounding his termination at Crystal, he was amenable to the union idea. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) ruled that the election had to cover both Eagle stores in Beloit. The other store lost the election for them. In order to break up the foursome who favored unionization, Breithaupt was transferred to the other Eagle store where he spent the next year organizing.

PRIOR TO EAGLE, BREITHAUPT HAD AVOIDED WORKING FOR CHAIN STORES BECAUSE CHAIN MANAGERS WERE SUBJECT TO FREQUENT TRANSFERS

BREITHAUPT'S JOB WITH EAGLE
Scope and Content Note: A stocker, but he had to train a young assistant manager.

COMPARISON OF WORK AT EAGLE TO MAIN MARKET AND CRYSTAL
Scope and Content Note: More part-time employees. Stockers, in order to make an eight-hour day, had to work split shifts. Came in at 5 a.m. to unload trucks and stock shelves until store opened. Came back to work the 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. rush; went home for supper; returned to stock after supper. When breaks were instituted, had to come to work at 4:45 a.m. and take a break first thing.

EAGLE UNIONIZED
Scope and Content Note: After Breithaupt was transferred to the second Eagle store, whenever someone complained about something, he told them they should have voted for the union. Union won its second Eagle election in 1968. Immediate positive changes because of the union: no split shifts, breaks in the middle of the morning instead of at the beginning of the day, ten cents an hour raise, insurance, pension.

HIRED AS BUSINESS REPRESENTATIVE FOR RETAIL CLERKS INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION (RCIA) LOCAL 1401
Scope and Content Note: When the first contract with Eagle was negotiated, Breithaupt was the representative from his store. Local 1401 President Bill Moreth asked if he would like to work for the union. He knew the long hours of a business representative and had had enough long hours as a store manager. However, being a stocker in his late forties was beginning to tell on his body, and his wife convinced him to look into the union job. Three others interviewed for the job, and he got it.

HIS ATTEMPT TO ORGANIZE CRYSTAL FOODS
Scope and Content Note: Harold Bitter had been servicing Janesville and Beloit in addition to some duties in Madison. Breithaupt was given Janesville and Beloit and tried to organize Crystal Foods where he had once managed. The election was lost because management said it would close the store if it was unionized.

DUTIES AS BUSINESS REPRESENTATIVE
Scope and Content Note: Received training and literature to read. Travelled with Bitter and Moreth for several months to learn the ropes. Was not given contract negotiations for some time, and all grievance handling had to be reviewed by Moreth. There was no steward system in Local 1401 because Moreth felt business representatives could handle grievances more efficiently and would not feel the pressure a steward might feel working in a store in which a grievance was in progress. Also, because of contract uniformity, there was enforcement uniformity which could be more effectively handled by a business representative. Milwaukee stores had a steward system when Local 1401 merged with Milwaukee Local 444 to form Local 1444 in 1980. Moreth changed their duties so that their only responsibility is signing up new members. In general, members have “a lack of interest unless they have a problem.” Breithaupt visits each store once a month so that he gets to know the employees, and they get to know him. He carries a route book with him which he checks against time cards for new employees.

COMMON GRIEVANCES/PROBLEMS
Scope and Content Note: Three quarters of his work is ironing out problems before they become grievances. About half the time management is wrong, and about half the time the worker is expecting too much. Most common problems are scheduling, preferable shifts, holiday/vacation dates, productivity complaints by management, incorrect cash register totals over a period of time, tardiness and absenteeism, and raises.

CHECKER ERRORS
Scope and Content Note: Company must first prove drawers did not balance properly. Then Breithaupt makes sure the checker checked her own drawer in and out, and the drawer was used by no one else.

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

LEGITIMATE CAUSES FOR DISMISSAL
Scope and Content Note: Theft; repeated tardiness; not doing job properly; mismanagement of department by department head; insubordination.

STORES MORE IMPERSONAL TODAY AND TOUGHER ON EMPLOYEE PRODUCTIVITY
Scope and Content Note: Except somewhat at Woodman's Food Stores, both chains and independents make little effort to correct problems or help employees with problems. Where once management would carry to retirement a loyal employee of many years, now management would prefer the employee quit so a younger, cheaper, quicker person can be hired.

UNION MEETINGS
Scope and Content Note: Monthly membership meetings are held in Milwaukee, and bimonthly meetings in Madison and Janesville. Also, an area meeting is held each month in a town other than Milwaukee, Madison or Janesville. These latter meetings are mainly for informational purposes--communications, answering questions, making the members feel they are part of the organization.

NEGOTIATIONS PROCEDURE
Scope and Content Note: Proposal meeting with the membership; draw up and submit proposals to the company. Each business representative handles his own negotiations. After concluding a tentative agreement with management, contract is explained and membership votes on it at another large meeting. Majority rules. Because of past practices, employees do sit in on negotiations with some stores, but in general, it is just the business representatives. Breithaupt has mixed emotions about employee representation on bargaining teams; feels time is wasted putting on a show when employees are present. In Milwaukee, strike votes, as a bargaining tool, were common, but Breithaupt has “never taken one back that I recommended be rejected because I never went back until I figured I had what I could get.”.

CHANGING BARGAINING PATTERNS
Scope and Content Note: Until the last contract, negotiated two years ago, chains bargained together and arrived at a master agreement that would cover them all. At the last negotiations, however, Woodman's and John Godfrey's Sentry stores pulled out of the management group. Their contracts now are basically the same but do have some different language so that business representatives can no longer answer employee questions without looking up the specific contract. The reason Sentry and Woodman's pulled out was because a few years ago at negotiations, a representative from National Tea was the industry spokesman, and he gave in on a number of items the others did not want to give in on; and, after the conclusion of negotiations, National closed all its Wisconsin stores.

SENTRY STORES AND THE THREAT OF NON-UNIONISM
Scope and Content Note: A master agreement is bargained only for those Sentry stores owned by Godfrey. Those Sentry stores which have been franchised to other owners have their contracts bargained individually and usually for lower rates since they are often in small towns. Because successor clauses are unenforceable, Godfrey uses the threat of franchising against the union. In Monroe, he sold his organized Sentry store to a new owner who refused to hire back any of the old employees; the new employees know this and refuse to talk to the union.

BARGAINING GETTING TOUGHER
Scope and Content Note: The cost of doing business is skyrocketing, and the only thing the employer can control at all is wages. This is particularly a problem for non-food stores which are organized and are in competition with unorganized stores. Janesville is highly organized, so it is not too big a problem there. Even in food now, however, there are enough non-union stores showing up to make wage competition a factor.

NON-UNION STORES IN THE BELOIT/JANESVILLE AREA
Scope and Content Note: The Monroe Sentry store pays no one more than minimum wage, and no one gets vacation, paid holidays or insurance unless they work 40 hours a week. Copps uses the threat of closing to keep the union out. Copps employees tell Breithaupt they are not worth more than $3.50 per hour. In the Copps store at Janesville, Breithaupt signed up all the female employees but was unable to sign up a single male because management had given them all titles and convinced them they were part of management, even though they were only being paid five cents over minimum wage. In smaller towns, the only part-time jobs available are often in minimum wage discount stores, and people do not want to jeopardize their employment by talking to the union. Employers are using the threat of closing more and more to prevent organization.

LOCAL 1444 DUES AND INITIATION RATES
Scope and Content Note: Dues are about two hours' wages per month. Initiation fee is less for part-timers than full-timers.

CONTRACTUAL CLASSIFICATION OF EMPLOYEES
Scope and Content Note: Those working 24 hours per week are considered full-time. Wages for full-timers and part-timers are the same. The only difference is insurance coverage; part-timers' dependents are not covered by the insurance. Many new classifications were added in the late 1970s.

TREND TOWARD PART-TIMERS
Scope and Content Note: Employers are scheduling people to work only when they are needed to stock or to check customers. Thus, despite the available hours clause, people with seniority are unable to schedule many hours without working a split shift or a sixth day, and the contract forbids both. About 60% of food store employees are now part-timers.

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

PART-TIMERS, FULL-TIMERS, AND SCHEDULING
Scope and Content Note: Membership has not pushed for an end to the contract clause which prohibits split shifts; rather, the membership would like the union to force management to schedule people for eight-hour shifts. Stores need many more people on Saturday than on weekdays but must schedule each employee for at least 12 hours a week. Membership felt job was not worth having if it was for less than 12 hours a week. Most employers do not like having too many short-hour people because it creates extra bookkeeping. The problem of holding on to part-timers is getting worse all the time. At Woodman's, the computer sets up work schedules. Work schedules vary from week to week for both part-timers and full-timers. “They seem to spend more time writing schedules than doing anything else.” Management is not chipping away at the hours of 40-hour people because there is no advantage to doing this; the cost of wages and benefits are the same for full-time and part-time. Employers nevertheless prefer to have two part-timers instead of one full-timer because there are four hands instead of two during rush periods. The union would prefer to see more full-time, career people because the turnover among part-timers makes for poor union members.

DIFFICULT TO MAKE A CAREER IN THE FOOD STORE BUSINESS TODAY
Scope and Content Note: Despite available hours clause, it takes a very long time for someone to accumulate enough seniority to get a 40-hour week. Also, no new stores are opening in southern Wisconsin, so there are very few managerial positions available. In Beloit, there are 400 clerks and only six assistant manager positions.

ASSISTANT MANAGERS
Scope and Content Note: Most are good union members. Hence, not many problems result from having both assistant managers and clerks in the same union. Assistant managers are not permitted to write up employees; if an assistant manager sees an infraction, the manager must write it up. Assistant managers are trained for management positions, but many refuse to become managers because they do not want to give up union security and benefits. Some employers attempt to demote assistant managers who refuse promotion.

MORE ON THE GRIEVANCE PROCEDURE
Scope and Content Note: Ninety-nine percent of all grievances are worked out at the store level. First step is meeting with the store manager and the employee. Second step is meeting with the supervisor. Third step goes to personnel and is written up. Fourth step is arbitration.

GOVERNING STRUCTURE OF LOCAL 1444
Scope and Content Note: Executive Board, elected by the membership, runs the local. Business representatives are hired by the Executive Board. Business representatives of Local 1401 could not be Executive Board members, but they could in Local 444. Thus, some business representatives are on the Board of Local 1444, but this will be phased out.

TOUGHEST EMPLOYERS TO DEAL WITH
Scope and Content Note: Changed from time to time. Kohl family was easier to deal with than the current conglomerate ownership.

STRIKES
Scope and Content Note: Since Breithaupt became a business representative, there has been a big strike at Topp's in Madison and a strike at the Sentry store in Waterford, but no strikes of chain stores.

STORE CLOSINGS
Scope and Content Note: Union position is that all closed because of poor management. A & P was backward; still had oiled floors after tile floors were common. Kroger did not put profits back into the stores. National was distracted by an attempt by a Canadian company to take over. The country was not ready for Kroger's attempt to operate with central meat cutting; had to close central cutting plant in Madison. Employees of closed stores usually are out of a job. Although the contract forces management to interview people referred by the union, it does not force management to hire them. Seniority is not portable from chain to chain, so a full-time employee from a closed store would have to start at the bottom of the seniority list in another store and would thus receive very few hours of work. Also, since experience does play a role in where a new hire is placed on the pay schedule, employers prefer to hire inexperienced people because they are paid less. Union unable to bargain more influence over hiring practices.

SUPREME COURT DECISION WHICH INVALIDATED SUCCESSOR CLAUSES
Scope and Content Note: Decision involved the Burns Detective Agency and said if a new employer hires 51% of the old employees, he must negotiate a new contract with their union. Many employers will rehire 49% of the old employees, which means the union's recognition will be lost.

ENTRANCE OF CONGLOMERATES INTO THE FOOD STORE BUSINESS

MAJOR CHANGES IN FOOD STORES SINCE THE 1930s
Scope and Content Note: Union brought seniority rights and job security. Hours greatly reduced from the 60- to 70-hour weeks of the past. Health and welfare and pensions. Work is physically easier now because of the introduction of better heat and air conditioning and mechanization, but mentally it is harder because of a greater push by employers for increased production. Customer relations no longer a big part of a clerk's work.

PRODUCTIVITY
Scope and Content Note: Like an industrial union, Clerks point to productivity increases at the bargaining table. Thus, increased wages and fringes have been tied to increased productivity. Because of inflation, however, productivity increases have been difficult to measure. Rather than measuring by dollars, some employers are now measuring by case counts and even some by individual can counts.

END OF TAPE 3, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

WITHOUT THE UNION, MINIMUM WAGE IS THE GOING RATE
Scope and Content Note: Employees in low-wage, non-union stores are being pushed for higher production just as much as those in union stores. Further, low wages in non-union stores are not reflected in lower retail prices; they are reflected in higher profits.

SUNDAY AND EVENING WORK
Scope and Content Note: The larger stores began to open regularly on Sundays about 15 years ago. The union negotiated double time for Sunday work in the hope of keeping the stores closed on Sunday, but in Beloit, the stores opened on Sunday the week after the double time was negotiated. Previously, Sunday grocery purchases had been left to the ma and pa stores. Today, Sunday is a big grocery buying day. Evening hours have been common for many years. Breithaupt's father's store was open until midnight on Saturday.

AUTOMATION/MECHANIZATION CHANGES
Scope and Content Note: Self-service. Refrigeration. Absence of bulk deliveries and sales. No item marking in stores with scanners.

COMPUTERIZATION/SCANNERS
Scope and Content Note: The biggest change Breithaupt has witnessed. When introduced in Woodman's, the employees did not oppose it, although the union did because it would mean fewer hours. It did not mean fewer hours at Woodman's because the sales volume increased, but it means fewer hours at other stores whose business Woodman's is drawing. The average customer does not like computerization and scanners because price comparisons are more difficult, and the price on the shelf might not be the same as the price in the computer. Nevertheless, customers do patronize Woodman's to a great extent. Checkers no longer have to know how to make change; today's high school graduates do not know how to make change anyway. Computerization and scanners will become the norm for large stores; otherwise they will not be able to compete.

UNION REACTION TO SCANNERS
Scope and Content Note: Union did not try to prevent the introduction of scanners but did try to get at first national and state legislation and then city ordinances requiring each item to be price-marked. In Beloit, Breithaupt's efforts in the City Council failed; no attempt was made in Janesville because of Woodman's influence in that city. Madison had such an ordinance for one year, but it was not renewed. Contracts require employers to train existing employees to use scanners, but nothing in the contract prevents a reduction in hours due to scanners.

WORK RULES
Scope and Content Note: Before unionization, there were no written work rules. “You knew what was acceptable, and you knew what wasn't, and that was it.”

UNION INDOCTRINATION/ORIENTATION
Scope and Content Note: Milwaukee Clerks at one time had to attend the first meeting, but that has been dropped. Now new employees get a packet with an explanation of what the union is, phone numbers, a contract, a constitution, a booklet on the grievance procedure. Monthly newsletter. Business representative store visits.

CLERK TRAINING
Scope and Content Note: Very little training given by employers. Most hired now as baggers first and given maybe a half hour instruction on how to pack a grocery bag. Checkers given about a day's training on the cash register, which is not enough. Kohl's gives the most training to checkers. Checker positions now must be filled from the utility clerk classification (baggers and carryout), so a certain amount of observation has taken place.

HIRING
Scope and Content Note: Although the contract requires that checkers be hired from the utility classification, it does not require that this be done strictly on a seniority basis because not all utility clerks are able to handle the checker's job. If the union insisted on seniority in this, some people could never be hired as baggers in the first place. Most stores require a written test and a personal interview. As part of their test, women baggers must be able to lift an 80-pound bag of salt and put it in a shopping cart. Because of the higher wages and better fringes, employers today should have a better choice of job applicants. Before, stores had to take what was left over. “Clerks used to be where the people working in banks are today.”

PAY SCHEDULES
Scope and Content Note: The union philosophy has always been to get people to the top of the schedule as quickly as possible. The members do not always agree with this, and the employers obviously want few people at the top of the schedule. Thus, whereas the schedules used to be 24 months in length, they are now over five years.

WOMEN CLERKS
Scope and Content Note: There is a higher percentage of women clerks today than during the 1960s and before. More women are working, and this is a job open to them. Also, men usually want full-time work, and food store work is rapidly turning into part-time work only. Having a high percentage of women members has not caused any particular problems. Incidents of sexual harassment are very few. Women are more active in the union than men. The wage differential between men and women was ended as an anti-discrimination measure. Men and women do the same work in stores today.

BREITHAUPT'S ASSESSMENT OF THE GROCERY BUSINESS
Scope and Content Note: Challenging. A steady job. Good wages and benefits in union stores, though opportunities for promotion are limited. What Breithaupt liked most about the work was meeting people and not having to do the same thing day after day.

END OF INTERVIEW

Subseries: Doherty, Ken J.

INTRODUCTION

BIOGRAPHICAL BACKGROUND
Scope and Content Note: Born in La Crosse. Worked in a small Kroger store while in high school and vocational school.

DESCRIPTION OF KROGER STORE WHERE DOHERTY WORKED WHILE IN SCHOOL
Scope and Content Note: Small store on the north side of La Crosse. No electric refrigeration; cake ice kept butter and eggs cool. Everything in bulk; bagged sugar, dates, coffee. Coffee ground for each customer. Waited on customers. Kept produce fresh overnight by laying wet towels on it. Worked six days a week, including much night work when items were readied for the next day and bulk items were broken down. Two windows on either side of the entrance were used for display, one for produce and the other for canned goods. Often would find the canned goods display tumbled down overnight because a truck had roared past.

DESCRIPTION OF KOLLER STORE DOHERTY ALSO WORKED FOR WHILE IN SCHOOL
Scope and Content Note: Joe Koller had a small chain of about five stores, a larger one of which Doherty later worked in. No charge for deliveries, so many deliveries. “Sometimes you'd no more than get back from a delivery and they'd call up and want a dozen eggs they forgot. So you'd have to go out again.” Full-service and everything in bulk. Store very hot in the summer and very cold in the winter.

HOURS OF WORK AT KROGER AND KOLLER (1934 TO 1936)
Scope and Content Note: Was taking only one class in high school while working at Kroger, and he and the manager were the only employees, so worked long hours. Store open 7 a.m. to 6 p.m., but he would work past 6 p.m. Open until 9 p.m. on Fridays. At Koller he worked fewer hours because he was attending vocational school. Worked after school and on Saturdays. Both stores were closed Sundays.

WAGES AT KROGER
Scope and Content Note: Made a dollar a day for 11 to 13 hours' work. At Koller he earned 20 cents an hour. “I always figure that working by the hour is better for anybody; then they don't abuse you by making you stay too long.”

BOOKKEEPING, CHECKING OUT, AND CREDIT AT KROGER
Scope and Content Note: “Everything was more or less done in just a cheap five-cent tablet and a pencil that probably cost two cents. No typewriters, no adding machines.” Customer orders were tallied on a pad, and the total rung up. No one ever checked the addition. Because of the Depression, everyone wanted to charge their purchases, which was not allowed by the Kroger Company. The manager, however, had to permit credit in order to maintain business. He would write charges on the wall in the back room; and, when the account was settled, that charge would be scratched off the wall. Because of the hard times, “you really got gyped out of lots and lots of money.” One store on the north side of La Crosse supposedly lost $20,000. “Everybody lost money.” Doherty's Kroger store was a little more fortunate than some others because it had not been in business too long and did not remain at the same location very long.

KROGER MANAGER MADE $19 A WEEK; HIS WIFE WORKED ON BUSY DAYS

KEEPING PRODUCE FRESH IN THE 1930s
Scope and Content Note: Carried only the basic items--carrots, cabbage, radishes, celery, lettuce, oranges, lemons, grapefruit. Sprinkled with cold tap water hourly. A more advanced store in La Crosse had pipes in the produce rack which sprayed a cold mist 24 hours a day. In the summer, produce would keep for only about one day. If anything was left at the end of the day, it would be sold for half price the next day. Only small quantities were ordered, and small quantities--maybe a half dozen of each item during the week and a dozen and a half on the weekend--were purchased.

KROGER MANAGER MADE DELIVERIES EVEN THOUGH HE WAS NOT SUPPOSED TO
Scope and Content Note: “You were continually going out of your way doing favors.”

DELIVERIES TO THE KROGER STORE
Scope and Content Note: Two or three times a week at night from Madison. Truck driver had a key and unloaded items into the store.

KEEPING PRODUCE FRESH BETWEEN DELIVERIES
Scope and Content Note: Some vegetables would keep if they were simply kept out of sunlight; other produce kept on ice in large galvanized cans.

SIDEWALK DISPLAYS
Scope and Content Note: Every morning some merchandise was put out on the sidewalk under the awning. “You sold just as much stuff right off the sidewalk as you sold in the store.” Summer items included fruit, grocery items on sale, chicken feed and salt blocks. Winter items included frozen hog parts, lutefisk, herring, smoked carp, and chickens farmers brought in. These things had to be placed high enough so that dogs running loose could not get at them.

MEAT IN GROCERY STORES IN THE 1930s
Scope and Content Note: Bologna, hot dogs and cold cuts, but not much else. Most meat was sold through meat markets. “Everything was separated in them days.... Everybody else is infringing on everybody else's business now.”

BARTER WITH FARMERS
Scope and Content Note: Farmers would bring in meat they had butchered and dressed, and the store would give them an IOU from which was subtracted grocery purchases. In the summer, farmers would bring in apples and cucumbers.

FURTHER DESCRIPTION OF THE OPERATION OF KOLLER STORE
Scope and Content Note: Much like the Kroger store. Manager would pick up fresh items in the morning at the main store in the chain. There was a store manager, a meat cutter, Doherty, and another person who handled deliveries. Everyone did everyone else's work when busy. Mostly men worked in stores then. Koller had a fresh meat counter, about seven or eight feet long. Refrigeration was too expensive and unreliable, so ice was used for cooling.

INVENTORY AT KROGER
Scope and Content Note: Someone from the Kroger Company came in quarterly. “You tried awful hard to have this money that people owed you on the back wall... cleared up.”

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

ORDERING AND STOCKING AT KROGER AND KOLLER
Scope and Content Note: There was no back-room storage; everything had to be on the shelves. Did not have to order full cases. “There was very little bookwork, and everything was done, you might say, right off the cuff.” Carried two or three cases in at a time and put the items right on the shelves. No price marking; prices were posted on the shelf below each item.

PRICING AT KROGER
Scope and Content Note: Customers were always comparing Kroger prices to A & P. Price changes, however, had to be approved by the district supervisor.

STORES OFTEN BOUGHT LARGE QUANTITIES BECAUSE PEOPLE WOULD BUY LARGE QUANTITIES FOR CANNING
Scope and Content Note: Some even canned meat. Some meat smoked, some hung out to freeze during the winter.

MORE BIOGRAPHICAL BACKGROUND
Scope and Content Note: Father owned a couple farms, one of which Doherty lived on until he was five. Father then moved to La Crosse to work in the rubber mill. Studied woodworking at vocational school but had no particular aim other than to get a job. Went to work for the Sweet Shop in 1936. “A steady job...was better than a high school education.”

PRESERVING EGGS DURING THE WINTER
Scope and Content Note: People would store up to thirty dozen eggs in “glass” in their fruit cellars. The yolks might “start flattening out a little bit...or break,” but the eggs did keep for the winter.

WORK AT THE SWEET SHOP
Scope and Content Note: Went to work there in 1936 and learned the ice cream and candy making business. Paid $8 a week and was promised he would have the opportunity to buy the business, but the owners never retired. Served three years in the Army beginning in 1942. At the Sweet Shop, made candy and ice cream all day and worked in the confectionery at night.

WENT TO WORK IN THE PRODUCE DEPARTMENT OF THE MAIN KOLLER STORE IN 1948
Scope and Content Note: Koller Super Market had been sold to Ernie Grindler, and a friend of Doherty was assistant manager. He accepted their offer of employment because it meant more money, fewer hours, working only one night a week, and no holiday work. This was his first supermarket experience. The Sweet Shop owners tried to get him to return, but he refused; was married and had a child by this time. He did all the produce department work, but, at first, that was not enough to account for a full-time job since people still preferred canned to fresh produce. Thus, he also worked the dairy and frozen food sections.

PRODUCE TRAINING
Scope and Content Note: Mostly on-the-job training, though he did go to produce school in Milwaukee for three days. Also, a trailer travelled the state and would set up near a produce wholesaler (in La Crosse, it was A.J. Sweet) and use that wholesaler's produce to demonstrate how to set up a produce rack, how to trim and package vegetables, how to fill produce racks to their best advantage, etc.

DISPLAYING PRODUCE
Scope and Content Note: Mirrors on the back of the rack. “You'd stand back a little ways, and you'd have your vegetables all in front of this mirror and then you looked back in the mirror, and, gosh, it looked like you had a rack in there that was about 20 foot long.... It really looked beautiful.” Some stores would use colored lights in addition to mirrors to improve the appearance of the produce. Colors of fruits and vegetables were mixed. “Ribbon-like display.” Some, for a while, had no mirrors, but rather open spaces so the racks could be filled from behind without getting in the way of customers. This did not work out very well, however, because it narrowed the aisles, and also produce would be stored behind the racks, making it difficult to get at the rack. Cleanliness, freshness, and attractive displays were important. “Attractiveness would always sell merchandise.” Rotation, though this was sometimes defeated by people who would dig to the bottom in order to get at the fresher items. Rotation at least once a day.

THE ARRIVAL OF SELF-SERVICE
Scope and Content Note: The Koller store Doherty worked in was remodelled before he came and was the first self-service supermarket in La Crosse. In the early days of self-service, the shelves were high, and customers had to use “claws” attached to a long handle to reach the high items. Clerks would do this for elderly customers.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

TRUCKLOAD BUYING OF PRODUCE AT THE LARGE KOLLER STORE
Scope and Content Note: In the late 1940s, people still did considerable canning, so the store would often purchase in large quantities, like 500 crates of peaches to be sold at 99 cents a crate for a weekend sale, Potatoes also. For a few dollars, the trucker would leave his trailer for a week, and the produce would be sold right out of the trailer. Koller store was located on a busy street, and people would see the sign and the trailer and pull in.

STOCKING AT THE LARGE KOLLER STORE
Scope and Content Note: Had a chute to the basement storage area, so trucks could be unloaded right into the basement. Stocking of shelves was done during the day because there were not many customers, and they did not mind stocking going on while they shopped. Today most stocking is done at night.

LAYOUT OF THE LARGE KOLLER STORE
Scope and Content Note: Hard items first and soft items, like bakery and produce, at the end. To minimize shoplifting losses, small, expensive items like cigarettes were up near the checkouts. Had three checkouts, though the third one used only at busy times.

CHECKER-STOCKERS AT KOLLER
Scope and Content Note: During slow periods, checkers would stock or clean near the checkouts.

DOHERTY INSTALLED LA CROSSE'S FIRST FULLY SELF-SERVICE PRODUCE DEPARTMENT
Scope and Content Note: He did this in the early 1950s shortly after seeing the demonstrations in the trailer which had stopped near the A.J. Sweet Company. “My boss didn't even tell me to.... I guess I surprised him even.” Everything was pre-packaged and priced, and the scales were removed from the produce department. Some things could be purchased by the store already pre-packaged.

CUSTOMER REACTION TO ARRIVAL OF SELF-SERVICE
Scope and Content Note: Negative at first. Many men refused to use shopping carts, referring to them as “baby carriages.”

MORE ON INSTALLATION OF SELF-SERVICE PRODUCE DEPARTMENT AT KOLLER
Scope and Content Note: Customers did not like the idea, fearing they would get one or two bad items in a package of ten. To combat this, the store put up a sign in the department and also advertised in the newspaper that any rotten produce item could be returned and exchanged for two items of the same kind. Managers from other stores would bring in their produce heads to see Doherty's department and talk about it with him. In general, managers resisted the change, but the change was inevitable since, eventually, produce arrived at the store already pre-packaged.

MORE ON PRE-PACKAGING--PRODUCE AND MEAT
Scope and Content Note: Pre-packaging of meat came after pre-packaging of produce. Where once there were 50 meat markets in La Crosse, today there are only two. Individual customer preferences were still serviced, however. If someone did not want a whole bag of oranges, the bag would be broken up for them. The advantages to the store of pre-packaging were it cut down on the number of people needed to wait on customers, it made rotation easier, and items of lesser quality could be mixed in with better quality items thereby cutting down on shrinkage. If customers tore open bags themselves, they would have to return to the produce department to have the items priced since checkers knew only the bag prices.

MALE SHOPPERS
Scope and Content Note: Prior to self-service, some produce was pre-bagged because men shoppers did not want to take the time to select and bag their items. “It was really a lot more fun to wait on men than it was women, for that reason, because they didn't really take you to task on everything.... They just grabbed it.”

MAJOR CHANGES DURING DOHERTY'S 20 YEARS WITH KOLLER
Scope and Content Note: “We tried to go along with the times as much as possible....” Small line of self-service meat put in to provide customers with a choice. Self-service produce. Combining dry rack items with refrigerated rack items so that entire produce department, except for island displays of sale items, was refrigerated.

THE “MARK-DOWN TABLE” IN THE PRODUCE DEPARTMENT
Scope and Content Note: Contained produce which had started to spoil and was reworked. Many customers on fixed incomes shopped this table. Koller store was closed Sundays, so a couple of hours before closing on Saturday, both produce and meat departments would begin marking down items which would not keep over Sunday. Many people were aware of this and took advantage of it. The “mark-down table” was necessary in order to maintain a clean produce department. Doherty insisted it be kept away from the better produce and out of the flow of traffic; its regular customers were always able to find it. Usually everything on this table was half price or less. Very important that items on this table clearly marked as being reduced in price so that customers could not complain of the inferior quality.

DOHERTY WORKED AT KOLLER ABOUT A YEAR BEFORE BECOMING PRODUCE HEAD

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

DOHERTY'S DAY AS PRODUCE MANAGER
Scope and Content Note: Vegetables covered the night before with cellophane or towels to hold in coolness. First thing in the morning, remove those covers and begin working on green vegetables. “When the greens look bad, the whole store looks bad.” Clean out wilted green vegetables and replace with good merchandise. “I think a person just automatically started at the lettuce every morning; seemed like that's the most important vegetable....”

IMPULSE BUYING
Scope and Content Note: “The big four” of the produce rack are lettuce, celery, carrots and cabbage. They made more sales than all the rest of the vegetables. Usually they were placed at the head of the rack, but sometimes at the end in order to force customers to shop the whole rack, thereby picking up some impulse sales. Doherty used to pick up shopping lists dropped in his department and compare them to what people actually bought. He concluded that 90% of the customers were impulse buyers. People made impulse purchases because of cleanliness, quality, freshness and display.

CONTINUATION OF DESCRIPTION OF DOHERTY'S DAY AS PRODUCE MANAGER
Scope and Content Note: Once things were set up for the day, most of the rest of the day was spent making sure rack was fresh, clean and well supplied. When the rack was all set, worked on trimming and packaging vegetables. This done throughout the day. About noon, racks restocked, but not necessarily rotated. Back to packaging until about 4 p.m. or 5 p.m. at which time restocking was done to prepare for the evening when there usually were no produce clerks on duty.

SIMILARITIES BETWEEN PRODUCE AND MEAT DEPARTMENTS
Scope and Content Note: Packaging all day long in the meat department also. Meat had only a skeleton crew at night. Because of strict health regulations, much cleaning necessary in the meat department.

CONTINUATION OF DESCRIPTION OF DOHERTY'S DAY AS PRODUCE MANAGER
Scope and Content Note: Department cleaned at closing time, and those items which could not survive an unair-conditioned night were put in the cooler. Other items covered. Koller got produce deliveries daily. Shortly before Doherty left for the day, the three produce wholesalers in town would call him and take his orders for the next day. They would deliver in the morning shortly after Doherty arrived at work. Truckers would unload the trucks themselves; they had to do this in order to keep the business because, with three wholesalers in town, it was quite competitive.

PRODUCE SHRINKAGE
Scope and Content Note: Wholesale companies would give credits if merchandise, as delivered, was unsellable because of quality or quantity. Often the truck driver would have Doherty check the merchandise before unloading. Generally, once Doherty took delivery on something, it was his responsibility. Merchandise could be returned the next day if the quality was inferior but not simply because sales were slow. Profit on sales had to be large enough to cover items which were reduced in price or thrown out. “If you're supposed to operate on 25% profit, you better increase your profit when your stuff is fresh so that when you throw stuff out, then you still make your 25%.”

INVENTORYING IN PRODUCE
Scope and Content Note: Actually a visual inventory was done each day in order to order properly for the next day. A closer inventory was done each Saturday between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m. “That was just to show you if you didn't make enough money that week” so that corrections could be made the following week in order to make the proper showing at the end of the month when the monthly inventory figures went to a certified public accountant. Only meat and produce received this kind of close inventory attention; groceries were inventoried only once every three months.

RECEIVING PRODUCE
Scope and Content Note: Had to make sure quantity delivered was the same as quantity listed on “the slip” because if the slip is signed and the merchandise is not actually there, “it's tough cookies.” Delivery men were not above shorting one store and selling the merchandise at the next; “that was all profit for their pockets.”

BACK-ROOM PROCESSING OF PRODUCE
Scope and Content Note: Packaging, bagging and reworking. Reworking consisted of trimming away wilted leaves, taking bad items out of packages and repackaging. “You didn't want your customers to see you doing that sort of work,” so it had to be done in the back room. Sometimes rework could really back up.

MORE ON PRODUCE DISPLAYING
Scope and Content Note: “Very important.” Displaying varied from store to store, but Doherty tried to put the more perishable, “soft items” toward the front and the “hard items” toward the rear. Tried to keep out-of-season items in stock by getting them from outside the country. Soft items are placed first in the rack so they will move better. “I don't think they know what they want to buy in fruits 'til they see it.”

MORE ON PRICING PRODUCE
Scope and Content Note: At Koller's, a 25% profit was expected in produce. In order to account for shrinkage, the mark-up would be 25% over “selling price,” not 25% over cost. For example, if an item cost the store one dollar, 10% over selling price would be 10% of the dollar plus another 10% of that figure. (Thus, the one dollar item would be priced at $1.11.) This mathematics did not have to be done by the produce head or clerks because fruit companies provided little “hand calculators,” hand-held little wheels which made the calculations easy.

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON PRICING PRODUCE
Scope and Content Note: Marking up over selling price rather than over cost was done to cover shrinkage and also to make more money. While Koller was satisfied with a 25% mark-up in produce, today, most produce departments try to operate at a 40% mark-up. Meat department mark-up is about 30%. In groceries, the mark-up used to be about 15% but is in the 20% to 25% range today. All of this is due to the higher overhead today--wages, repair costs, etc.

PRODUCE DEPARTMENT IS EXPECTED TO ACCOUNT FOR 10% OF GROSS SALES

EXTENT OF DOHERTY'S AUTHORITY AS PRODUCE HEAD
Scope and Content Note: Outside of maintaining a clean and fresh department, the only way to increase sales was through advertising. Doherty eventually was responsible for produce department advertising. Had to use adjectives--sweet, juicy, crisp, fresh, green. “You had to use adjectives that... when the people read it, they were getting hungry already....” If Doherty wanted to run a trailerload sale or another big sale, he had to go through the manager, because he would need the manager's guaranty of sufficient advertising and because he would need the manager's authority if the big sale was likely to infringe on another department's floor space.

DOHERTY AND LOCAL 640 OF THE RETAIL CLERKS INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION (RCIA)
Scope and Content Note: Koller was organized about 1950 to 1951. Doherty was elected recording secretary of the local about six months later. Held that post the longest but also held several different offices. He was quite active; he and his wife would often do nearly all the work for “smokers” which had food, beer, door prizes, etc. Because of all this free work for the union, he could generally get any office he wanted. RCIA International Representative Murray Plopper tried to convince Doherty to become a business representative, but the hours and travel made him uninterested.

ORGANIZATION AND THE UNION AT KOLLER
Scope and Content Note: Doris Meyers, a union activist (who later married Murray Plopper), signed up everyone in the store except one checker who was the boss' sister. At that time, the RCIA avoided representation elections unless it was fairly confident it could win. After organizing, “the boss made it very miserable for us because he was very mad about it. We didn't dare stand around a minute of the day then..., but he got rid of that attitude in a short while.” Toward the end of Koller's existence, Doherty was the only full-time union man left in the store; he spent a good deal of time convincing part-timers that the union was good for them because of seniority rights and higher wages. The owner had a “mean disposition”; and, when he got “ornery,” the employees would have the business representative come in and make him “cool it.”

KOLLER EMPLOYEES
Scope and Content Note: The store had been under new management for about two years when Doherty went to work there. The new management retained at least two of Joe Koller's former employees--one who, when the store eventually closed (1969), had been working in the liquor store portion for 55 years, and a meat cutter who had been working there 40 years. Ernie Grindler was the owner and store manager, and Doherty's friend, Don Forrest, who had gotten him the job in the first place, was assistant manager. When the union came in, Grindler made Forrest ineligible for membership by calling him the manager. At its peak, the store had about 18 employees; Doherty had a full-time clerk helping him in produce. At the time of closing, the grocery department had only three checkers and a part-time stocker, the meat department had only two full-time meat cutters and a part-timer. The store closed because it had not been improved, and business had declined drastically. Doherty never had any problems with the people who worked under him, because “it is easier to show a person something what to do than it is to holler at them....”

LOCAL 640
Scope and Content Note: Monthly meetings. Dues were $3 a month, $3.50 if the member did not attend the meeting. Good attendance at meetings. Stewards signed up new employees and collected dues from those who did not attend meetings. Doris Meyers worked in a store, but she “was very union-oriented” and did a lot of organizing.

END OF TAPE 3, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

ORGANIZING OBSTACLES
Scope and Content Note: “Sweetheart managers,” who would have parties for workers, threatened closing and layoffs, etc. The local made strong efforts to organize unorganized stores with informational picketing and the like, but to no avail.

SERVICING OF LOCAL 640
Scope and Content Note: In the early days, International Representative Murray Plopper did the organizing and servicing. Later hired business representatives with other locals. Local bosses and union representatives from each store would sit in on negotiations, but generally, lawyers from the chains and the business representatives, sometimes with help from Plopper or Bill Moreth of Local 1401, would do the actual negotiating. Independents, like Koller, would pretty much let the chain lawyers handle things and then sign the same contract. The local never had a strike but did take strike votes for leverage. “We always had it in our mind that we were never going to strike the whole organization in town. We were going to pick...what we figured was the store that was holding up the whole process....”

MOST COMMON PROBLEMS THE UNION DEALT WITH
Scope and Content Note: Managers would ignore seniority lists and play favorites when it came to giving time and a half and double time work. Also, raises were not always properly implemented. The contract clause providing for promotions within the store had “a lot of loopholes.”

DISCIPLINE
Scope and Content Note: Habitual tardiness usually resulted in a three-day suspension. Unexcused absences from the store and abuse of sick leave were other reasons for discipline. If someone left early and had someone else punch out for them, that would result in a three-day suspension. Theft and drinking on the job resulted in dismissal, and the union would not fight it. The union usually did not infringe much on store discipline decisions.

GOOD RELATIONS WITH THE AMALGAMATED MEAT CUTTERS AND BUTCHER WORKMEN (AMC&BW) LOCAL
Scope and Content Note: Mutual agreement to honor each other's picket lines was never tested.

MERGER OF RCIA LOCAL 640 WITH RCIA LOCAL 1401
Scope and Content Note: “It didn't do La Crosse any good.” La Crosse could not afford to hire a business representative, and negotiating was being done by the Madison local anyway. The promised greater strength in numbers did not materialize. Chain stores continued to move out of La Crosse, and the independents were not organized. Only one union food store is left in La Crosse--Super Valu.

LOCAL 640's PEAK
Scope and Content Note: Peak membership was about 375 to 400 and occurred in the late 1960s. Koller was the last food store organized in La Crosse. Membership growth after that was the result of organizing Montgomery Wards, which later decertified, and the growth of the business of organized stores.

SPIE'S SUPER VALU ELIMINATED THE EXPENSIVE HELP
Scope and Content Note: In 1969, Doherty got work with the Super Valu. He worked there about ten years. Four or five months before he retired, a new owner (Spie) bought the store and got the union to agree to give 90 days instead of the usual 30 days to try out the existing employees. The new management proceeded then to lay off most of the high-seniority employees and to erase the seniority (except for wages) of the long-term employees who were retained. Doherty's hours were cut to 24 a week. He figured he was going to be laid off before long because of his age (62) and his seniority. The business was not doing well, and the manager told Doherty he would be cut to 16 hours, which would put him in the part-time category and end his vacation and fringe benefit rights.

END OF TAPE 3, SIDE 2, Part 2

INTRODUCTION

DOHERTY TOOK LAYOFF RATHER THAN A CUT IN HOURS
Scope and Content Note: Because he would lose his benefits and make less money than he would on unemployment, Doherty requested to be laid off. An agreement was reached whereby Doherty would be laid off after two weeks and would be kept at 24 hours a week for those two weeks.

HOW DOHERTY CAME TO WORK FOR SUPER VALU
Scope and Content Note: After leaving Koller [on the tape, Doherty mistakenly says Super Valu instead of Koller at this point], Doherty went to work in a foundry. He heard Super Valu was looking for a produce man, and he wanted to get back under an RCIA contract in order to improve his pension. He applied and was hired. “That's how I improved my pension ten more years.”

AFTER SUPER VALU, DOHERTY WENT TO WORK AT WEAVER'S WAREHOUSE FOODS
Scope and Content Note: He began drawing his pension but wanted to find part-time work. He did not want to retire completely until he was 65. He found work as a clerk in the non-union Weaver's Warehouse Foods. He could not work in a union store because he would have to stop drawing his pension. “That was so silly.”

DOHERTY'S WORK AT SUPER VALU
Scope and Content Note: The work was about the same as at Koller, but there was a lot less “grief” because he was not the department head. Twice refused to become produce head. “I was able to sleep a little better nights.”

AFTER LEAVING KOLLER, DOHERTY CEASED UNION ACTIVISM
Scope and Content Note: He wanted to be “just one of the members.” Did attend meetings. No one from La Crosse remained an officer after the merger with Local 1401.

WORK AT SUPER VALU WAS MORE DIFFICULT THAN AT KOLLER
Scope and Content Note: “...(A)wful physically hard for me at Super Valu because there, we had to unload trucks.” This situation was improved later when a dock was installed and merchandise came on pallets.

STRESS AS PRODUCE HEAD AT KOLLER
Scope and Content Note: “That's why I give it up. I was just mentally exhausted. I didn't want to think any more. I just wanted to put my brain to bed at night and let it sleep and not let it stay awake all night.” The job was making him sleepless, nervous and irritable. “So I just hung it all up; everything--being a union officer....” Lack of interest by union members was getting frustrating.

DOHERTY'S WORK AT WEAVER'S
Scope and Content Note: Mainly a check-in man; checked in local vendors. Ordering and displaying for the store label in the bakery department. Also took care of returnable bottles. Once, caught a pop truck driver trying to steal empties.

DOHERTY'S ASSESSMENT OF GROCERY WORK
Scope and Content Note: Liked the work. Liked being produce head because “it was almost like operating your own little store in a big store.” Would not have liked working in the grocery department.

END OF INTERVIEW

Subseries: Dubinski, Henry

INTRODUCTION

BIOGRAPHICAL BACKGROUND
Scope and Content Note: Dubinski came to work full-time for the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen (AMC&BW) Local 73 in Milwaukee in 1958. He has been secretary-treasurer since 1965. Born in Detroit, Michigan, in 1921.

REMINISCENCES OF DEPRESSION YEARS
Scope and Content Note: In 1931, neighborhood billboards with “Re-elect Hoover” were all defaced. He learned about politics reading editorial pages as a newsboy. He looked up “politics” in a dictionary and found two definitions: “The science of government,” and “the manipulation of government.” “That was some sort of benchmark for me ever since.” Recalls seeing Franklin Delano Roosevelt in Cadillac Square on Labor Day. He saw “mounted police using clubs on workers when they were trying to organize.”

CONTINUATION OF BIOGRAPHICAL BACKGROUND
Scope and Content Note: His first job was with A & P in 1937, the same year he joined the AMC&BW. He was in the service during World War II. Owned his own store in northern Wisconsin briefly after the war, then began work for A & P in Milwaukee in 1952. Dissatisfied with how Local 73 was being directed, he ran for the vice presidency and was elected. He then became business representative and was elected secretary-treasurer when Harry Sutherland retired from that position (in 1963).

MORE ON HIS FAMILY HISTORY, THE 1936 SIT-DOWN STRIKE, AND OTHER SOURCES OF HIS BELIEF IN THE IMPORTANCE OF UNIONS
Scope and Content Note: He has one sister. His father was a tool-and-die maker in General Motors' Fisher Body plant. He took apples and sandwiches to his father, who was inside the plant during the strike, and tossed them through the window in a weighted paper bag which had his father's name on it. A “dedicated union member,” his father told him that “F.D.R. could do no wrong.” The city and his neighborhood were solidly pro-union. “I don't think I ever met a Republican until I went into the Army.”

FIRST JOBS WITH A & P AND KROGER
Scope and Content Note: He worked in the meat department, waiting on customers and cleaning up. There were 12 meat cutters in the store. Started work at 25 cents an hour and learned the trade by asking questions because there was no formal apprenticeship. Seven months later, he got a job with Kroger at 45 cents an hour. He worked from 7 a.m. until 6 p.m. Monday through Wednesday. On Thursdays, he worked from 7 a.m. until 7 p.m., and Fridays and Saturdays from 7 a.m. until 10 p.m. He learned how to break down quarters of beef mostly “by trial and error,” although a Kroger manager taught him much. He became a meat department manager at a Kroger store at age 20, shortly before entering the Army. When he first entered the trade, he had planned to work long enough to earn enough money for college, but he never was able to do it.

DURING THE WAR, DUBINSKI WAS A MEAT AND DAIRY INSPECTOR

AFTER THE WAR, HE TOOK OVER HIS FATHER-IN-LAW'S STORE FOR A FEW YEARS

GREAT CHANGES IN FOOD STORES JUST BEFORE WORLD WAR II
Scope and Content Note: Not much difference in meat departments after the war, except that shortages and rationing stamps continued. But before the war, “the little stores became big stores.” These stores were called “supermarkets.” Grocery departments became self-service, though meat departments had service departments.

WOMEN WORKED AS MEAT CUTTERS DURING AND JUST AFTER THE WAR
Scope and Content Note: He worked with some women meat cutters for a few years after returning from the service. Few women remained as meat cutters by the time self-service meat counters were introduced in the 1950s.

HOW HE BECAME BUSINESS REPRESENTATIVE FOR LOCAL 73
Scope and Content Note: When he became business representative in 1958, Harry Sutherland was secretary-treasurer, and Paul Hampel was president and business representative. Hampel was defeated as president in a re-election bid and left for a job in the AMC&BW's Education Department. The secretary-treasurer and president became full-time business representatives. The union grew in size and strength after World War II.

WHY HE CHALLENGED LOCAL 73 LEADERSHIP
Scope and Content Note: He thought more organizing was needed, and “better contracts could have been negotiated” and administered, especially “handling of grievances.”

HIS WORK AS A BUSINESS REPRESENTATIVE IN 1958
Scope and Content Note: Collecting dues “probably took 80% of our time.” Winning dues check-offs in the late 1960s enabled union officials to work on organizing and grievances. He serviced some 100 stores. Another business representative was added to the staff when Oshkosh, Appleton and other smaller locals merged with Local 73. He could visit 10 or 12 Milwaukee stores in one day, though perhaps 7 or 8 when just collecting dues.

LOCAL 73 WAS IN RECEIVERSHIP FROM 1960 TO 1963
Scope and Content Note: He thinks the primary cause was that grievances were not processed. Business representatives Dubinski and Paul Fricke passed grievances to Harry Sutherland, who failed to press them through step three of the grievance procedure. Members became frustrated when grievances were not resolved by 30 to 60 days.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON LOCAL 73's RECEIVERSHIP
Scope and Content Note: Another reason for the receivership was that Harry Sutherland used money from the strike fund to operate the union instead of asking the membership for a dues increase. Sutherland did not use funds for himself. So a group within the union, including Dubinski, asked for a friendly receivership.

HOW THE UNION WAS OPERATED DURING RECEIVERSHIP
Scope and Content Note: International Vice President Ray Wentz became deputy receiver. Wentz appointed Emil Schuette from Sheboygan to manage the union. When Schuette died about 18 months later, Wentz appointed Kenneth Nolte to replace him. The membership did not like Nolte's appointment, but “we tolerated it.”

DUBINSKI OPPOSED NOLTE FOR SECRETARY-TREASURER POSITION IN 1963
Scope and Content Note: Dubinski won by a two-to-one margin. “The issues in that election were that Ken Nolte did not have the experience or the ability.” Dubinski's slate included Alex Mitchell, who was elected president, and a candidate for every office. Nolte's slate was not that complete. “It was the biggest political campaign we ever had. I think about 80% of the members voted.” Union elections formerly were held at a union meeting. Dubinski insisted--”and prevailed”--that this election be conducted by mailed ballot. He emphasized the need for democratic participation. A letter mailed to members on behalf of Dubinski's slate called for, among other things, “a complete financial report at every meeting,” reports from the executive board at general membership meetings, faster processing of grievances, uniform contracts, and a stewardship system.

INFLUENCE OF HIS ATTENDANCE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN SCHOOL FOR WORKERS
Scope and Content Note: He attended the School for Workers for four semesters before running for union office. Jack Barbash, who taught there, and his readings and education generally helped prepare him for union leadership.

CHANGES IN LOCAL 73 PRESIDENTS SINCE HE BECAME SECRETARY-TREASURER
Scope and Content Note: Alex Mitchell was the first president, then William Danielson, then, when Local 73 merged with Madison's Local 502, Danielson stepped down to enable Eugene Meyers to become president. When Meyers retired, Paul Fricke became Local 73 president.

MERGERS OVER THE YEARS HAVE ADDED CONSIDERABLE GEOGRAPHICAL TERRITORY AND MEMBERS TO LOCAL 73's JURISDICTION
Scope and Content Note: The union now has jurisdiction over the entire state except for the extreme northwest corner and Racine and Kenosha counties. Membership has increased from about 1,000 in 1958, to 4,500 today. The merger with Madison added about 1,000 to Local 73's numbers. Another 1,000 was added when sausage and packinghouse Local 248 merged with Local 73. Local 248s long packinghouse strike resulted in its membership declining from 2,200 to 1,100. Reasons for the mergers: “Better service, greater strength, efficiency.”

HE BEGAN WORKING FOR UNIFORM CONTRACTS WHEN HE BECAME SECRETARY-TREASURER
Scope and Content Note: He thinks the union has been “98% successful” in obtaining uniform contracts. Unions in some southern states were never to establish uniform contracts. Locals in Kenosha and Racine counties negotiated jointly with Local 73. Paul Whiteside, the local president there, was sometimes able to obtain even better contracts than Dubinski negotiated.

BLACKS DID NOT BECOME RETAIL MEAT CUTTERS IN MILWAUKEE UNTIL THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT OPENED MORE OPPORTUNITIES
Scope and Content Note: Blacks were prominent in packing houses. Few blacks work in food processing plants, which are located in more rural areas, and in wholesale companies.

WOMEN AND BLACKS ARE PLAYING MORE PROMINENT ROLES IN UNION ACTIVITIES

MOST UNION MEMBERS HAVE WORKED FOR CHAIN STORES, ALTHOUGH MANY CHAINS HAVE LEFT MILWAUKEE AND WISCONSIN
Scope and Content Note: In 1958, “about 80% of our membership worked for chains.” Most were national chains, though Kohl's (a Milwaukee-based organization) grew quickly throughout the state. A & P, Kroger, National, Jewel have all closed their stores. Now, Sentry and Kohl's are the major chains in the city and state. “Sometimes it appears to me like it's almost a manipulated game of musical chairs.” Most have left because the stores which remained were operated better. Kohl's and Sentry especially out-performed other chains. The local chains were managed better. Meat cutters who lost their jobs due to store closings formerly were able to find jobs, but it is much more difficult to do so now.

THE UNION SELDOM GRANTED CONTRACT CONCESSIONS TO INDEPENDENTS AND SMALLER MARKETS
Scope and Content Note: His philosophy has been that labor costs should be relatively fixed from employer to employer to avoid giving a competitive edge. Some consideration was given to meat markets employing “counter-hoppers”--people who waited on customers but were prohibited from cutting meat unless they were paid the union scale.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

SELF-SERVICE MEAT COUNTERS WERE INSTALLED IN MOST MILWAUKEE STORES BETWEEN 1950 AND 1955

HOW SELF-SERVICE MEAT COUNTERS AFFECTED MILWAUKEE'S APPRENTICESHIP PROGRAM AND THE WORK OF MEAT CUTTERS
Scope and Content Note: The formal apprenticeship program was ending when he became active in Local 73. “There was not enough interest from the employer's side.” The union's position was that employers could train meat cutters in stores if they so desired, but that in 36 months, the apprentice moved into the journeyman wage scale regardless of how well trained he was. He thinks store management wanted meat cutters trained in stores because self-service meat counters altered the traditional work of meat cutters. Instead of having to learn all meat-cutting tasks, meat cutters now became specialists: one worked on fish, another on poultry, another on beef, another on pork and lamb. “I've seen journeymen meat cutters who worked for A & P for 20 years and only worked on chickens.” “So they became mechanics.” “Today, journeymen, as we used to know them, are extinct. I don't think that 5% of our journeymen remaining today would know how to skin a calf.” Many others do not know how to break down a carcass into primal cuts because many stores receive meat only in primal cuts. There are proportionately fewer meat cutters than in previous years. Although the International had once urged locals to discourage young men from becoming apprentices, this was not done locally to Dubinski's knowledge. Store managers often preferred to train their own apprentices because companies had different ways of cutting and merchandising meat.

THERE HAVE BEEN FEW WOMEN MEAT CUTTERS IN MILWAUKEE
Scope and Content Note: The trade has been dominated by men. Contract provides that openings for journeymen meat cutters must go first to current employees who are not yet journeymen. Perhaps not more than five women have applied for apprenticeships during the last ten years in areas under Local 73's jurisdiction. Today, there are only two women “journeywomen.” Employers do not discriminate. “It's not appealing to women.” “It's hard work, and a woman would have to be pretty robust.” Even today, primal cuts are difficult to lift, weighing as much as 130 pounds.

WOMEN AND SELF-SERVICE MEAT COUNTERS
Scope and Content Note: Dubinski confirms an account given by Paul Hampel in another interview for this project that Harry Sutherland had urged Local 73 to insert language dealing with job duties in self-service meat departments in the 1950 contracts after seeing such departments operating in Detroit, and before they were introduced in Milwaukee. Language specifically defining the kind of work to be done by meat wrappers and deli employees was inserted “because of the wage structures. We didn't want the duties of the journeymen to be eroded.” Women could be employed to do any kind of meat department work as long as they were paid journeymen wage rates. In the 1950s and 1960s, he often saw women deli workers cutting beef who were not paid union scale. He had to insist they either be paid journeymen rates or not be allowed to cut meat.

THERE WAS MUCH CONCERN IN THE 1950s ABOUT UNION JURISDICTION IN STORES
Scope and Content Note: Lengthy clauses detailed which cuts of meat could be sold by which employees during certain store hours. This also reflected concern about the effects of self-service meat departments. Numerous grievances resulted from these concerns. Poultry used to arrive at stores with head and feet still on. Then they came eviscerated, “oven-ready.” Years ago, meat department employees made overtime wages during Thanksgiving week; now, many are given vacations that week because turkeys enter the stores ready for sale. “That was a tremendous erosion of jobs on the store level.”

DELI DEPARTMENTS ASSUMED ABOUT 25% OF WORK FORMERLY DONE BY MEAT DEPARTMENT PERSONNEL
Scope and Content Note: Contract language specifying that “women may be employed in delicatessen” departments reflected this shift and the need to protect remaining meat department jobs, and also led to union demands for health and welfare and other benefits to compensate for shifting work formerly done by meat department employees to another department.

THE UNION WON HEALTH INSURANCE FOR ALL MEMBERS IN THE 1961 TO 1963 CONTRACTS
Scope and Content Note: Only A & P had health and welfare provisions for employees when he came to Milwaukee. To get it for all members, employees had to take a pass on wage increases. A & P employees, which comprised about one-half of Local 73's membership, balked because they already had health insurance. “And we had to lecture on fundamental unionism.” The vote, at a “tumultuous” meeting, was very close and “tilted” on the strength of talks by “three or four good unionists from A & P who were meat managers.”

SELF-SERVICE MEAT COUNTERS CREATED OPPORTUNITIES FOR THE INDUSTRY AND THE UNION BUT ALSO FORCED SMALLER INDEPENDENTS OUT OF BUSINESS
Scope and Content Note: Contract provisions expanded enormously during the 1960s, in part because of self-service counters, across the nation.

DELI EMPLOYEES BECOME UNION MEMBERS
Scope and Content Note: Kohl's was a national leader in installing delicatessen departments. Max Kohl got Local 73 Secretary-Treasurer Harry Sutherland to agree that full-time deli workers would become union members, but that part-timers would not. Sutherland did not insist on a ratio of full-time to part-time workers. The wage differential between full- and part-time deli workers was vast. Dubinski tried to organize all deli employees when he became a local officer. It was difficult. “Kohl fought us.” It took a year to organize them. “I'll never forget that.” “It was not unusual for us to talk to one girl five times. We would talk to her three times, and then we felt (if) we couldn't convince her, we then would go and talk to her parents. For several months, every night, I was making house calls.” Two teams worked on this drive. Dubinski worked with Phil Paar, a volunteer organizer from the Fur and Leather Department in Chicago. Ken Nolte and Emil Schuette comprised the other team. Some women feared they would be fired if they signed a union card. Some parents were anti-union. Kohl threatened to put in self-service delis.

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

MEAT WRAPPERS
Scope and Content Note: Meat wrappers automatically became union members and did not have to be organized. Only 1% or 2% of wrappers are men. There is little turnover among wrappers, or among grocery store employees generally. Piggly Wiggly employees are not at the top of wage scales because of low turnover.

NUMEROUS PROGRESSION PERIODS IN CONTRACTS AFFECTING MEAT WRAPPERS WERE ADDED AT EMPLOYER INSISTENCE
Scope and Content Note: “It was to keep the cost down.” Union compromised on this. Early 1950 contracts contained six progression periods within the first two years. “We also felt--I cannot just blame management--that people should be rewarded for staying.” Some wrappers and deli employees upstate make more than their husbands.

HE DOES NOT THINK EMPLOYERS WANT TO ELIMINATE WOMEN FROM MEAT DEPARTMENTS
Scope and Content Note: “I hear that all the time.” But he thinks stores merely “want to get meat wrapped at the minimal amount of cost.” Men also tell him they fear women will replace them in meat departments.

HE SEES MANY ADVANTAGES IN CENTRAL MEAT-PROCESSING PLANTS
Scope and Content Note: Workers in these plants “break the carcass down into primal and sub-primal cuts.” They also remove certain bones. Trimmings are freshly ground there instead of in a store several days later. Quality control is better. Stores can order certain cuts of meat that sell better in their neighborhoods instead of having to buy entire carcasses. “If I were a superintendent of an operation of this sort, it's very likely I would go into a centralized cutting facility....” Nationally, perhaps 40% of major employers had such plants.

THE UNION'S RESPONSE TO CENTRAL MEAT-PROCESSING PLANTS
Scope and Content Note: “As long as they are in our jurisdiction, we don't care. If they are not of our jurisdiction, then we scream to high heaven.” The union forbids importation of boxed beef unless the employer had its own plant in the area under Local 73 jurisdiction. Job classifications are somewhat different in a central processing plant. Ninety percent of employees in the Kohl's plant make journeymen wages, a scale higher than most plants in the nation.

DUBINSKI DIFFERS WITH THE INTERNATIONAL ON ALLOWING KROGER'S CENTRAL MEAT-PROCESSING PLANT TO OPERATE IN MADISON
Scope and Content Note: Local 73 filed an unfair labor practices complaint against Kroger because the company operated its plant in Madison, Wisconsin, which was outside the local's jurisdiction and in violation of contract provisions prohibiting trucking in of meat in such cases. International Retail Director Marvin Hook opposed Dubinski's position. “He thought I was obstinate in not permitting them to bring that product here.” Kroger management tried to skirt Dubinski because of Hook's position. “I wouldn't succumb to that.” The International did not oppose central meat-processing plants as long as locals had jurisdiction over them. The plant was closed at about the same time as Kroger closed its Wisconsin stores.

HOW THE UNION STRIKES A BALANCE WITH AUTOMATION
Scope and Content Note: Thinks the union cannot stand in the way of progress, but that jobs have to be protected as best as possible. “We're not going to stop automation. But I think in America we are very remiss with what happens when people are displaced.” Some displaced European workers are quickly retrained. The problem with new machines and production process is not knowing how many will lose jobs. Management should pass along some of the savings arising from automation to customers. “We still don't know, oftentimes, how much and how well we can trust management, because management changes.” Job displacements from automation have not been as great in the food retailing industry as in others.

DIFFICULTIES IN TRYING TO MEASURE PRODUCTIVITY IN RETAIL MEAT DEPARTMENTS
Scope and Content Note: Some time-study people from the International talked to him about productivity. “To me, they sounded incoherent. I think they rambled just because they were being paid.” Different neighborhood buying habits make it very difficult to measure productivity. “It takes much more work to work in a suburban store than it does in a ghetto area.” People in ghetto areas buy “offal” meat products (a trade term), including liver, kidneys, pig's feet, leg bone, and other items requiring little processing. Wealthier neighborhood residents buy products requiring “the maximum amount of processing.” Other stores fall somewhere in between. Meaningful comparisons among stores based on pounds per man hour or pounds per dollars could not be made. It may require only five man hours to sell 1,000 pounds of canned hams, but 50 hours to sell that much beef. When he was in the industry, sales per employee hour varied from $15 to $30; clerk-hire-rate was from $4 to $10.

THE INTERNATIONAL'S PERFORMANCE AND COST EVALUATION (PACE) PROGRAM TRIED TO ESTABLISH A WORK STANDARD IN MEAT DEPARTMENTS
Scope and Content Note: Guy Pinney was in charge of the program. It was not very successful.

STORES TRY TO INCREASE PRODUCTIVITY BY CUTTING HOURS
Scope and Content Note: Weekly work schedules in chain stores sometimes are drawn up by central offices. Work loads often fluctuate. “I've seen people in extreme stages of exhaustion.”

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

ATTEMPTS TO INCREASE PRODUCTIVITY BY SALES
Scope and Content Note: These sometimes do not work if meat has been “overcut,” and a sale fizzles because of poor timing or bad weather. In such cases, meat may have to be re-ground or re-packaged, which adds more work and distorts productivity figures.

STORES HAVE USED TIME-STUDY MEASUREMENTS
Scope and Content Note: Sentry and Kohl's have used them in the past, but he has never seen results of such studies. “I conclude that at best, they are inconclusive.”

THE UNION'S ROLE IN EMPLOYEE EVALUATION PROCEDURE
Scope and Content Note: Store managers occasionally will send a constructive advice form to the union, complaining about an aspect of an employee's job performance. The union will send a business representative to talk with store managers, other employees, and the employee in question. There have been “extremely rare” cases of arbitration about such matters. Sometimes a person's age affects productivity. In a few cases, early retirement arrangements were made.

MANAGEMENT COMPLAINTS ABOUT LOW PRODUCTIVITY INVOLVE CASES IN WHICH WORK TASKS CAN BE MEASURED BY A STANDARD, AND CASES IN WHICH IT CANNOT

CONSTRUCTIVE ADVICE FORMS ARE NOT AS WIDELY USED AS THEY ONCE WERE

MOST COMPANIES ISSUE PERSONNEL MANUALS
Scope and Content Note: Stores sometimes do not enforce company policies for a number of years and then begin to do so selectively. “Management, by and large, is not the culprit that some workers think it is.”

MOST SERIOUS VIOLATION OF UNION REGULATIONS IS WORKING OFF THE CLOCK

UNION POLICES ITS REGULATIONS BY PEER PRESSURE
Scope and Content Note: Steward system exists in larger plants, but it does not work well in stores. Clerks are more successful with stewardships because there are more clerks in a store.

MEAT DEPARTMENT HEADS OFTEN “ARE THE BEST UNION PEOPLE”
Scope and Content Note: People who worked for him when he was an A & P meat department manager became his election committee when he ran for union office. Some asked him how he could be a union officer and a meat department head at the same time. “And I merely answered them, 'I give Caesar what is due Caesar, and I give God what is due God.' And it usually worked.”

SLOWDOWNS IN MEAT DEPARTMENTS ARE “RARE”
Scope and Content Note: It is difficult to engage in slowdowns because it is so easy to see workers doing it, and workers might be reprimanded. He has known workers to respond to work problems by not filleting as well, or by not trimming meat properly. “Sloppy performance.” These kinds of work actions have most often occurred because of “harsh” managers, or in cases which are not grievable. Some successful grievances have been filed against overbearing meat department managers.

MOST COMMON FORM OF GRIEVANCES
Scope and Content Note: Most concern unpaid holidays or unpaid overtime. “Grievances as far as working conditions per se are minimal,” especially as compared to packing houses and central meat-processing plants.

GREATEST UNION MEMBERSHIP GAINS OCCURRED BETWEEN 1945 AND 1955 AS A RESULT OF SUPERMARKET GROWTH
Scope and Content Note: The International had little to do with helping to organize retail meat cutters in Wisconsin. Most of the organizing was done by locals.

STATE MEAT CUTTERS COUNCIL WORKS ON POLITICAL AND LEGISLATIVE MATTERS
Scope and Content Note: The council includes retail, wholesale, fur and leather, and other units. Coordination of contracts is done between Local 73 and the Kenosha local.

THERE IS DISCUSSION ABOUT MERGING THE MEAT CUTTERS AND CLERKS COUNCILS SOMETIME THIS YEAR

DUBINSKI'S RELATIONSHIP WITH THE INTERNATIONAL HAS CHANGED FROM AN “ADVERSARY” ONE TO FRIENDLY
Scope and Content Note: He differed often with the International during his first ten years as secretary-treasurer and now thinks some of his opposition to the International's policies was “well founded,” and some was not. Such problems were not unique to his local. Some problems arose because International policies were not explained to him clearly enough. For example, the International's opposition to establishing a pension program, which he wanted, stemmed not from the International's opposition to the idea, but from its desire to delay demanding the program until it could be coordinated among all locals. He learned of the International's reasoning in this matter only later. He opposed the International's position then, but now thinks it was “valid.” It did displease him because California had had a pension program for five years, because his own members were prepared to begin one, and especially because International officers had had a program established for ten years.

CONTRACTS HAVE TO BE APPROVED BY THE INTERNATIONAL
Scope and Content Note: Formerly, International representatives participated in major negotiations, thus making formal International approval unnecessary. International approval was required for strikes.

HE NOW HAS AN “IDEAL” RELATIONSHIP WITH THE INTERNATIONAL AND PARTICIPATES IN SEVERAL UNION FUNCTIONS
Scope and Content Note: He is a member of the International's Advisory Board, is president of the state council, and was president of the Midland Joint Council.

PURPOSE AND ACTIVITIES OF THE MIDLAND JOINT COUNCIL
Scope and Content Note: Founded about 12 years ago by Kansas City's Carl Nothnagel, Joe DeFontaine from Omaha, and Dubinski, their purpose was to counter the political power of eastern Meat Cutter locals at International conventions. Midland's membership grew from 3 to 120 locals. He was president for two terms. “When we first organized, certain elements within the International called us a rump group (not chartered). But we survived. And we still continue.” “I think we brought some equilibrium to the total International union. I do believe they listen to us more.” His own relationship with the International has improved since the Midland Joint Council was established.

END OF TAPE 3, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON THE MIDLAND JOINT COUNCIL
Scope and Content Note: The merger between Meat Cutters and Clerks “has diminished the effectiveness of the Midland Joint Council because of the numbers.” Even without the merger, the Council has achieved what it set out to do, and so it is not as needed as before. He thinks the Council has helped lessen the number of arbitrary trusteeships imposed on locals. “We wanted to protect our autonomy.” The merger has lessened the autonomy of locals. He is pleased with the vice presidents in the new merged organization--the United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW).

RELATIONSHIP WITH CLERKS HAS PROGRESSED FROM BAD TO GOOD
Scope and Content Note: When he was elected to union office, Local 73 Secretary-Treasurer Harry Sutherland and Clerks President Edward M. Stadelmann would not speak to each other. Dubinski was “a good friend” of Michael Burtak, with whom he worked at A & P, and who succeeded Stadelmann. Burtak and Dubinski improved relations, coordinating organizing drives and negotiations.

JURISDICTIONAL DISPUTES BETWEEN MEAT CUTTERS AND CLERKS FOCUSED ON DELICATESSEN DEPARTMENTS
Scope and Content Note: Existing prior to his becoming secretary-treasurer, the disputes resulted in mediation by George Meany who stipulated that deli departments contiguous to meat departments would be under Meat Cutters jurisdiction, while those elsewhere would belong to the Clerks. This caused a problem in those chains which had delis next to meat departments in some stores but elsewhere in others, making it impossible to transfer some employees from store to store.

MOST OF HIS NON-TRADE UNION ACTIVITIES ARE DIRECTED TOWARD POLITICAL EFFORTS
Scope and Content Note: The union is involved in local and national political affairs. He worked especially hard in the Lyndon B. Johnson campaign against Barry Goldwater in 1964, and in the George McGovern campaign against Richard Nixon in 1972.

PROGRESS IN CONTRACT PROVISIONS HAS BEEN “STEADY” AND NOT MARKED BY GREAT LEAPS IN ANY SPECIFIC AREA

BARGAINING IS MORE DIFFICULT TODAY THAN IN FORMER YEARS
Scope and Content Note: The economic climate makes it more difficult to gain concessions from employers.

THE SENTRY CORPORATION IS THE MOST DIFFICULT COMPANY TO NEGOTIATE WITH
Scope and Content Note: The Godfrey family, which owns Sentry, is “ultra-conservative,” and the company's lawyer is “extremely astute, tougher than hell,” and reflects company attitudes.

KOHL EMPLOYEES LAUNCHED A “SIT-DOWN” STRIKE SOME 12 YEARS AGO
Scope and Content Note: The International then was boycotting Iowa Beef. The Kohl meat-processing plant received a shipment of carcasses which employees refused to process until Dubinski was told the company promised not to buy any more from Iowa Beef if they could process that shipment.

THE UNION HAS NEVER PURPOSELY CLOSED DOWN AN EMPLOYER
Scope and Content Note: The one exception may have been Food Queen.

EMPLOYERS GENERALLY ABIDE BY CONTRACT PROVISIONS

STRIKE AGAINST NATIONAL FOOD STORES
Scope and Content Note: The strike lasted perhaps a day and a half in the mid-1960s. The president of National Foods, Norman Stapelton, drove to Milwaukee, replaced the company's labor-relations person, and settled with the union.

1969 STRIKE AGAINST KOHL'S
Scope and Content Note: The union had been negotiating with many employers in the Milwaukee area at the same time. Herb Kohl had attended some but not all of the negotiation sessions. When negotiations reached an impasse, Dubinski called Kohl, told him the union's demands, and said the union would sign with Kohl if he desired and work out problems with the others. He agreed but later reneged. Sentry, A & P and other stores locked out union members. The strike lasted nine days, through Holy Week. The union won its demands.

END OF TAPE 3, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

WHAT THE UNION HAS MEANT TO ITS MEMBERS
Scope and Content Note: “To too many, it meant just getting more money.” Few understand the meaning of solidarity and the need for a union. Workers in Europe seem to have a deeper understanding of the need for unions--perhaps a result of socialism. He has tried to stimulate more union participation and interest by talking to members and by publishing a union newspaper.

HARD TIMES MAY BRING A “RENAISSANCE” TO THE LABOR MOVEMENT
Scope and Content Note: “I think that the workers in America are going to have to learn some bitter lessons that they will not forget for a long time again.” Just 23% of American workers are organized. European workers are much more organized.

THE FUTURE OF THE UFCW IS BRIGHT
Scope and Content Note: “I think the future of the UFCW is perhaps better than of any labor organization in the country.” He was very pleased by the merger with the Clerks. He had hoped for the merger since first working for Local 73.

HE WORRIES ABOUT THE LEGACY HE WILL LEAVE TO HIS MEMBERS
Scope and Content Note: “That's what I agonize over more than anything else.” The merger with the Clerks might be part of his legacy.

END OF INTERVIEW

Subseries: Gartzke, Frederick F.

INTRODUCTION

BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION
Scope and Content Note: Born in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin (1923), and lived outside of town with his parents and four siblings, none of whom became meat cutters. Gartzke's mother was a domestic; his father, a farmer.

REMINISCENCES OF LIFE IN OCONOMOWOC DURING THE DEPRESSION
Scope and Content Note: It was possible to buy a box of groceries “the size of a toilet tissue box” for $25 and three pounds of pork liver for 25 cents. City streets were paved with tar-covered wood blocks. His father worked repairing streets, and after school, the children helped the family by knocking tar off blocks so they could be used in the wood-burning furnace. “That was our fuel for the winter.”

CHILDHOOD JOBS AND WORK ASPIRATIONS
Scope and Content Note: He had various “neighborhood” jobs, including a paper route. “People then were just living from day to day.” People took what jobs they could get. No one forced him to get a job. He worked because that was a common goal. Recalls having 53 customers on his paper route. “That was my first real job.” He was paid one and a half cents on daily papers, and four cents on the Sunday papers. It was hard for young kids like himself to carry the accounts of monthly customers.

HOW HE BECAME INTERESTED IN BECOMING A MEAT CUTTER
Scope and Content Note: Started by riding on a grocery delivery wagon driven by a neighborhood acquaintance. He took over occasionally when the driver became sick, then delivered groceries door to door four times daily. Gradually learned how to work at the service meat counter for the store, to kill and deliver chickens, to make sausage, prepare veal, and other meat market duties.

WORK IN HENSCHEL'S MEAT MARKET IN OCONOMOWOC
Scope and Content Note: Small, independent market employing five men and two women, where Gartzke worked in the early 1940s for two years. “The girls answered the phone, the men cut the meat and delivered it, made the sausage, killed chickens, killed veal, and all of that.” He readied orders for delivery, and delivered orders “door to door.”

HOW HE WAS TRAINED TO CUT MEAT AND MAKE SAUSAGE
Scope and Content Note: Sausage was made every Tuesday afternoon. “We had to sit there and knead that sausage by hand...in a big washtub with all this meat and mixing it up.” Knew the sausage was ready if the 40- to 50-pound tub of meat could be lifted just by sticking hands into it and lifting it from the meat. Also learned how to kill and eviscerate chickens in the back room and the basement. “Charlie” killed veal on Tuesday afternoons. Still in high school, Gartzke was not considered old enough to slaughter veal himself. “I never did kill any calves. All I did was watch them.” Later he learned how to break down quarters of beef into primal cuts--ribs, chucks, rounds, loins.

DESCRIBES HOW QUARTERS WERE BROKEN DOWN
Scope and Content Note: The shank and brisket were cut from the forequarter, leaving the ribs and chucks. From the hindquarter came the clod and the flank. When he began, the sirloin tip was left on the sirloin rather than removed and sold separately as it is today. Loins were separated from the rounds, leaving the rump roast, the loins and the steaks from it, and some ground beef, which came from the hindquarters. All primal cuts were then re-cut into retail cuts. He learned this trade while working during the summers as a high school student.

SUMMER WORK FOR FARMERS' EXCHANGE
Scope and Content Note: Before working for Henschel's and learning this trade, he worked at the Farmers' Exchange (1942 to 1943), where farmers exchanged eggs and other items for groceries. Meat sold there was not as good a quality as at Henschel's.

TYPICAL WORK DAY AT HENSCHEL'S MEAT MARKET
Scope and Content Note: Began work at 7 a.m. getting ready for 8 a.m. deliveries. Returned from deliveries at 9 or 9:30. Routine continued throughout the day. Sometimes he made special deliveries phoned in. On days he had few deliveries to make, he learned how to make sausage, scraped wooden blocks, swept floors, cleaned up, and closed at 6 p.m. On Saturdays, they worked from 7 a.m. until 10 p.m. On those nights, they washed grinders, cubing machines and counters. He made $22.50 for a 57-hour week. He made $27.50 for a 48-hour work week in his first meat cutting job.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN HENSCHEL'S AND FARMERS' EXCHANGE
Scope and Content Note: Henschel's did their own slaughtering; Farmers' Exchange bought meat from Armour, Hormel, Plankington, Swift; either in quarters or, as with pork, in loins and butts. He learned more about his trade at Henschel's. Learned how to make sausage, killed own chickens and veal, smoked some hams. “We had a better clientele of customers at Henschel's than we had at Farmers' Exchange.” Henschel's catered to summer vacationers, the hospital, people with more money.

WORK AT THE FARMERS' EXCHANGE
Scope and Content Note: He took a job there because wages and hours were better. Made $27 a week for a 48-hour week. He worked after school and full-time in the summer. There were no benefits.

BEGAN WORK FOR NATIONAL TEA COMPANY IN OCONOMOWOC IN 1943, THEN WAS DRAFTED INTO THE ARMY SEVEN MONTHS LATER
Scope and Content Note: In the Army, Gartzke went to cook and bakers' school. Was in the Army three years.

RETURNED TO NATIONAL TEA WHEN RELEASED FROM THE ARMY IN 1946
Scope and Content Note: Burlington store needed a meat cutter, so instead of taking a month's vacation after his discharge, he returned to work in just five days. Service time counted toward pension. He worked for National 30 years.

GARTZKE MOVES TO BURLINGTON
Scope and Content Note: Generally he liked Burlington, though not the weekend commutes to visit his mother, who had moved to Milwaukee. Lived with his boss in Oconomowoc. His wife was then a checker in the same store. They were married in 1951. She worked for 25 years as a checker. He was transferred to the National store in Elkhorn in about 1971.

MOST IMPORTANT CHANGES IN WORKING FOR NATIONAL TEA FOR 30 YEARS
Scope and Content Note: The change from service to self-service meat departments, and from quarters to primal cuts, were the most important. “We didn't have to handle...meats so much....” Cold cuts used to be sliced by hand; now they are pre-packaged.

MAJOR IMPROVEMENTS IN WORKING CONDITIONS
Scope and Content Note: Began working 48 hours a week and gradually lowered to 40 hours. The Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen (AMC&BW) helped protect workers from employers who might otherwise be able to dismiss employees with little or no cause.

IMPROVEMENTS IN MEAT INSPECTION LAWS
Scope and Content Note: When he began, only wholesalers were inspected by government inspectors. Retail markets were not. Retail inspectors first made an appearance after World War II.

OTHER CHANGES GARTZKE THINKS ARE IMPORTANT
Scope and Content Note: Packaging of meat and meat process are much different.

HEALTH AND SAFETY PROBLEMS OF MEAT CUTTERS
Scope and Content Note: Cold affected some meat cutters. He wore long underwear for protection. Cellophane wrap allegedly gives off fumes when burned or sealed in meat departments which may injure lungs. He does not know anyone who has developed lung problems from these fumes. Health and safety inspections generally helped keep work places clean and safe. A friend, also a meat cutter, had leg stripped from varicose veins when only 27 or 28 years old.

BIGGEST GAIN IN CONTRACT PROVISIONS DURING THE YEARS HE WAS A MEAT CUTTER
Scope and Content Note: Benefits in general, but especially days off, hospitalization, seniority, vacations. By the time he retired, he had five weeks of paid vacation a year. “That was one of my biggest losses.” “I didn't need it, I just missed it.” He also appreciated eye care and dental care benefits. He brought work pressures home with him and especially looked forward to vacations to help relieve accumulated tensions. Only married meat cutters with children could take vacations during summers in Lake Geneva stores, because that resort town did most of its business in the summer season.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

DESCRIPTION OF TYPICAL GROCERY STORES OF THE 1950s
Scope and Content Note: Stores had aisles lined with grocery products. Produce departments were not refrigerated. Produce was displayed on wooden racks in the mornings, returned to refrigerators in the evenings.

CHANGES IN THE MEAT DEPARTMENT SINCE THE 1950s
Scope and Content Note: Meat was displayed in refrigerated cases. Before pre-packaged meats, some kinds of meat had to be re-cut. Wrapping machines, grinders, primal cuts, pre-ground hamburger all helped cut down on work loads. Chickens also began to arrive at stores prepacked. In the 1950s, meat cutters would cut and tray meat; conveyor would transport it to the wrapper who wrapped, weighed and priced meat. Computers later were added which did weighing and pricing automatically.

WEEKLY AND DAILY WORK SCHEDULES
Scope and Content Note: Market manager, with help from the district manager, set work schedules. Meat cutters could not take either Mondays off (meat had to be unloaded and cut) or Thursdays through Saturdays (weekend business). Later the “meat specialist...kind of ran the show.” Meat cutters learned daily tasks primarily from experience: they knew what had to be done to keep the counters full. Meat specialist often would rearrange cases and make other changes.

RELATIONSHIP OF MEAT DEPARTMENT TO STORE LAYOUT
Scope and Content Note: Big-profit items were put near the store entrance; impulse items in the middle of the store; hard-to-sell items “were put in a convenient place.” Name-brand products were put at eye level. Stores put produce and meat departments first in customer traffic in the 1950s and 1960s. “A woman built her grocery shopping around her meat and her vegetables.”

GARTZKE'S ROLE IN MERCHANDISING MEAT
Scope and Content Note: It was important to have meat counters looking good. “I always had that saying of 'eye appeal is buy appeal.' If it don't look good, you ain't gonna sell it, no matter how low the price is.” He also would instruct meat wrappers to pull and perhaps rewrap or dispose of old meat or broken packages. “If it didn't look right to you, get it out!”

PRODUCTIVITY
Scope and Content Note: Concerns about productivity arose during contract negotiations. “You were always working against dollars per man hour.” Management representatives compared current year's performance with past performance, sometimes comparing periods when productivity increased due to special sales or quantity purchases by organizations with same calendar periods when there were no such sales. Productivity was measured by how well the daily tasks were completed and by the department's overall sales per man hour or tonnage. Productivity figures were computed from figures on weekly forms listing the amount of meat received and sold, and the number of employee hours worked. One week's figures could determine what the company expected the following week. If sales declined, employee hours might be cut. Special chicken sales of 39 cents a pound meant total meat department tonnage had to be increased to offset lower prices. “You had a hell of a time making your dollar per man hour.” “You'd just cringe whenever you had a chicken sale, because there was no dollar volume there.” Beef sales produced more work but at least helped increase dollar volume and tonnage.

HOW MANAGEMENT TRIED TO GET WORKERS TO INCREASE PRODUCTIVITY
Scope and Content Note: “Their famous saying was 'Don't work harder. Work smarter.'” That meant “cut corners”; save time. Company suggested that meat cutters grind 50 or 100 pounds of hamburger instead of 25 pounds. Company “meat specialists” especially encouraged meat cutters to cut corners, but often customers would ask for help and take Gartzke away from tasks, thereby slowing down his “production.” Employees cooperated as much as possible to help meet company productivity goals.

NEW MACHINES AIMED AT HELPING TO INCREASE PRODUCTIVITY
Scope and Content Note: There were grinders, cubing machines (to make cubed steak from round steak), wrapping and scaling machines, and machines which stuffed sausage by air. High-pressure machines were developed to reduce clean-up time to as little as 30 minutes.

GARTZKE'S VIEWS ON CUSTOMERS
Scope and Content Note: Generally he did not like to wait on customers, because “most of them were fussy customers.” Some preferred to see meat cut fresh rather than buy the same cut, almost as fresh, from the counter.

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

BOXED BEEF
Scope and Content Note: First introduced into National stores in 1968 or 1970. Company seminars for meat cutters “proved” that buying boxed beef in primal cuts was more “efficient” than buying beef in quarters. Boxed beef was easier to unload than quarters. Pork was brought in loins, hams, butts; never in quarters. National bought its boxed beef from wholesalers like Kenosha Pack, Iowa Beef Packers, Mumford and others. National had its own central meat-processing plant in Chicago.

REACTION OF GARTZKE AND OTHER MEAT CUTTERS TO BOXED BEEF
Scope and Content Note: It increased the work load because it reduced the number of work hours. He liked not having to lift such heavy weights, but there still was much work to be done by fewer employees.

NEW MEAT WRAPPING MACHINES ALSO REDUCED EMPLOYEES' WORK HOURS

MORE ON THE REACTION TO BOXED BEEF
Scope and Content Note: In some ways, it was very helpful. If they wanted a sale on round steaks, they had to order just rounds, not whole quarters, which had to be trimmed. Overall though, “you were just about the same as you were before, with less help.” National continued to use boxed beef until its stores were closed in 1976. Boxed beef is not a thing of the future; “it's here.” The “ma and pa” stores will continue to decline.

WORK SUPERVISION
Scope and Content Note: He. was supervised by the meat market manager, who in turn reported to the company's “meat specialist.” Company's head meat buyer had overall supervision. His main responsibilities were to keep up production and keep the meat department clean and orderly.

NATIONAL'S MEAT DEPARTMENTS HAD UNIFORM APPEARANCE AND HAMBURGER PREPARATION POLICIES
Scope and Content Note: Meat counters were arranged the same way in all National stores for most of the years Gartzke worked for the company. National was especially concerned about maintaining strict standards on the fat content in hamburger (no more than 30% fat). Some meat cutters and market managers lost their jobs for not maintaining this standard. Machines were devised to test fat content. Meat cutters made hamburger from lean boneless beef, bought in 60-pound boxes, to which they added trimmings from choice beef. Ground chuck was 81% lean, 19% fat. State inspectors would report violations of fat content level to company meat specialists, who in turn would visit stores where violations occurred and reprimand the meat cutters. The union would also be informed.

WORK RULE VIOLATIONS RESULTING IN REPRIMANDS
Scope and Content Note: These included not rotating stock, dishonesty, tardiness, mis-wrapping meat. Not many people were written up for violations. Absenteeism was a problem. “It's like they say in the car business: 'Don't buy... any cars made on Monday.'” Alcoholism on the job was not a frequent problem but it did occur.

MOST COMPLAINTS ABOUT WORK PERFORMANCE WERE HANDLED BY STORE MANAGERS

CUSTOMER RELATIONS
Scope and Content Note: Customers with complaints often wrote company headquarters. “Some of the meat cutters were a little bit short with their customers.”

MOST COMMON EMPLOYEE COMPLAINTS ABOUT MANAGEMENT
Scope and Content Note: Working conditions, job pressures, disputes about vacation time and the length of apprenticeship. They also complained about co-workers whose absenteeism resulted in more work. The grievance procedure has worked well. He never filed a grievance.

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

GARTZKE'S UNION AFFILIATION
Scope and Content Note: Joined the union in 1953. The National store where he worked was not unionized at that time. Impetus to organize came from comparison of wages and hours with Milwaukee meat cutters. Meat cutters had to pay the same grocery prices as did summer vacationers in Lake Geneva but were not making high enough wages. Before joining the union, they worked 48-hour weeks. Mike Weiss, from Local 358 in Janesville, organized the store. During the summer, there were six meat cutters employed in the store; in winter, the store employed two full-time and one part-time cutter. The union had an induction ceremony for new members. The Committee on Political Education (COPE) provided political and union education for members. Gartzke attended meetings regularly. The union discounted dues for members who travelled some distance to attend meetings. Meetings were well attended by local meat cutters and wrappers, but not that well attended by members from outlying areas. He never held union office or served on union committees.

UNION MEMBERS HAD DIFFICULTY GETTING MEAT CUTTERS IN INDEPENDENT STORES TO JOIN
Scope and Content Note: It took many years to convince such meat cutters to join the union, even though they made as much as $3 an hour less than union meat cutters.

GARTZKE PARTICIPATED IN MEETINGS ON CONTRACT DEMANDS
Scope and Content Note: Members had opportunities to make their concerns known. “If you don't get up and talk, it's your own damn fault. You only get out of it what you put into it.”

THE UNION HAD LITTLE CONTACT WITH EMPLOYEES IN THE STORES
Scope and Content Note: At first, the business representative would collect dues in person every month. Then dues were mailed in.

THERE WERE NO STRIKES IN GARTZKE'S STORE
Scope and Content Note: Employees sometimes worked without a contract and always received retroactive pay after the contract was ratified.

MANAGEMENT BALKED MOST OFTEN ABOUT DEMANDS FOR WAGE INCREASES

THE COMPANY GENERALLY ABIDED BY CONTRACT PROVISIONS.

COMPLAINTS BY MANAGEMENT ABOUT THE UNION ABIDING BY CONTRACT PROVISIONS WERE NEGOTIATED AND SETTLED BETWEEN UNION REPRESENTATIVES AND CORPORATE MANAGERS

RELATIONSHIP WITH THE RETAIL CLERKS INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION (RCIA)
Scope and Content Note: Clerks were not organized in his store until 1960 or 1965. Meat Cutters and Clerks had a good working relationship.

GARTZKE'S REACTION TO MERGER BETWEEN LOCAL 358 AND LOCAL 502 (MADISON) IN 1962
Scope and Content Note: He had to travel farther to union meetings, but the merger “gave us more clout. We were bigger then.”

HE THINKS UNIONS SHOULD STICK TO STRICTLY UNION BUSINESS AND NOT BE INVOLVED IN POLITICS
Scope and Content Note: Unions may endorse candidates, but “I'll vote the way I want to.”

OVERALL, HE FOUND HIS WORK SATISFYING
Scope and Content Note: What Gartzke liked most about his work: “To be able to meet people--be involved with people.” He was able to help people meet budgets. He still regrets not having become a male nurse just after he was discharged from the Army. It is becoming more difficult to find gainful employment as a meat cutter.

HE LOST HIS JOB WITH NATIONAL TEA WHEN THE COMPANY CLOSED ITS STORES IN DECEMBER 1976
Scope and Content Note: He worked two years at an independent supermarket before retiring in 1979. Employees knew the stores were in financial trouble long before they were closed. There were layoffs, department closings--”you could see the handwriting on the wall.” Losing all the vacation time he had accumulated “was one of my biggest shocks.”

THERE ARE NOT MANY LONG-TIME MEAT CUTTERS STILL EMPLOYED
Scope and Content Note: Some have found work elsewhere. And young people “don't stick” with the trade because “they don't like confinement” and are impatient.

END OF INTERVIEW

Subseries: Hampel, Paul R.

INTRODUCTION

AN OVERVIEW OF HAMPEL'S AFFILIATION WITH THE AMALGAMATED MEAT CUTTERS AND BUTCHER WORKMEN (AMC&BW)
Scope and Content Note: Joined Local 73 in Milwaukee, September 1934. Has held continuous membership since then.

BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION
Scope and Content Note: Born Cudahy, Wisconsin, September 10, 1914. Spent childhood and attended schools there. Graduated high school in June 1932. Had planned to attend Lawrence College, and eventually to become a lawyer, but the Depression forced him to seek work in hopes of saving enough money to enter college in a year. He never was able to attend college. His first job in a meat market was with D & F Markets (Dunlap and Frankiewicz), an independent chain of some 13 stores. Market he worked in was in Cudahy. Made $15 a week for a 72- to 75-hour work week. Worked in various other D & F markets, and others, before working for Local 73, and later, for the International.

PARENTS' OCCUPATIONS
Scope and Content Note: Father employed at Cudahy Packing Company until a strike in 1921. He and others were blacklisted. Then worked for Power and Mining Company, installing equipment for electric generating companies, and mining equipment. Then, in 1940s, worked for Newport Chemical Dye Company as a lead-burner repairing tanks. Retired rather than move with the company to New Jersey. Mother was a housekeeper; raised six children. Father never belonged to another union.

MORE ABOUT WHY HAMPEL NEVER TRIED TO BECOME A LAWYER
Scope and Content Note: “The longer you put it off, the harder it becomes to do that.” He was married in 1937; he and his wife had their first child in 1939. It would have been harder to get the degree on a part-time basis.

HAMPEL'S FIRST JOB AND STORE OPERATIONS
Scope and Content Note: Got a job by knowing market manager and butchers in the store where the family shopped because prices generally lower than neighborhood grocery store. Both groceries and meat were sold; butchers cut meat, waited on grocery customers, stocked shelves. Customer received receipt from register, took it to a cashier in a separate “cage” or “office,” paid the bill, took stamped “paid” receipt to butcher and claimed packages. This was a fairly typical market of the day. In National Tea Co. and A & P stores, grocery managers were store managers; meat departments headed by meat cutters.

HOW HAMPEL WAS TRAINED IN MEAT CUTTING
Scope and Content Note: “I think it was just a matter of learning by experience.” Began by waiting on customers and stocking meat displays. He then would cut particular cuts of meat rather than wait for another meat cutter to do it. Beef entered the store in quarters; lamb came in whole; veal came in with hide on, which had to be skinned, and which “was a craft trade,” because hides were sold to tanning company without nicks or slices. Hampel learned to do this too. Hides left on to prevent moisture loss and to make handling easier.

PERSONNEL AND WORKING HOURS IN THE D & F MARKET
Scope and Content Note: Manager, four butchers, Hampel, and four or five extra butchers on Friday and Saturday. Work began at 7 a.m., “but in order to hold your job, you got there by 6:30.” Work was supposed to end at 6:30, but often stretched until 7 or 7:15. Saturdays, markets closed at 10 p.m., but butchers often stayed as late as midnight cleaning up.

HAMPEL LOSES JOB WITH D & F MARKETS BECAUSE OF UNION ACTIVITIES
Scope and Content Note: There had previously been a union at Cudahy plant and others in Milwaukee's valley. Local 73 formed in 1934. Friends of his got him to join the union in September 1934. Paid $3 initiation fee and dues. Became one of the first in the D & F chain to join the union. Transferred to a D & F store at 2701 North Third Street in Milwaukee. Then transferred to main store and warehouse at 941 North Third. Somebody in the company office overheard Hampel on an intercom from the office to the loading dock trying to recruit workers into the union. He was fired for this.

HOW MEAT CUTTERS GOT PART-TIME WORK
Scope and Content Note: He did work part-time for other markets and even D & F after that. To get weekend work, meat cutters had to wait outside markets on Thursday afternoons or Friday mornings in hopes of being asked to work Friday or Saturday. Only A & P and National Tea Co. didn't require employees to stand in line for work.

MEAT CUTTERS HAD DIFFICULTY HOLDING JOBS OR MAINTAINING WAGES, 1932-1934
Scope and Content Note: Hampel talked to meat cutters in other stores trying to get support for improving conditions. A meat cutter making perhaps $15 a week might be told by employer another meat cutter was available willing to work for $12 a week. Meat cutter either had to accept lower wages or lose his job. Hampel recalls one meat cutter with a family worked for $10 a week just to have income. Perhaps could earn $5 or $6 for Friday and Saturday (combined).

SOURCES OF HAMPEL'S UNION COMMITMENT
Scope and Content Note: Able to try to help organize because he was not tied down. He was single, could live at home. But also because unionism was instilled in family. Anecdote about father sending him to the grocery store when young to get a loaf of bread. Hampel brought a loaf home without a union label on the wrapper, and he was sent back for a union-made loaf.

HAMPEL BECOMES MANAGER OF D & F MARKET
Scope and Content Note: Got a job again with D & F Market on South 16th Street, a store with a manager and one meat cutter. Soon thereafter, was made manager of the store when the other manager transferred. Store measured 40 feet wide by 65 feet in depth. A & P store next door had no meat department, so no competition, although Hampel's market did sell groceries. Store had counters with marble tops and glass partitions up front. No refrigeration, so meat not displayed on counters in the summer. Doors left open in winter for “natural refrigeration.” Meat sometimes froze to marble slabs in winter; butcher had to pry loose.

LITTLE ANTI-CHAIN STORE SENTIMENT IN MILWAUKEE
Scope and Content Note: Mayor Daniel Hoan and others opposed chains from socialist perspective, but most people accepted chain stores because prices generally lower.

CONTINUATION OF HAMPEL'S JOB HISTORY
Scope and Content Note: Hampel stayed with store until it closed in 1935 or 1936; then transferred to store in Bayview. Remained there for a year, then transferred to a new store at 27th and Vliet. By then, store name changed from D & F to just Frankiewicz Brothers Market. Was laid off in 1936 or early 1937. Didn't work for about a year. Had gotten married and was building a home. Began work again in 1938 for John Reinke on National Avenue.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

HAMPEL WORKS FOR JOHN REINKE'S MARKET
Scope and Content Note: Worked as sole meat cutter in this small, independent market. When business improved after six months to a year, an apprentice was added, reflecting the growth of unions and union standards.

INFLUENCE OF FEDERAL LEGISLATION ON GROWTH OF UNIONS AND ON HIS JOB AT REINKE'S
Scope and Content Note: National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA), passed in 1933, established National Recovery Administration (NRA). NRA set wages for retail meat industry at $15 a week for about a 72-hour week. NRA declared unconstitutional in 1935. Section 7A of the National Labor Relations Act (1935) gave workers the right to join unions. This helped the union grow. Under union contract, he made $35 a week in 1938--a substantial increase over preceding years.

HOW APPRENTICESHIP SYSTEM WORKED AT REINKE'S
Scope and Content Note: First contract providing for apprenticeship in retail meat industry was in 1936. New apprentice brought in began by waiting on customers, stocking shelves, cleaning meat from bones for hamburger. Reinke and Hampel taught him other skills of meat cutting. Final skill learned was cutting sirloins, T-bones and short steaks--most expensive cuts.

TOOLS OF THE TRADE, AND INTRODUCTION OF THE BAND SAW
Scope and Content Note: Contract required employer to furnish tools, but Hampel kept his own cleavers, knives, saws, etc. so others wouldn't use or abuse them. He still has some. In mid-1930s, band saw was introduced. Its purpose was “to help break the primal cuts--break the quarters and carcasses into their primal cuts of meat.” Band saw represented “the first instance of automation in the markets.” At D & F Market, used it mostly to saw frozen halibut. Easier to cut frozen fish. Also used it to cut soup bones and other bones. Most meat today cut by band saw. His reaction to the new band saw: “...we thought it was a blessing.” Made splitting a soup bone especially easy.

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN WORKING FOR D & F/FRANKIEWICZ AND REINKE
Scope and Content Note: Not as many pressures. He was given more responsibilities for merchandising.

LENGTHS OF APPRENTICESHIPS
Scope and Content Note: Apprenticeship was three years in the 1930s. Over the years, length has varied from place to place--in some cases, down to two years. Don't have to learn how to skin a calf because veal now arrives in quarters. Beef also comes in primal cuts. Store or meat department managers can order more precisely what they want these days, rather than worry about certain cuts they would have to dispose of if they had to break down a side or quarter in the store.

ADVENT AND EFFECT OF REFRIGERATED COUNTERS
Scope and Content Note: Introduced in the mid-1930s. Counters had coils of compressed ammonia under counter trays. Improved health conditions. Ammonia compressors occasionally leaked.

HAMPEL WORKED AT REINKE'S UNTIL 1945

WOMEN MEAT CUTTERS IN MILWAUKEE DURING WORLD WAR II
Scope and Content Note: “There were quite a number of female 'butcherettes,' as we called them, in the industry there.” They replaced men who entered service or went to work in war industries. Some women were just as “adept” as men at meat cutting. Recalls June Manthei and Pearl Bondar, two accomplished “butcherettes.” Some women remained in the stores after the war as meat wrappers. Some stayed on for awhile as meat cutters. No women head meat cutters (who were market managers), but women could be apprentices or “journeymen” and receive the same wages as men. No formal apprenticeship course for women as for men, because they thought women wouldn't be employed as cutters after the war. Market manager would train women as best they could. Men and women worked well together, cooperating for the war effort.

HAMPEL WORKS AT RETZLAFF MACHINE CO. AFTER THE WAR
Scope and Content Note: Was superintendent of set-up and production. In 1945-1946 period, some work was for the war effort. He left meat cutting in part because meat cutting was no longer considered an essential occupation, and because he had to drive a long way to work and gasoline was rationed. He had some technical training in high school for the job. Pay was slightly higher than in meat cutting. He continued to enjoy working with people. Shop was non-union. Some employees were “geniuses” at finding shortcuts. Some worked at piece rate, producing as much as 300% of normal. Hampel counseled such workers not to produce themselves out of a job, saying management would restudy the job and make them produce more for the same wage.

HAMPEL RETURNS TO MEAT CUTTING AT SODEN'S SUPERMARKET IN MILWAUKEE
Scope and Content Note: Returned to the trade because it was part of his life. He liked people, the trade and the variety (it wasn't “routine or redundant”). Soden's was an independent market. Worked there until 1952.

CONVENTION, VACATION AND WORK IN VARIOUS INDEPENDENT MARKETS: JUNE 1952 TO APRIL 1953
Scope and Content Note: Had been elected delegate to 1948 Meat Cutters convention and was elected again in 1952 to the convention in San Francisco. Wanted vacation; took family. They were gone from June to August. When they returned, he had to find work.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

CONVENTION, VACATION AND WORK IN VARIOUS INDEPENDENT MARKETS: JUNE 1952 TO APRIL 1953: CONTINUED DISCUSSION
Scope and Content Note: Worked in small, independent stores part-time, looking for full-time job.

HAMPEL BEGINS WORK FOR LOCAL 73 IN MILWAUKEE
Scope and Content Note: While still working part-time in a market, Harry Sutherland, Secretary-Treasurer of Local 73, asked Hampel to work part-time for the union as a business representative. Began full-time work in April 1953 after business agent Frank Trzesniewski suffered a stroke.

SUPERMARKETS--POST-WAR INNOVATION
Scope and Content Note: Because of meat shortages during the war, meat didn't need to be promoted--it sold itself. When meat was more plentiful after the war, stores tried to recapture customers for meat and other products. Separated meat from grocery departments and called stores “supermarkets.” Shopping carts replaced shopping baskets. Meat markets were still service-type markets in which cutters waited on customers. Checkout lanes replaced individual department cash register check outs. Refrigerated meat display cases improved with Freon systems. Meats often displayed in storefront window refrigerated cases. “Now, it was a different concept of shopping.” Self-service largely replaced service stores.

INTRODUCTION OF SELF-SERVICE MEAT COUNTERS IN MILWAUKEE
Scope and Content Note: Began in 1952-1954 period. Made possible by improved refrigeration.

HARRY SUTHERLAND VISITS SELF-SERVICE MARKET IN DETROIT; TELLS MILWAUKEE MEAT CUTTERS TO READY FOR INTRODUCTION THERE
Scope and Content Note: Sutherland visited store with self-service meat counters in 1951 or 1952 in new Detroit shopping center. Learned how Meat Cutters Local 539 “had met the challenge,” reported to Local 73 executive board and general membership. Sutherland believed union should respond to self-service counters by maintaining “complete jurisdiction over the product” guaranteed in contracts.

WRITTEN AND UNWRITTEN AGREEMENTS PROHIBITED WOMEN FROM USING “TOOLS OF THE TRADE” IN SELF-SERVICE MEAT DEPARTMENTS AND DELICATESSENS
Scope and Content Note: In informal agreements between union and employer, or in formal contracts of 1950s, women were prohibited from receiving meat wrappers' or deli workers' wages if they handled meat cutters' tools. Contracts defined activities women could perform. Hampel says this requirement was intended to prevent the employer from having women cut or slice meat without receiving meat cutters' wages. Specific duties also intended to define jobs of women meat wrappers. They received wages between beginning apprentice and accomplished journeyman but on separate wage scale. They could not use band saws, cleavers, slicing knives, steak knives, hand saws. Regulations were not intended to exclude women from being meat cutters. Pearl Bondar and June Manthei in fact continued to cut meat after the war and were paid journeymen wage rates. Another woman, Lee Koepke, was also a meat cutter (and union official), but Hampel didn't know her very well.

REASONS WHY EARLY 1950s CONTRACTS DEFINED BARGAINING UNIT IN SUCH DETAIL
Scope and Content Note: The 1950-1951 contract with National Tea Co. included a lengthy clause defining the bargaining unit. Was inclusion of the clause Sutherland's way to prepare for the eventuality of self-service meat counters, or the union's attempt to inform employers that it would continue to insist on a legitimate position in meat department jurisdiction? “I would think that there was a little bit of both involved in this.” Meat department was gradually losing some products over which meat cutters had jurisdiction--butter, lard, bacon, for example. The union believed continuation would result in fewer jobs for butchers. Central meat processing plants would even further erode jobs. Contract language was designed to reflect those concerns and protect jobs.

HOW SELF-SERVICE MEAT COUNTERS ALTERED MEAT DEPARTMENT WORK
Scope and Content Note: Meat cutters only cut meat all day long. Meat wrappers now wrapped, priced and displayed meat. However, the number of meat department employees was not reduced. Meat cutters did not react unfavorably to self-service counters.

WHY CONTRACTS PROVIDED THAT A MALE MEMBER OF THE MEAT DEPARTMENT HAD TO BE ON DUTY AFTER 6 P.M.
Scope and Content Note: “To protect the jurisdiction of the meat cutters.” If no male on duty, then work could be done by checker or manager, “who is now a grocery man rather than a meat man.” Had to be a “qualified” meat cutter who could cut special cuts of meat as needed, thus excluding apprentices in their first six months of training. Hampel thinks this provision would not have excluded women from cutting meat after 6 p.m. if they were “qualified” meat cutters.

MORE ON APPRENTICESHIP TRAINING
Scope and Content Note: Self-service counters had prompted an executive committee of the Meat Cutters to issue a statement discouraging apprentice training because the number of jobs was declining. But the Milwaukee local didn't discourage apprenticeships for that reason. Chicago apprentices still must attend Washburn Trade School for training. Milwaukee apprentices had been required to learn percentages, mark-ups, cuts of beef at the Milwaukee vocational school. The program was abandoned because employers didn't want to pay employees while in school. Companies decided to train apprentices in stores, where meat cutters wouldn't have to learn pricing because prices set by company.

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

PRODUCTIVITY
Scope and Content Note: A concern of stores in the 1950s. Independent store managers could set their own prices to meet their own profit goals, but chain managers had to conform to goals set by corporate officials. Productivity standards differed. Some stores measured by “pounds-per-employee-hour,” others “sales-per-employee-hour.” The union took the position that employees shouldn't lose jobs because of failure to meet productivity goals. Meat department managers couldn't get new employee in expectation of increased business; they had to request new employee on the basis of the previous week's productivity. “It was really a problem.” Stores never admitted doing time studies but did issue statements indicating what departments were expected to produce with the given number of employees and hours. Hampel thinks productivity standards incorporating time-study principles may have come from central meat-processing plants where such measurements could have been obtained. He was inside an A & P meat-processing plant, and “...it was quite a production-line process.” Instead of meat cutters doing various tasks as in a store, jobs here were specialized. The Milwaukee local union never developed its own standards for countering store productivity standards, as West Coast locals did. But the International issued PACE (Performance and Cost Evaluation) orientation programs designed to illustrate the many specific job duties--including even answering the telephone--which comprised the total job. The union also considered discussing a roast with a customer as “productive time.” Stores are mostly concerned with just profit, not with the union's position in PACE programs.

KROGER AND A & P CENTRAL MEAT-PROCESSING PLANTS
Scope and Content Note: A & P's plant was in Chicago; it serviced southeastern Wisconsin, northern Illinois, perhaps down to central Illinois. Doesn't know whether Kroger closed its Madison plant because of high transportation costs or if it just closed when Kroger closed its stores in Wisconsin.

FACTORS DETERMINING WHETHER PRODUCTIVITY GOALS COULD BE MET
Scope and Content Note: Workers in some stores had problems, others didn't. Harder to meet productivity standards in low-income neighborhoods.

NEW WAYS OF STRUCTURING WORK IN THE 1950s
Scope and Content Note: No new work rules, and none were published. Wrappers placed the meat in the tray, sealed in on hot plate, weighed and priced. Meat cutters used band saws almost exclusively except for taking meat off bones. There was a new cubed steak machine. Using a band saw, meat cutters would cut meat, place it on belt line, and not see it until wrapped. A later process did all wrapping, weighing, pricing, stamping automatically. Meat wrappers now do very little wrapping--just displaying.

PERSONNEL EVALUATION PROCEDURES
Scope and Content Note: No formal method in the 1950s. Market managers might try to increase efficiency or productivity by simple personal encouragement or praise. “Constructive advice forms” and other more formal evaluation procedures probably were not introduced until the 1970s, when companies decided they needed written evidence to respond to the union's challenge to a disciplinary matter. Personnel handbooks listing company policies were not common in the 1950s either, though some chains may have issued them.

MOST COMMON COMPLAINTS BY MANAGEMENT
Scope and Content Note: “Probably not much different than they are today.” Tardiness and excessive absenteeism were common. Not much absenteeism on weekends because meat cutters knew this was a busy time, and they had to be at work. Most meat cutters had days off during the week because they worked weekends.

HOW THE NATURE OF GRIEVANCES HAS CHANGED
Scope and Content Note: They have “become more of a protection for the worker than had been prior to this time.” Few grievances filed prior to the 1960s except for discharge. (Causes for discharge in the 1950s most commonly were dishonesty and negligence.) Now grievances are more “technical,” concerning productivity, tardiness. Grievance procedure is “the one thing” at the workers' disposal to democratically protect themselves.

TYPICAL WORK ACTIVITIES FOR HAMPEL AS BUSINESS REPRESENTATIVE FOR LOCAL 73
Scope and Content Note: During time he was business representative (1953-1958), he also was union president. Got phone calls all hours of the day and night. Might have to be at a store when it opened to make sure time cards were being punched correctly. Work day sometimes began at 6 a.m. and ended at 10 p.m. Believed it was important to contact employees often, so he visited each store in his area at least once a month.

UNION MEMBERSHIP
Scope and Content Note: Had 1,200 when he became president in metropolitan Milwaukee area. Later, Meat Cutter locals in the Fox River Valley were added, increasing Local 73's coverage up to Rhinelander. Unit meetings held in outlying areas.

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

INFLUENCE OF FEDERAL LABOR LEGISLATION ON EARLY HISTORY OF LOCAL 73 IN MILWAUKEE
Scope and Content Note: Some organizing efforts made in Milwaukee before Hampel joined Local 73 in September 1934, thanks to spur given by passage of the Norris-LaGuardia Act in 1932. Act outlawed “yellow-dog” contracts and federal injunctions against picketing. Hampel perhaps attended a meeting where a labor lawyer mentioned how “labor's Magna Carta” helped unions locally. Section 7A of the NIRA also helped by permitting workers to join unions. Hampel's store, which he then managed, conformed to the NRA's code of $15 a week for either a 63- or a 72-hour week. Local union membership was roughly 400 by the time the NIRA was declared unconstitutional in May 1935.

OTHER MEAT CUTTER LOCALS AND OFFICERS IN MILWAUKEE IN THE 1930s
Scope and Content Note: There had been Local 222 at Cudahy Packing Company, which disintegrated after the 1921 strike. Also locals at Plankington, Armour and other packinghouses. Local 257, a fish handlers' local, was headed by Charlie Ott, president, and Ed Lauf, organizer. When Local 257 merged with Local 73, Lauf became a business agent for 73. Ed Schilling, organizer for Local 73, “disappeared” when an accounting of funds was requested. Unsalaried or underpaid, he used dues for living expenses. Things improved when Edward Borzykowski was elected financial secretary (in 1937).

UNION STRUGGLES AGAINST A & P AND KROGER IN THE 1930s
Scope and Content Note: Union membership in chain stores was strong enough by 1934 to seek union recognition. Because the Wagner Act not yet enacted, often had to resort to strike because no provisions for recognition by elections. When the union struck A & P, company closed store meat departments and leased them to market managers or other meat cutters as concessions. Kroger closed all of its stores in Milwaukee and Waukesha.

OTHER MEAT CUTTER LOCALS IN MILWAUKEE AND MERGERS AMONG THEM
Scope and Content Note: Local 369, poultry and egg handlers, headed by Walter Reid (later an International organizer), merged with Local 73. Joe Nowicki from 369 became a business agent for 73 after merger. Independent packinghouse workers were represented by Local 248. Industrial packinghouse union (Packinghouse Workers' Organizing Committee) organized most major packers in Milwaukee. Meat Cutters Local 248 had just the independent packers in the 1930s. Local 64, perhaps headed by Mike Gersch, represented sausagemakers. Local 64 merged with Local 248 “because of financial difficulties.” Matt Ellak from Local 64 and George Bohacek became International auditors. Some Fox River Valley locals also eventually merged with Local 73 “for economic reasons.”

ROLE OF THE INTERNATIONAL IN ORGANIZING AT THE LOCAL LEVEL
Scope and Content Note: Mergers did not necessarily reflect the International's strategy of trying to gain strength by enlarging the geographical jurisdiction. “The International union I think was interested in organizing whoever they could wherever they could....” Patrick Gorman (International Secretary-Treasurer) and Dennis Lane (President) travelled extensively by train to organize locals and support organizing efforts. Might address members in Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Duluth, Montana (to speak to cattle and sheep butchers), Iowa. They made “a prodigious effort” to bring “unity and solidarity” to the union. Hampel thinks International membership was about 70,000 by the time of the 1940 convention in Milwaukee.

SUPPORT BY THE INTERNATIONAL AND OTHER UNIONS FOR GROWTH OF LOCAL 73
Scope and Content Note: “Milwaukee had always been a good union town....” Federated Trades Council and the Teamsters always helped in strikes by refusing to cross picket lines; Local 73 helped the Teamsters organize Berry Trucking Company by not handling products from packinghouses delivered by Berry. International might occasionally help financially, though not in early stages of the union's growth. Locals had always cooperated well. For example, in 1939 they formed the Butchers' Local Credit Union, which Walter Reid helped form. Now known as the Food, Commercial and Medical Employees Credit Union (FCM). Reid and William Mansfield from the International helped organize locally. Bill Tate, a black organizer, helped organize packinghouses in Milwaukee.

IF HEAD MEAT CUTTER IN INDEPENDENT STORES ORGANIZED IN THE 1930s, THEN WHOLE STORE WAS ORGANIZED
Scope and Content Note: This situation occurred because in most cases, the head meat cutter was also the store manager. But independent chains, at least, soon began to separate the head meat cutter from other grocery store employees because they didn't want to pay such high wages. Thus, grocery clerks were separated from meat cutters. Local asked Gorman for permission to organize clerks in the late 1930s, but he said agreement with the Retail Clerks International Association (RCIA) meant any clerks organized by meat cutters had to be delivered to the Clerks jurisdiction.

GORMAN'S AGREEMENT IN THE LATE 1930s WITH THE NATIONAL RETAIL MEAT DEALERS ASSOCIATION ALSO HELPED LOCAL ORGANIZING EFFORTS
Scope and Content Note: The agreement stipulated that the Association and its affiliates wouldn't resist unionization. In cases where there were two or more owners of a shop, one would be exempt; others had to join the union. Helped Local 73 organize some independent shops. The national Association's agreement was not binding on Milwaukee Retail Meat Dealers Association; “it was the moral power” of the national organization that helped.

MEAT CUTTER-CLERK RELATIONSHIPS
Scope and Content Note: Received no help from Clerks in 1934 A & P strike, because the union was not organized at that time. But other union members honored the picket lines. Only in Bayshore or Fox Point areas might there have been difficulty getting the picket line honored. After the Clerks were organized, relationships were good. Hampel recalls walking picket lines with Clerks in an unsuccessful effort to organize the Boston Store. Would also help organize clerks for RCIA, both for magnanimous and protective reasons. In 1954 or 1955, told Kohl's management that Meat Cutters would honor any Clerks picket line, leading Kohl's management to stop resisting Clerks efforts to organize. Meat Cutters signed up deli workers at Kohl's at about the same time. Also cooperated in organizing a Kroger store in Waukesha.

END OF TAPE 3, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MEAT CUTTERS AND CLERKS
Scope and Content Note: There were no jurisdictional disputes between the two in Milwaukee as occurred elsewhere. Milwaukee meat cutters abided by the national agreement worked out by George Meany in 1955 and by the directions of Pat Gorman not to organize clerks. Later agreements at International levels aimed at untangling contesting jurisdictional claims, but in some areas, deli workers whom Clerks had organized remained in RCIA. “There were some very, very bitter disputes” between the two unions, caused by the introduction of self-service markets.

MORE ON THE 1934 A & P STRIKE
Scope and Content Note: After the strike, meat departments in A & P stores were not managed by A & P until after World War II, according to Hampel's recollection. A & P opened a “warehouse market” on First and Beecher and then expanded into their other stores as the idea of a “supermarket” grew.

STRIKE AGAINST E.G. SHINNER'S MARKET
Scope and Content Note: Shinner's was among the numerous other independent chains operating in Milwaukee, including Buehler Brothers (based in Chicago), Independent Packing House Market, D & F (later Frankiewicz), Start Markets, Inc., Schubert's Markets, Max Kohl's, Harlflinger's Markets, Soden's Super Markets (a subsidiary of Independent Packing House Markets). Based in Chicago, Shinner's had five stores in the Milwaukee area. In 1935, the union, led by Harry Sutherland and Ed Borzykowski, decided to put “a recognition picket line” in front of those Shinner markets not yet unionized. The company got an injunction in federal court barring the picketing. Eventually (in 1938), the United States Supreme Court returned the case to Milwaukee “for some clarification.” The union decided to resume picketing and distribute handbills explaining their position. One picket-line slogan was, “All we want is a fair deal,” a reference to the Franklin D. Roosevelt slogan. The Milwaukee Police Department informed the union of the city's anti-handbill ordinance--saying it really was an anti-litter measure--and of the possibility of arrests. The executive board, of which Hampel was a member, decided that the board members' wives should distribute handbills, expecting arrests and also good publicity. Hampel convinced his fiance, Sadie, to join the other women. The next day, a picket line of one man and the board members' wives were arrested. Photographers were present. Women lunched on bologna sandwiches at the police station and were released on bail. They were fined $10 and costs. Neither the International nor any state or national labor federation believed the case merited financial support, though the International promised to help defray costs of the case if they won it. Arthur Richter, a local lawyer, promised he would charge only for paperwork if he lost the case but wanted a regular fee if he won. The U.S. Supreme Court declared the anti-handbill ordinance unconstitutional (in 1939). Hampel didn't know the cases hadn't been disposed of until years later when he sought a property deed and learned a judgment still stood for the $10 fine owed. And he married Sadie. Her parents “were quite aggrieved” by the incident, “so I had to protect her integrity, and I had to marry her. But I didn't do it because of that. I did it because I loved her. She was a true union person, all the way through....”

REASONS FOR UNION GROWTH IN THE 1930s
Scope and Content Note: Federal legislation did help, but also “we didn't have anything to lose, and we had everything to gain.” First contract, signed (he thinks) in 1936 and only two pages long, provides evidence of what could be gained. Journeymen received $25 for a 63-hour work week, including Saturday night. (Apprentices started at $18 a week.) “This, to us, was a boon.” Contract also provided for holidays on New Year's Day, Memorial Day, July 4, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas. “But there was no pay for these days. It was merely the fact that they were going to be recognized as holidays, and we would not have to be working on those holidays. We would be able to be home with our families.”

BIGGEST CONTRACT GAINS BETWEEN 1936 AND 1958
Scope and Content Note: By 1941, journeymen made $40 a week. War Labor Board (WLB) regulations meant that in 1942, union members got just a 15% wage increase, amounting to 41 cents across the board. (Decided to make it across the board rather than give more for head meat cutters and journeymen and less for apprentices.) From 1941 to 1946, WLB standards prevailed. But some employees received merit increases. Working hours were reduced over the years from 63 in 1936 to 40 in 1952 or so. Important to realize that the retail industry was exempt from 1938 wage and hour law which provided for time and a half for work over 40 hours a week. Eventually, retail employees were covered by federal wage standard laws. Self-service markets also opened opportunities to improve wages and conditions. Negotiated provision allowing a 40-hour work week to be derived from a combination of hours during the day from 8 a.m. until 9 p.m., and over several days. Regular employees were guaranteed two and a half to three hours of overtime on Friday nights. So if the employee began at noon, worked until 6 p.m. with an hour off for lunch, then worked 6 p.m. until 9 p.m., would earn time and a half for the last three hours. Same if the employee worked eight hours starting as late as 4 p.m. Considered this something of a penalty for employers, because employees didn't want to work after 6 p.m. But Sutherland and the executive board decided late work was the coming trend, and the union should get as much as possible for employees under such conditions. There also were provisions for equal overtime opportunities. Wages just after World War II were “fantastic” because wartime wage strictures were removed.

HOW SOCIAL COMPOSITION OF LOCAL 73 CHANGED OVER THE YEARS
Scope and Content Note: No blacks in retail perhaps until 1955, but many Poles, Slovenians, Croatians, Germans, Irish, English, Italians. Women were ethnically mixed too.

END OF TAPE 3, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON SOCIAL COMPOSITION
Scope and Content Note: Other blacks had merged into Local 73 from Local 369 packinghouse workers. Hampel signed up the first black meat cutter in 1955 or so. The man had been working in a store, but the manager hadn't told Hampel about him. “From that time forth, why, there was no bar for anyone who was of a different color or race from becoming a retail meat cutter....”

EFFECT OF TAFT-HARTLEY LAW IN MILWAUKEE
Scope and Content Note: Not much effect on retail side of the industry, but did affect labor generally. The law did prohibit activities previously permitted. Section 14-B enabled the state to pass labor laws more restrictive than federal labor legislation. The law also prohibited unions from requiring that new employees be hired from a union hiring hall. Labor hurt by prohibitions against secondary boycotts. Taft-Hartley's list of “unfair labor practices” also “made it a little harder to organize....”

JOB WITH INTERNATIONAL IN CHICAGO
Scope and Content Note: Elected as business representative but not president in January 1958. Through conferences and other meetings, he had previously come to know members of the International staff, who had asked him to work for the International's Education Department. He had declined because it meant a move to Chicago. Asked again in August 1958, and he accepted, “because there was a little bit of internal friction in the union policy and the union executive board at that time.” Pat Gorman told him, “We're asking you to come on this job. You're not asking for a job. And there's a difference.” Commuted from Milwaukee from 1959 to 1962, then moved to Chicago. Was out of town about 40 weekends during the year doing educational work throughout the United States and Canada. Later became assistant director of education. Retired from that job in 1972 to become “director of building services and supplies.” Retired from the AMC&BW in 1979. Wife died in February 1979; they had planned he would retire when he reached age 65, so he did.

TEACHING RESPONSIBILITIES IN LABOR EDUCATION AT ROOSEVELT UNIVERSITY
Scope and Content Note: The university has a “long-term” (32-week) labor education program. Frank McAllister was department head and asked Hampel to teach occasional courses to union members. “Some unions don't believe in education,” and McAllister knew Hampel would welcome the challenge to teach workers about union operations. McAllister convinced Gorman of Hampel's value to the program despite Hampel's schedule, and Gorman believed “that kind of talent” should be shared. He's been coordinating the first of a four-year program since 1972.

WHAT HAMPEL TELLS HIS STUDENTS ABOUT THE STATE OF THE LABOR MOVEMENT TODAY
Scope and Content Note: “...The more things change, the more they stay the same. And in spite of the fact that we see much change going on here, they're pretty much the same as they were back in the 1930s...that we still have these battles to win.” Will meet challenges if don't shirk responsibilities to fellow workers. Some “work enrichment programs” will help make work places safer and better. Management seems to be more enlightened these days, despite some anti-union companies. Still, unions stand to lose many of the things gained since the 1930s. Because of various management tactics aimed at making encroachments or dismissing workers, unions must rely on the grievance procedure, “the industrial democracy on the job,” to protect workers. These will help people realize they have a stake in the health of their unions. White-collar workers have realized this value.

A SUMMATION

END OF INTERVIEW

Subseries: Hannon, Conchera L.

INTRODUCTION

HANNON CAME TO MADISON FROM SICILY
Scope and Content Note: She was two months old. Her father had come first, gotten a job with the railroad, then sent for his family. Relatives and friends had previously immigrated to Madison. There were two children when the family emigrated; 11 more children were born in the United States.

HER FATHER OPENED A GROCERY STORE
Scope and Content Note: She and her mother worked in the store, as did a brother for awhile, “but after my father saw his attitude toward the customers, why, he realized that Vito wasn't ever going to be a grocery clerk.” The family “often wondered about” her father's decision to leave the railroad for the grocery business. But there was potential on Regent Street for such a business. One large store had already opened, and nearby churches also attracted business. The store was located “just about where Madison General Hospital is now.” It was a busy area with no parking problems and good traffic for the store. The store opened in perhaps 1921 or 1922, when she was about nine.

HANNON'S DUTIES IN THE STORE
Scope and Content Note: “They were many.” She waited on customers, ordered, kept books, interpreted for her father with salesmen, and cleaned cases. “The candy case always had to be cleaned.”

CUSTOMERS CAME FROM VARIOUS ETHNIC BACKGROUNDS
Scope and Content Note: “We had Jewish..., we had Irish, we had German.” The store also got business from university professors living at what then was called “College Hill” (now University Heights).

ITALIAN SPECIALTY ITEMS WERE PURCHASED FROM A CHICAGO SALESMAN
Scope and Content Note: “...(L)ike olive oil, the spaghettis, your tomato paste, and cheeses--he would get great big rounds of cheeses.” Some of these items were shipped on freight trains. Her father picked up shipments in a Model T Ford, “which was the pride of the neighborhood.” It was sometimes necessary to make several trips in the car. She has a photograph of herself in her store apron with two neighborhood boys standing by the car. Her father kept the car for years.

MORE ON HANNON'S BOOKKEEPING FOR THE STORE
Scope and Content Note: She was the store's bookkeeper because her father could neither read nor write English. She worked at this during recess from the school she attended across the street from the store. “I started my own bookkeeping system.” She got a ledger and wrote out receipts and bills on a carbon-copy book. One copy was for customers; she used the other for entering totals in her ledger. Charges and payouts had a separate book. Some wholesale companies helped her set up her book-keeping system. “I don't know if they only helped me or maybe helped perhaps other immigrants who had businesses.” Inventories of store stock was needed for government reports. “They were very nice that way to help out.”

A TYPICAL WORK DAY FOR A NINE- OR TEN-YEAR-OLD
Scope and Content Note: She would be awakened by a cow bell, rung by her mother. She would be in the store by 5:30 a.m. “I didn't dare to be late.” Laborers would buy lunch meat in the store before reporting for work. “So, we had to be up early so they could get to work early.” Next, bakery items arrived in big trays. “Then we would have the breakfast trade.” There would be a lull at about 10 a.m. At 10:15 recess, Hannon came to the store to place some orders and finished ordering and posting the morning's credit at noon. “It was really amazing...how this man, who couldn't write, yet, he would have all these numbers down, and he would know, and what items they bought, by memory. And he would read them off to me.” He had his own “code” for memorizing orders until she could record them. It was important to be accurate; “heaven forbid” if she erred. Customers knew she would not be there to write down charges immediately. “Oh, it was really fun, fun, fun, I'll tell you.” She also worked during afternoon recess and after school for “the supper trade.” “It was nothing to have the store open 'till 10:30, 11 o'clock at night.” She did her homework on the store counter and would play jacks and ball with her sister when her father was not there. “It was difficult. I don't know--I think that's why I grew up so fast. At thirteen I felt old.”

LOCAL SOURCES OF GOODS FOR HER FATHER'S STORE
Scope and Content Note: He bought from Simon Brothers, Frank Brothers, and Klueter and Company. Italian specialties came from Chicago. Produce came from the Frank or Sweet companies. Meat came from Armour, Oscar Mayer, and another company. The store did not carry fresh meat, only cold cuts.

REFRIGERATION IN THE STORE
Scope and Content Note: There was a “huge ice box and a smaller one.” An ice cream cabinet was serviced daily. Ice was delivered once or twice a day. The ice box was 19 or 20 cubic feet. Ice was put on top. There was a pan underneath which had to be emptied several times daily.

WELFARE CUSTOMERS AT THE STORE
Scope and Content Note: The store had its “welfare trade.” She made monthly visits to the welfare office to deliver bills and pick up new orders. She remembers a small room containing clothes and shoes for welfare recipients. “I can still remember those ugly shoes.” There were special holiday orders. Statements from the welfare office listed the names of welfare recipients and the amounts they were entitled to purchase. Candy, tobacco and near-beer were prohibited. Substitutions were allowed to account for food preferences of different nationalities.

CREDIT CUSTOMERS PAID THEIR BILLS MONTHLY
Scope and Content Note: Credit customers had to be sure she was there to pay their bills. Her father gave customers a bag of cookies as a “token of appreciation” for paying their bills. Deliveries were made only for customers living some distance away. There were no deliveries for neighborhood residents. “A lot of it was credit. It wasn't anything to have a $400, $350 grocery bill a month.”

THE STORE'S LAYOUT
Scope and Content Note: There were window displays on either side of the entry door. Displays changed according to the season. Sometimes there were firecrackers (for the Fourth of July), and school supplies. Her father took in used schoolbooks from students on consignment. One side had tobacco, bakery goods, candy. There was a long counter with “10 or 12 different kinds of spaghetti.” They sold sugar and navy beans in bulk. Flour was bagged in 25- or 50-pound bags. Yeast was also sold in bulk; it was cut with a string. The ice box was behind the long counter. Cookies were on a rack in bulk boxes. Another end had vegetables. A pot-bellied stove kept things warm in winter because furnace pipes were not long enough to reach into the store.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

MOST STORE ITEMS WERE STOCKED IN BULK

THE DECLINE OF HER FATHER'S STORE
Scope and Content Note: Stores began selling fresh produce and meat. Chains had a produce rack which her father's store lacked. Not long after the appearance of chain grocery stores, larger produce and fruit markets also began to appear. “That started to take away some of our business.” People could buy in larger quantities at lower prices. Her father paid more because “his merchandise was more select.” “Multiple sales”--six items for 25 cents, for example--began appearing too, and were popular. “Dad couldn't compete with that.” After the 1929 stock market crash, more people bought on credit. “I said to Dad, 'You aren't going to be able to pull through this.'” “I said, 'I'd rather go to work and see a paycheck at the end of the week.'” This “hurt his pride.” He decided to close the store he had operated for about ten years. It closed in 1930. She began work at A & P; her father returned to working for the railroad. “We enjoyed what we were doing. We enjoyed the years that we had in the store. But when competition came, then it was an entirely different situation. He just couldn't compete with it.” Chain store brands especially hurt. Customers complained because his prices were so much higher. “I just couldn't stand that anymore.”

SHE BEGAN WORK AT A & P IN 1930
Scope and Content Note: Located on Park and Mound streets just down the street from her father's store, the A & P had been open for about a year or so when she began work. Other chains came to Madison too, creating more competition. She got the job by asking the A & P manager for it when he passed by her father's store one day. “It helped because I could speak the language (Italian) too and help out.”

ORTHODOX JEWS AND OTHERS IN HER MIXED ETHNIC NEIGHBORHOOD
Scope and Content Note: She helped Jews on the Sabbath by opening their mail and lighting their gas stoves for them. It was a large ethnic neighborhood. “To us, they weren't the Jewish people, they weren't the Irish or the German. They were people that we knew by name. And they were just like one of the family.” “They were people that we grew up with, so we didn't think of them as being any different.” For Jewish customers, she had to use different knives for cutting cheese and cold meats, and keep her cutting board very clean. “I would tease them once in awhile, but we respected them....”

DESCRIPTION OF A & P
Scope and Content Note: It was twice the size of her father's store, even though it was still small compared to today's stores. There was a loading dock and storeroom in back. Packaging, egg candling and potato bagging were done in the back storeroom. Preparations for special sales were also done there, well ahead of sale time.

SHE COMPARES HER FATHER'S STORE AND THE A & P
Scope and Content Note: Her father's store had one room above the store for extra stock. They carried 100 to 150 boxes of spaghetti because customers bought it “by the cases.” Father's store was located in the front of their house. The A & P, therefore, seemed very large to her. Both stores were service stores. The clerks added each item separately. Cash registers rang the totals only. There were no adding machines. The display area at A & P was larger. A & P also had specials. Even today, she can tell if a store is an independent or a chain store by the displays. “The displays are changed more frequently...to keep the customer alert” in a chain store. Hannon noticed this as a difference between her father's store and A & P.

HANNON'S WORK AT A & P
Scope and Content Note: She stocked at the store. “We had to do everything.” Employees included the manager, assistant manager, the manager's wife, Hannon, and a meat manager. She used a “long pole with a spring” with prongs at the end to get items off upper shelves in the store. “But many's the item I got on my head, especially if it was a heavy can or something.”

A & P's REFRIGERATION
Scope and Content Note: At first, there were ice boxes. They had walk-in coolers with an ice storage space above. Large blocks of ice were delivered once or twice daily. Electric refrigeration was not introduced until after she began working for Kroger a few years later. She did not recall how meat was refrigerated.

WORKING HOURS AT A & P
Scope and Content Note: She does not recall when work began on weekdays, though she recalls leaving work at 6 or 6:30 p.m. On Fridays and Saturdays she worked from 7:30 a.m. until 10 p.m. Because child labor laws also covered women, “I think they were a little more strict about the hours.”

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WORKING HOURS AT A & P AND HER FATHER'S STORE
Scope and Content Note: A & P did not open early enough to cater to laborers enroute to work. “In fact, at my Dad's store, we never knew what it was to have a Sunday meal.” Her father kept the store open to enable churchgoers across the street to pick up needed groceries after church. “So it was a good many years before we got Dad to finally realize that we wanted at least one hour on a Sunday to have a family meal.” Even so, customers would knock on the back door and interrupt their dinner because they had forgotten something at the store. “It was disgusting.”

WAGES AT A & P
Scope and Content Note: She made 14 or 15 cents an hour, or about $13.50 a week.

SHE FINDS INCOME TAX RETURN FOR 1951
Scope and Content Note: It shows she made $367 that year working for Piggly Wiggly. Her husband, Bill, worked at the University of Wisconsin. “And he sure wasn't earning a lot of money, I'll tell you--$2,150?”

JOB DUTIES AT A & P
Scope and Content Note: She waited on customers and stocked shelves during slack times. Rotating stock was “a must.” She did that at her father's store, too. Even just before she retired, some stock boys were “lazy” about doing this.

HANNON WORKED AT A & P FOR FOUR YEARS. THE STORE CLOSED BECAUSE “PEOPLE JUST WEREN'T BUYING ANYMORE”

EFFORTS OF A & P TO STIMULATE BUSINESS
Scope and Content Note: A & P sent her around the neighborhood to take orders on specials. The manager ordered carloads of special items such as flour. The manager delivered the orders. “This was all on our own in order to get some business stimulated.”

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

REASONS WHY A & P FAILED
Scope and Content Note: “I think it's what we're going through right now. What business is going through right now, they were going through then.” A & P closed some of its smaller stores. They were competing with self-service stores.

HANNON WORKED FOR KROGER
Scope and Content Note: First, she worked at a store on Mound and Randall streets. Shortly thereafter, she moved to a new self-service Kroger store on Winnebago Street at Union Corners in about 1940. The self-service store “was pretty much like it is now.” Customers used shopping carts; the store had checkout lanes. Today's stores have different registers.

DUTIES AT KROGER
Scope and Content Note: She waited on customers, stocked shelves, packaged, put up dried fruit and candy. At the Union Corners store, she was a checker and also stocked shelves and dusted. “You just don't stand in back of a register and wait for a customer.” After her son was born, she also had to order and stock drugs “between checking customers. And if that isn't nerve-wracking....”

THOUGHTS ABOUT WORKING IN A SELF-SERVICE STORE AFTER HAVING WORKED IN A SERVICE STORE FOR 20 YEARS
Scope and Content Note: “I found it a little exciting.” When she waited on customers in a service store, sometimes she and waiting customers would become somewhat anxious when customers could not decide what brand or product to buy. “To know that you didn't have that to contend with, it was real nice.” She did have to help customers unload groceries at the self-service counter. “Each method has its own responsibilities.”

MORE COMPARISONS BETWEEN SERVICE AND SELF-SERVICE CLERKING
Scope and Content Note: Kroger still carried some bulk items which had to be packaged by clerks. This was done either in the back room or on an unused counter “so we could keep an eye on our checking.” She often spent as much time doing things away from the cash register as checking.

RESPONSIBILITIES AS A CHECKER
Scope and Content Note: At Kroger's Winnebago Street store, the manager gave her about 10 minutes of training on the cash register. Each checker checked her register in and out every day. Registers had to balance at night. If registers were off, “you'd have to check and recheck it. If it didn't come out, it didn't come out.” “Sometimes, it's just as bad to be over as it is to be short.” “We had to be very careful.”

WHY HANNON WAS SWITCHED FROM THE MOUND AND RANDALL STORE TO THE UNION CORNERS STORE
Scope and Content Note: She was told she was needed at the newer store. She thinks Kroger planned to close its smaller stores anyway because they were losing business and because “they were deciding to go into complete self-service.”

SHE NEXT WORKED AT THE UNIVERSITY AVENUE KROGER STORE
Scope and Content Note: She retired from that store because another son was born. She was asked back to help out during World War II, beginning on weekends, and gradually working more and more weekends.

SHE WAS TRANSFERRED TO THE PARK STREET KROGER STORE AND WAS ASKED TO MANAGE FULL-TIME
Scope and Content Note: At this store, she was asked to manage stores while managers were on vacation. “And then, the big question came up: Did I want to manage full-time?” She decided, “No, I can't do it. I can't give it the responsibility it will have to have.” She also wondered how high school boys would respond to a woman manager. At the Park Street store, boys “would sass back” occasionally. She also believed her baby needed “total care.” Kroger fired her when she told the company she did not want to be a full-time manager. “So that was my thank you for being an excellent clerk, or whatever, or manager, and I went down to a no-nothing in no time at all.” Kroger was not yet unionized. Neither was Piggly Wiggly, for whom she later worked. A & P may have been unionized. Kroger had wanted her to manage a downtown store on Hamilton Street. A woman named Irene managed the Hamilton Street store, which was still a service store.

MORE ON THE SIZE OF THE UNION CORNERS KROGER STORE
Scope and Content Note: There were three or four checkout lanes. A nearby A & P was double the size of Kroger. Kroger moved into the smaller store just to compete with A & P. “I couldn't understand why Kroger's went into it.” The store “was there for a good many years.”

MORE ON CLERKS UNLOADING SHOPPING CARTS
Scope and Content Note: Clerks still helped customers unload shopping carts when she began working at Piggly Wiggly. She recalls having to go around the counter to help. In 1949 to 1950, Piggly Wiggly was one of the area's larger supermarkets, with perhaps eight checkout lanes. The manager or assistant manager would help customers unload shopping carts. Conveyor belts enabled customers to unload carts for themselves. “But it took a long time because a lot of people resented it. They didn't like to unload their groceries.”

CUSTOMERS LIKED SELF-SERVICE STORES
Scope and Content Note: Customers believed “they were saving money, which, in a way, they were.”

MORE ON UNLOADING CARTS
Scope and Content Note: For awhile, customers resented having to unload their own carts because they thought checkers were being paid to do it.

COMPANIES OFTEN DISTRIBUTED FREE SAMPLES TO CUSTOMERS
Scope and Content Note: As many as six companies might distribute food samples on Fridays and Saturdays. “Or they would have free giveaways, which they don't have now.” “That was always exciting. We liked all that hoopla.” Sometimes they had to wear costumes.

SHE HAD TO WEAR UNIFORMS
Scope and Content Note: She “hated” A & P's uniforms because they scratched her neck. Next came the nylon uniforms, which were “really hot in the summer.” Just before she retired, she wore slacks and a jacket, which she liked “because that saved clothes.”

MORE ON HANNON AS A PART-TIME MANAGER FOR KROGER DURING VACATION TIME
Scope and Content Note: This was during 1944 to 1945. Her responsibilities included weekly ordering, supervising clerks, handling displays, cashiering. She did not receive manager's wages. She also had to take inventory before and after the vacation period. For this, Kroger sent in “a regular inventory crew.” The inventory protected her and the manager.

HOURS OF WORK AT KROGER AND PIGGLY WIGGLY
Scope and Content Note: She worked a six-day week at Kroger. A five-day work week was begun while she was working at Piggly Wiggly. She worked an eight- or nine-hour day. Stores stayed open until 9 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays. She worked either a split shift or a straight shift with a lunch hour, depending on scheduling.

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

MYSTERY SHOPPERS
Scope and Content Note: She thinks A & P and Kroger both used such shoppers to check for courtesy and accuracy in making change. Piggly Wiggly had mystery shoppers, too. Checkers never knew when they would come in. She thinks they are still used today.

WORKING FOR KROGER AND RATIONING STAMPS DURING WORLD WAR II
Scope and Content Note: The stamps posed problems for stores “especially if you ran out of merchandise.” They also had rationing tokens or chips. Stores could sell just so much of one item per customer. Handling coupons slowed the checkout process. This was about 1942.

LATER, COUPONS AND TRADING STAMPS ALSO SLOWED THE CHECKOUT PROCESS
Scope and Content Note: They were a problem for checkers, “but somehow or other, you get into a routine of doing all this.” “I think that once you get into the routine, it's all done automatically.” Trading stamps were discontinued because they were too costly. Store games were “a lot worse than giving out green stamps...because you always had a lot of disappointed people.” Coupons still are problems for checkers “because you've got to remember whether or not they bought the item.” Good checkers, who worked many years, developed a knack for doing this.

CHECKERS MUST GET TO KNOW THEIR CUSTOMERS
Scope and Content Note: Checkers learn to do this “if you have any interest in the customer. But if you're there just like a robot, then you just don't. You really have to learn to like your customer. You have to enjoy your work. And that was my big 'it'--I enjoyed my customers.” “It was just like a friend coming in to visit.” Old-time customers sometimes could be insulted if a new management policy mandated changes in check-writing requirements--such as limiting the amount of the check to the purchase amount only, or insisting on identification or fingerprinting. “And that's one of the things that all of us hated, when we had to tell an old customer that there was a new procedure.”

COMPANY WORK RULES
Scope and Content Note: All stores had personnel handbooks. “Basically, your chain stores are about the same.” Some stores prohibited wearing tennis shoes and jeans, required boys to wear ties, and forbid girls to wear earrings or nail polish. Some of these policies have changed. Stores prohibited smoking on the floor, shopping during working hours, and eating lunch in customer areas. Store managers did not want checkers to converse much with customers. She found such talk distracting, “and that's when you can make a mistake.” It is also “rude” to customers waiting in line. “Of course, the younger clerks would do that. The younger girls. Where the world is a big merry-go-round.”

AFTER HER SON'S ILLNESS, SHE RETURNED TO WORK AT PIGGLY WIGGLY ON EAST WASHINGTON AVENUE
Scope and Content Note: She was spending too much time at home with her son, who had rheumatic fever, and returned to work when a doctor advised it. She worked there for about 11 years. She began by working from 4:30 p.m. until 9:30 p.m. After her son had started school, the manager told her she was working more hours as a part-time employee than a full-time employee but without the full-time employee's benefits. So she began working full-time beginning at noon or 1 p.m. Gradually, she was given responsibility for all nonfood items.

BENEFITS AT PIGGLY WIGGLY ON EAST WASHINGTON AVENUE
Scope and Content Note: A non-union store, the company had hospitalization and profit-sharing.

SHE LIKED GETTING BACK TO WORK AFTER NOT HAVING WORKED FOR SIX YEARS
Scope and Content Note: Hannon found she needed little instruction on the newer cash register and quickly worked her way back into food store work. Maybe “it was something that was in me.” She assumed responsibilities for nonfood items when the manager became too busy to do it himself.

COMPARISON OF THE KROGER STORE AT UNION CORNERS WITH THIS PIGGLY WIGGLY STORE
Scope and Content Note: “Altogether different.” The volume of business was greater at Piggly Wiggly. Also, employees got to know the owner of the chain. “He was a nice gentleman. Real nice.” There was a different “feeling” among employees when Kroger supervisors entered the Kroger store than when Piggly Wiggly's owner and his aides entered the store. The personal aspect to Piggly Wiggly was lost when the chain was sold to Consolidated Foods.

STORE MANAGERS CONTRIBUTE MUCH TO A STORE'S WORKING ATMOSPHERE

CHECKERS SOMETIMES TRIED TO AVOID CERTAIN CUSTOMERS
Scope and Content Note: They did this by slowing down and forcing such customers into another checkout lane. “I don't know if they're still doin' it, but I know they were doin' it then.”

CLERKS COOPERATED WITH MANAGERS EVEN THOUGH THEY MIGHT NOT LIKE THEM

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON DIFFERENCES BETWEEN KROGER AND PIGGLY WIGGLY
Scope and Content Note: “The atmosphere was entirely different. I imagine because it was such a busy store.” It was “better to me” than the Kroger store. They also gave more free samples. She liked the busier store.

CHANGES IN ORDERING METHODS
Scope and Content Note: At first at Piggly Wiggly, she ordered by marking needed items on a form. Then the company switched to ordering on IBM cards with a special pencil. Following this method was an IBM telephone ordering system in which the assistant manager called in her order to an IBM recorder. She no longer had to mark the IBM ordering cards. Goods were delivered twice weekly instead of once weekly with the phone ordering system. These changes began in 1971 or 1972 after she had switched to the Middleton, Wisconsin, Piggly Wiggly store. The telephone ordering system was installed in 1974 or 1975.

DUTIES AS MANAGER OF NONFOOD PRODUCTS
Scope and Content Note: The store's management gave her a certain number of hours to do this work, even though it was close to a “full-time job, because it wasn't only the nonfoods. I also had to do my own unloading, my own marking, my own stocking.” A certain number of feet of shelving required a given number of hours to stock, but there were never enough hours to do the job. “And in between times, 'Connie, check. Connie, check.' If girls were on a break, I had to fill in.” After four or five hours of checking, she did not have enough time to stock. “The only time I resented it was when I had to do my ordering, because then I would lose my train of thought.” Cigarettes alone required much time to rotate and inventory.

SHE WAS NOT PAID EXTRA WAGES ABOVE CHECKER RATES FOR MANAGING NONFOOD ITEMS
Scope and Content Note: She was unable to get the Retail Clerks International Association (RCIA) to change her status from checker to a department manager in order to receive wages commensurate with her duties. She thinks that now changes have been made to compensate for these extra duties. A recent contract corrected these inequities. She thought it was unfair to be responsible for stocking and ordering in the nonfood department without receiving extra pay, especially during those times when she was hard at work stocking, and checkers, who made the same wages as she did, were resting at checkout counters because of a slack time in the store. The night manager sometimes got idle checkers to help her.

THE MIDDLETON STORE ORIGINALLY WAS LARGER BUT SINCE HAS BEEN REDUCED TO MAKE ROOM FOR MORE STORES
Scope and Content Note: A shopping center “was made out of the entire store.” The store was too big for customers and for the town. As business and building increased in Middleton, “then the store got too small.”

IT WAS NOT LIKELY FOR A WOMAN TO BECOME A STORE MANAGER WHEN SHE WAS WORKING
Scope and Content Note: “Well, I could have done it. Not now, I wouldn't do it.” “I would have enjoyed it.”

THE DEMANDS OF MANAGING FOOD STORES ARE GREATER TODAY THAN IN FORMER YEARS
Scope and Content Note: Many store managers “aren't out on the floor like they used to be. They manage from behind the scenes.” Assistant managers do most day-to-day managing in larger stores. Some managers believe it is important to have considerable customer contact to better understand customer needs.

THE PACE OF WORK HAS SPEEDED UP
Scope and Content Note: The busier the store, the faster shelves must be restocked. Night crews do much of the stocking. This helps keep aisles clear when stores are open.

STORE MANAGERS TRY TO KEEP EMPLOYEE COSTS LOW TO BOOST PROFITS
Scope and Content Note: “They always tell us that they don't start makin' any money until Friday.... Up until then, what money they've taken in, for instance, has to go for...their overhead.” Profits sometimes are less than a penny on some items.

MEAT CUTTERS WERE UNIONIZED AT EAGLE “WAY BEFORE US”

THE RCIA ORGANIZED EAGLE WITH LITTLE OPPOSITION FROM THE COMPANY
Scope and Content Note: She thinks all Eagle stores were organized at the same time--perhaps district-wide.

CHANGES RESULTING FROM UNIONIZATION
Scope and Content Note: Employees got seniority rights, vacations and other benefits. “You felt more comfortable with your work because you knew you were protected.”

SHE HAD LITTLE CONTACT WITH UNION AFFAIRS

MOST COMMON GRIEVANCES
Scope and Content Note: Employees complained most about vacations, days off, and sometimes wages. Younger workers today perhaps understand contracts and rights better than she did. Her store had a union steward, who was the produce manager. She thinks there were few problems in the store.

HANNON VIEWS HER UNION
Scope and Content Note: “I think that in a way they helped us.” Wages increased. “Sometimes I think you feel that there are things that you shouldn't do that the union or the union members--you have to go along with the tide.... Like asking for more when you know that you can't have more.” She wonders if clerks may have to follow Oscar Mayer workers in accepting wage freezes. Some employees do not appreciate all the benefits they receive and still demand more.

END OF TAPE 3, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON HANNON AND HER UNION AFFILIATION
Scope and Content Note: She would attend union meetings if she could get a ride, especially at contract negotiation time. The United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW) now includes many other workers besides retail clerks.

MORE ON WAGES
Scope and Content Note: Some women who had worked at Eagle for many years complained that newer employees were catching up to their pay scale more rapidly than they had been able to advance. An assistant manager speculated that some hourly workers who were able to work considerable overtime would make more than he did. She believed that she should have received the same compensation for the work she performed as men received, especially because she worked so hard.

CHECKERS AND OTHER EMPLOYEES QUICKLY ASSUME ADDITIONAL RESPONSIBILITIES

PART-TIME EMPLOYEES DO NOT REMAIN LONG
Scope and Content Note: Many are students who will move on to other jobs or to college. Because of so large a pool of part-timers, the company does not have to pay substantial wages.

HANNON TALKS ABOUT THE DIFFICULTY OF HER WORK
Scope and Content Note: “The way I felt about it was because I had these interruptions, that the company was making me more tired because I felt that I wasn't doing my work at my own pace--that I always had to work two or three steps ahead of myself. And I felt, in order to do a good job, I felt that I should have been left alone and not called to check when I was responsible to my work. And I told them so many times. Some managers that I had would be sympathetic, and some would go by the book.” Work pressures increased.

AMOUNT OF HELP IN HER DEPARTMENT WAS DETERMINED BY THE AMOUNT OF SALES DURING THE PREVIOUS WEEK

HEALTH PROBLEMS ASSOCIATED WITH FOOD STORE WORK
Scope and Content Note: Allergies affect some people. Standing long hours bothered some women. Some men developed hernias. Checkers were taught how to lift heavy bags. “Gosh, I used to have these old ladies come up to me, and they would feel my muscles. And, gosh, I felt like a boxer.”

HANNON COMMENTS ON MAJOR CHANGES IN FOOD RETAILING OVER THE YEARS
Scope and Content Note: “I think the biggest was, or is, in your cash registers.” Pre-packaging of products also represents a major change.

ANECDOTE ABOUT HER FATHER TEACHING HER HOW TO PACK ICE CREAM
Scope and Content Note: The ice cream was very hard and difficult to pack in cans or other containers. “My Dad would show me how to get a scoop of ice cream, and then the customer would say, "Come on, now, pack it in.' And my Dad would show me how to fill it and make it look full.” Now, the ice cream and other ice cream products come pre-packaged.

MORE ON FOOD STORE CHANGES
Scope and Content Note: “I think that the self-service business in itself is the biggest thing.” “And I think that the larger the store gets, the more you miss this contact with the customer.” “You miss that little something that you get when you know a checker.”

CHANGES IN MANAGER-EMPLOYEE RELATIONSHIPS
Scope and Content Note: The manager at one of the last stores where she worked told her he was told that managers should not “socialize with the clerks.” “I don't think that they want the managers, really, to get too involved with the store help.” “I think that when the manager gets impersonal, that I think that that takes something away. How can you relate to someone who is impersonal? I don't know.”

ON RELATIONSHIPS AMONG CLERKS
Scope and Content Note: Gossip always occurs in any job. Some clerks had friendships with other clerks, and some did not. In one store, she thinks that those employees who did socialize with department heads or the store manager received better treatment. The company may have stopped that practice.

HANNON HAD CONSIDERED OTHER CAREER POSSIBILITIES BUT DECIDED AGAINST THEM
Scope and Content Note: “I'm so much more comfortable in what I am doing--what I know how to do best. And then I couldn't see myself in an office, just doing the same thing, because I just would lose all that contact with the public.”

HANNON'S OVERALL APPRAISAL OF HER WORK
Scope and Content Note: She liked most working with people. The aspect of work that most bothered her was being interrupted and not being able to get her work done. “I had a nice relationship with the customers, and I enjoyed it.”

END OF INTERVIEW

Subseries: Henning, Ethel W.

INTRODUCTION

BIOGRAPHICAL BACKGROUND
Scope and Content Note: Only one of six children to graduate from high school; graduated in 1930. Henning had an office job at Century Pen Company in Whitewater her senior year in high school and held the job for five years after that. Married in 1935, had two children, and didn't return to work until after the children were five or six years old. She got a job at Carr's Food Store in Janesville in 1943 and “worked steady for the next 32 years.”

CHILDHOOD ASPIRATIONS
Scope and Content Note: Liked mathematics, spelling and typing as a child.

JOB AT CENTURY PEN COMPANY
Scope and Content Note: Took dictation, typed letters. That job was too confining, so when she moved to Janesville, she looked for work where she could meet the public.

EARLY MARRIED YEARS
Scope and Content Note: Lived on a farm near Whitewater. She stayed home to care for the household. Her husband worked for a wealthy farmer. They stayed there until “his back gave out.”

JOB AT CARR'S
Scope and Content Note: Got the job through a newspaper ad within a month after moving to Janesville. Husband worked for Buggs & Hovland Food Store as a clerk. She was well trained by the manager for job as a checker. An experienced checker worked alongside her for a month or so before Henning could work by herself. “Everything had to be just exactly the way he wanted.” Had to put money a certain way, couldn't talk while checking, and had to count change back to customers.

DESCRIPTION OF CARR'S
Scope and Content Note: Four checking lanes. A self-service supermarket with meat department, frozen foods, produce. “It was very attractive.” Checkstands in front, aisles ran straight back, produce department to one side, windows at front looked onto the street. Frozen foods on the right side as patrons came in the door; produce on the left; meat department in the back.

PERSONNEL AT CARR'S
Scope and Content Note: Twelve to fifteen employees; six full-time checkers who would stock counters and shelves when not busy checking. Part-timers came in after school. A supervisor/checker was responsible for all the registers.

THE UNION AT CARR'S
Scope and Content Note: Carr's was not unionized when she began work. “We kind of organized ourselves,” though with the help of Jennings W. (Mike) Weiss. Election won by the Retail Clerks International Association (RCIA) (Local 1139) in the summer of 1943. Before the union, she worked 48 hours a week for $16 a week. Rather than have to deal with the union, Carr's very soon thereafter sold to Kroger. Took about a year of picketing, without a strike, to get a contract after they organized a union. Never got a contract under Carr's ownership. Picketing did not help win a contract at Carr's even though Janesville was a stronger union town then than now. Employees picketed on their days off. Carr's did not like it but also did not fire anyone.

MORE ABOUT HOW CARR'S WAS OPERATED
Scope and Content Note: Family had been in business a long time, operating several stores. Managed to stay non-union. The brothers did not work much in the stores; stayed in their office. Many customers were wealthy, bought big orders, and charged their purchases. Head bookkeeper had to be efficient--and was. She could find even a penny lost on a tape. “She wasn't too interested” in joining the union, as “she was older than the rest of us were.”

HOW HENNING WOULD CHECK OUT A CUSTOMER
Scope and Content Note: Checkers had to unload carts themselves, check out the order, and do their own bagging. There was no conveyor belt system, so she often had to unload half an order, ring it up, then move around the counter to unload the rest, except when boys worked there as baggers after school. “It wasn't easy work; it was long, hard days.” “I'd like to have a penny for all the groceries I ever packed, I'll tell ya that.” Registers had “groceries,” and “meat” keys, plus letters “produce,” for each clerk. Charges had to be rung up first, then attached to the charge slip and put in the register. Each item had to be listed on the charge slip. “That used to take a lot of time.” Welfare orders especially took much time to check out. There was no particular checkout lane for welfare orders. Welfare orders caused delays and sometimes frustration, because “I was always taught by this manager: don't let the people wait. They can take their time goin' around the store, but when they get up to the checking counter, they want to get out. That was his way of telling us checkers.”

HOW CHARGES WERE WRITTEN UP AT CHECKOUT COUNTERS
Scope and Content Note: Each welfare order had an amount listed on it. Amounts purchased were listed on the order and signed by the purchaser “until it was used up.” Orders were sent to the county once a month, and the county sent checks for amounts purchased to the store. Checkers were not allowed to extend credit to welfare customers beyond the amount listed on the order. Those not on welfare who wanted to charge simply signed a charge ticket with the receipt attached. The bookkeeper would send bills at the end of each month.

STOCKING RESPONSIBILITIES
Scope and Content Note: Checkers stocked shelves when not busy at checking lanes, but so did kids working after school. Checkers often worked in produce, bagging items purchased from bulk bins. Sometimes they bagged apples, potatoes, etc. in advance of demand.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

PRODUCE AND MEAT DEPARTMENTS AT CARR'S
Scope and Content Note: Much smaller than today. Each had a department manager who was responsible for overall department operations. The meat department was owned by Carr's; not a concession. “They had a nice meat department.”

CUSTOMER BUYING HABITS AT CARR'S
Scope and Content Note: There was no typical day, but “usually, you saw the same people week after week.... You usually figured you got so that you learned the days certain people came to the grocery store, and at that time, it wasn't on the scale that they had to run in for a loaf of bread or a pound of butter. When they came, they bought an order that would last for quite some time, like for once a week or twice a week. And you could just almost figure their orders because they bought about the same every time they came in.”

SANITATION AT CARR'S
Scope and Content Note: Not much concern about it at the time. “I will say the store was kept in very neat condition.” No inspectors came around. There were wooden floors, and the manager made sure they were cleaned “real often.”

CARR'S SOLD BOTH THEIR STORES AND THEIR WAREHOUSE TO KROGER AND LEFT THE BUSINESS BECAUSE OF THE UNION PICKET

HENNING'S UNION EXPERIENCES
Scope and Content Note: “I had no experience or anything with unions until I went into the union myself. And, of course, gradually, you learn from going to meetings and listening to your union leaders what it was all about. And I gradually worked myself into it.” Her husband was not a union member, but she had to join when she went to work for Carr's. “I could see the benefits that a union gave....”

MORE ON HENNING'S BACKGROUND
Scope and Content Note: Even though she lived at home with her farm family until age 23, she spent a lot of time away from the farm, driving to high school for four years and to Whitewater for five years while working at the Century Pen Company. She grew to dislike office work because she and her husband both liked being outside rather than working indoors, or at least working with other people.

HOW SHE MANAGED TO WORK AND RAISE TWO CHILDREN
Scope and Content Note: “We always saw to it that either I was home with the girls when he was working, or he was home with the girls when I was working. So we never left the children alone; and we never hired baby-sitters either, I'll tell you that.” When her husband entered the service, she and the girls managed the household for the 15 months he was gone. She avoided night work during that period.

WORLD WAR II OPENED NEW JOB OPPORTUNITIES IN FOOD STORES FOR WOMEN
Scope and Content Note: She estimates that at least three-fourths of the store employees were women, because so many men were in the service. There were no women store or department managers, however.

MORE ON HENNING'S UNION EXPERIENCES
Scope and Content Note: She joined the union in early 1943, was president of the Clerks Local 1139 by the end of the year, because “nobody else wanted the job.” The union had a good-sized membership but poor attendance at meetings.

MIKE WEISS, BUSINESS REPRESENTATIVE FOR CLERK AND MEAT CUTTER LOCALS
Scope and Content Note: A retired meat cutter. “But he wasn't too efficient....” He was getting older by the time he took the job as business representative for the two unions and was not well informed on the Clerks “laws and rules.”

HOW CONTRACTS WERE NEGOTIATED
Scope and Content Note: A delegate from each store attended negotiation sessions, which were boring. Meetings with chain store representatives at the Labor Temple lasted from perhaps 9 a.m. until 5 p.m., and “you wouldn't know any more when you walked out of there than when you went in at nine o'clock in the morning.” They got help negotiating from International representative Murray Plopper and Milwaukee business representative Peter Voeller. (Weiss mostly organized and collected dues but did not help with negotiations. Plopper and Voeller were also called in to help settle grievances.) Contracts were negotiated with A & P and Kroger together. They were the only chains in Janesville then.

MORE ON HENNING'S UNION WORK
Scope and Content Note: Elected president in 1943 but does not recall how long she served. Carr's bookkeeper was also active in the union. Henning was vice president at least by 1947. Offices were traded around often as people tired of them. She also was the recording secretary. She also was a steward, collected dues, told new young members the benefits of belonging to the union. She did not want to be a delegate to union conventions. When the title of “Recording Secretary” was changed to “Secretary-Treasurer,” she kept meeting minutes and the union's financial records. Pete Voeller would check her books after he became the local's business representative.

ROLE OF STEWARDS IN STORES IN THE 1950s
Scope and Content Note: Main function was to collect dues and make sure new employees joined the union. Little role in grievance procedure. Steward would turn over complaints to Mike Weiss or someone in Madison.

CHANGES IN THE STORE WHEN KROGER BOUGHT CARR'S
Scope and Content Note: The store became part of a chain. “You got different people coming into the store than you would at an independent grocery store.” Orders became smaller but more numerous. Carr's had long-established customers. “You wouldn't get strangers.” More varied people came into Kroger. Charge accounts were abolished. Chain recognition brought people in. For Henning, “you were busier.” Kroger kept the same layout and most personnel. The company brought in its own manager from Janesville. Henning helped keep the store's financial records. Would also run the Delavan Kroger store during vacation season.

COMPARISON BETWEEN UNION KROGER AND NON-UNION A & P IN JANESVILLE
Scope and Content Note: A & P paid higher wages, even though not unionized until several years after Kroger. Kroger store was the only union store in town for some years, although the Clerks Local 1139 had organized non-food stores. “A & P was smart at that time. They always kept their clerks a little bit ahead of the union scale so that they didn't want the clerks to ever get interested in the union because they were making better money than the union clerks were, and they still didn't have to pay any union dues, so that way...the older help that was at A & P never was interested in belonging to a union until...Kroger kept coming up every year with their wages....” Then A & P employees joined the union. Was not possible to demand that Kroger pay what A & P paid. “Oh, you don't know how hard it was to negotiate, I'll tell you! It was...as hard as nails to try to negotiate with Kroger's.... They had their price set, and that was it.”

KROGER CONTINUED TO OPERATE THE STORE AS CARR'S HAD DONE

HENNING LEFT KROGER TO WORK FOR LYLE GRAVES' NEW IGA STORE
Scope and Content Note: Lyle Graves, who had operated a small grocery store on Randall Avenue, opened a new IGA store on River Street. She changed because she “wasn't happy,” wanted to work in a larger store, and experience a grand opening.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

HENNING'S RELATIONSHIP WITH HER NEW BOSS, LYLE GRAVES
Scope and Content Note: “I just wanted to get into a new store.” Store had new, “flat,” smaller registers, which she liked. Also liked the grand opening. She got to know and socialize with Graves' family. Graves tried to do right by the union and asked her how to deal with the union. She was like an assistant manager for him, although someone else had the title. Graves himself worked in the meat department with four others. She enjoyed working for him and the business itself: “I enjoyed the grocery business from the time I started until I quit, every bit of it.” She does not miss the business as much as the people.

GRAVES' ASSISTANT MANAGER RESISTED JOINING THE UNION
Scope and Content Note: Weiss forced him to join, saying otherwise he would have Graves fire him. He joined at the last minute. The store was unionized from the day it opened.

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN GRAVES AND THE GODFREY COMPANY
Scope and Content Note: Graves bought all goods from John Godfrey. No Sentry stores then. Godfrey solely a wholesaler, supplying mostly IGA stores.

MORE ON HENNING'S WORK AT GRAVES' IGA
Scope and Content Note: Her duties were similar to a head cashier. Did payroll, ordering, sale signs and checking.. Store had just three checking lanes. When she later worked for Woodman's, did not have to both check and order, because it was too confusing. At Graves, she ordered directly from salesmen and from Godfrey. Deliveries made two or three times a week. Henning stocked the two lanes down from her register when not checking. Got no extra pay for extra duties.

GRAVES' FLOOR PLAN
Scope and Content Note: Same size as the Kroger store. Canned goods to the right after entry. Groceries in the middle. Produce in the left corner, with the bakery next to it. Meat next to the bakery. Nothing across the back. Bread next to the checking lanes in front. Few bulk items left. She did order cookies in bulk and bagged them herself.

CASH REGISTERS AT GRAVES
Scope and Content Note: Smaller, and harder to operate. “They didn't have the zip that a big register has....” Easier to make a mistake. Still had just three department keys. She did not like them because she could not go fast enough. The new computer-linked registers are too complicated and lend themselves to errors.

CHECKOUT SYSTEM AT GRAVES' IGA
Scope and Content Note: No conveyor belt. Small counters with packers. People unloaded their own carts.

MORE ON THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WORKING FOR KROGER AND GRAVES' IGA
Scope and Content Note: “Kroger's were a tough outfit to work for.... They stuck right to base wages, and they wouldn't give you a dime more than what base pay was.” Graves paid her the same wages to start as Kroger. Gave her a chance to work an extra three hours on Friday night for time and a half. With Kroger, “you never gained anything.” Many employees left Kroger to work for Graves.

HENNING LEFT IGA SOON AFTER CHANGE OF OWNERSHIP
Scope and Content Note: Fred Rank bought the store from Graves after ten years or so. Business had declined. Rank not a good businessman. Henning tried to help him meet Graves' old customers. He fired her one Saturday night in the fall of 1958 with no reason, though he said he was not firing her, just “laying you off.” She got $37 a week unemployment compensation for six months.

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

WHY HENNING DID NOT USE SENIORITY TO SAVE HER JOB WHEN LAID OFF BY RANK
Scope and Content Note: Pete Voeller wanted her to press the issue, but she gave the job to a woman with a son who needed the job more than she did. Moreover, if she had returned to work, Rank would have found fault and tried to fire her. Employees also wanted her to fight Rank, but she said “no, you girls keep your jobs and don't worry about me.” A meat cutter told her Rank's business declined after she left, because customers boycotted the store when they learned she had been laid off. She had done the same work for Rank as for Graves.

COMPETITION FROM COPPS WAREHOUSE DISCOUNT STORE HAD FORCED GRAVES OUT OF BUSINESS
Scope and Content Note: New Copps discount store sold things in cases. Graves lost customers. Copps was not unionized for years. Copps' employees were afraid they would be fired for joining the union.

DESCRIPTION OF HENNING'S NEXT STORE, WOODMAN'S
Scope and Content Note: “It was beautiful.” Store fairly new. Graves had said Willard Woodman a little old to start such a new venture. Store manager “was all business--grocery business.” Store well cared for and planned. Office on the right as one entered the store. Three checking lanes in front, then four in the back on the side of building. Aisles ran straight back from checking lanes. Produce department on the right side; meat across the back; frozen food on another side; groceries in between. Separation of two groups of checking lanes--one in front, one in back--caused inconvenience and bunch-ups for customers. Lounge area was in front, with couches.

CHECKOUT SYSTEM AT WOODMAN'S
Scope and Content Note: National Cash Registers with conveyor belts, operated by checker's foot peddle. That was “a great big improvement.” Had to contend with bottles, coupons, refunds. The store did not have trading stamps. Carr's had used boxes and some bags for groceries; Woodman's used only bags.

DEPARTMENTS AT WOODMAN'S
Scope and Content Note: Head cashier, head checker, produce department, dairy manager, but no deli. Egg department employed a woman full-time. Employed 30 to 35 full-time and many part-time. Many in the meat department, including two women. Also, two bookkeepers, a manager, an assistant manager. “Every department had a manager.” Department managers not paid the same wages. The entire store was self-service.

THE STRIKE AT WOODMAN'S IN 1960
Scope and Content Note: Some were union members when she started work, but no union contract. LaVerne Wallace talked to Henning about the need for unionization and a union contract. The union had difficulty getting Willard Woodman to sign a contract. In 1960, the union struck Woodman's in order to send chains in Janesville a message by striking an independent store. Woodman and two sons worked in the store during the strike. Union members in Janesville would not cross the picket line. No strike fund. The decision to strike was made by Pete Voeller in Madison, thinking Woodman would give in because the strike was called just before Memorial Day. The strike lasted two weeks. Woodman agreed to union terms, although “nobody gains on a strike....” Union representatives from outside Janesville did not appreciate how difficult it was to face an independent store owner who lives in town. Membership did approve the strike, although some younger members, especially from other stores, did not understand its meaning. In fact, employees from other stores could vote to strike but would not have to strike themselves. “And that really kinda hurt.” Strike issues were wages and benefits. Did not get benefits but got a contract. Woodman's fought unionization.

ORGANIZING WOODMAN'S, AND THE UNION TODAY
Scope and Content Note: Discussed unionization on the telephone during off hours. Many employees were afraid they would lose their jobs if they joined the union. LaVerne Wallace was good at talking to such employees. Talking about benefits of the union helped in those days. But “the young kids nowadays, they don't care.” Few travel to Madison for union meetings. “They've just lost their interest here in Janesville as far as union meetings are concerned.”

MORE ON HENNING'S WORK AT WOODMAN'S
Scope and Content Note: Primarily a checker. Some stocking.

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

HENNING AS CO-WINNER OF NATIONAL CASH REGISTER'S (NCR) CHECKER-OF-THE-YEAR AWARD FOR WISCONSIN
Scope and Content Note: Customers voted in the store. Criteria: courtesy, accuracy, appearance, customer relations. Willard Woodman conducted the contest in each of his three stores. Wisconsin was not in one of ten regions feeding finalists to the national checker contest in Atlantic City, so she could not go. In Wisconsin contest, winners were determined by judges who visited stores incognito and compared her with others who had been entered from other stores around the state. She won a set of silverware. Shared award with a woman from Fort Atkinson. Judges were thorough in scrutinizing candidates. Woodman's did not participate afterwards because NCR excluded Wisconsin from the national competition. Henning did not want to go further anyway.

WOODMAN'S DID NOT USE PROFESSIONAL SHOPPERS' SERVICE TO CHECK ACCURACY OF CHECKERS

PETER VOELLER REPLACED J.W. WEISS, WHO DIED IN 1959
Scope and Content Note: Weiss had mainly serviced Janesville. After his death, the union was without a business representative until Pete Voeller. The International sent Voeller. “He really got the union people here in Janesville perked up quite a lot.” Attendance improved. When Voeller's territory expanded, he got Bill Moreth, a Sentry produce clerk, to be business representative. Moreth brought in Harold Bitter as business representative. Voeller had worked for Madison and Janesville Clerk locals. Two locals merged a couple of years after Voeller's arrival.

PETE VOELLER GOT LYLE HARBORT TO RUN FOR LOCAL PRESIDENT IN 1959
Scope and Content Note: Defeated the incumbent president. He had held several union offices prior to 1959 election.

MERGER OF MADISON AND JANESVILLE LOCALS
Scope and Content Note: “Nobody knew anything about it.” “We didn't have nothin' to do with it.... It merged, and that was just it.” Members voted on it. Became Local 1401. Henning retired from her office. Union officers thereafter came from Madison. “I wasn't that interested after they merged” in holding union office because of travel to Madison. She continued to attend meetings and to tell younger members the importance of the union.

ORGANIZING DRIVES AFTER VOELLER'S ARRIVAL ON THE SCENE
Scope and Content Note: Organizing efforts occurred mostly in Madison and further north. Janesville stores were mostly organized. Dues just $3 a month, so more members meant more funds to hire union staff, who would organize more members.

CONTRACT GAINS: HEALTH AND WELFARE AND PENSION
Scope and Content Note: Woodman's had a profit-sharing plan, which ended the day after Henning was hired. He knew the union was planning to start a pension plan. The union won pension with little effort.

CASH REGISTERS AT WOODMAN'S
Scope and Content Note: Began with upright NCR's. Later, larger registers with more buttons. Did not put in computer registers until new store opened. This was an IBM register which also monitored inventory. Scanners were installed after she retired. “Thank God I didn't have to learn that.” With registers which calculate change automatically, still have many things to keep track of. Scanners are even more complicated than machines she operated. She was responsible for checking her cash drawer in and out in all stores where she worked. She was never told if she had exceeded a short or excess limit in her cash drawer. Occasionally she was short and was informed at the end of the day. Some errors occurred when change was made between registers.

END OF TAPE 3, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

DRESS CODE AT WOODMAN'S
Scope and Content Note: Woodman's was the first place where Henning had to wear a uniform. Had to buy white uniforms first, then the contract said Woodman had to provide them. Employees laundered. “But that looked so much nicer when everybody's dressed alike.” Willard Woodman's son Phil changed to different colors. Now employees wear jackets with names on.

PHYSICAL PROBLEMS ASSOCIATED WITH CHECKING
Scope and Content Note: Not hard but tiring. “It's interesting work.” Can cause fallen arches. Good shoes help feet, too. Lifting causes shoulders and arms to be tired. She began to notice physical stress within the last ten years. She used to be able to work from nine to nine without it bothering her. Began to bother her “about ten years ago.”

SUNDAY OPENINGS
Scope and Content Note: Lyle Graves did not keep the store open on Milton Avenue, but new store was open Sundays. Stores started staying open in the early 1950s. Henning volunteered to work some Sundays and traded with another checker. Henning did not mind working on Sundays.

TURNOVER RATE AT WOODMAN'S
Scope and Content Note: Today, it is high. Checker told her recently she is only working 12 hours a week. The store does not want clerks to work 40 hours a week. Scheduling is a problem.

HENNING WANTED TO BE ASSIGNED TO THE SAME REGISTER EVERY DAY
Scope and Content Note: “The one thing I used to hate when I was working is, I liked to have the same register every day, because you learn the touch of the register, and you learn the keys of the register, and...you learn the feel of the register..., and I don't like anybody pushing me from one register to another.” Henning had her own register.

PART-TIMERS
Scope and Content Note: Management does not want clerks working 40 hours a week. Suggests even seniority rights to available hours does not help because management employs so many and hard to keep track of scheduling. Perhaps 100 time cards at Woodman's now. The union tried to improve wages for part-time help so employer would be just as disposed to hire full-time help. But management still wants more part-timers because will not have to pay as much in benefits. “But I still contend a full-time clerk takes more interest in their job than a part-time clerk does.” Henning was one of the last full-time clerks at Woodman's.

EVENING HOURS AT WOODMAN'S
Scope and Content Note: Did not start staying open evenings until the new store opened in 1972. Hours were 8 a.m. until midnight. In the old store, closed at 9 p.m. Friday night, 6 p.m. Saturday. She worked nights, but only until 9 p.m.

HOW MANAGEMENT MEASURES PRODUCTIVITY
Scope and Content Note: Management can tell just by observing. Only subjective measurement of productivity. Henning had to work faster and harder at Woodman's than other stores she worked at.

STOCKING AT WOODMAN'S
Scope and Content Note: Only boys stocked shelves at the new Woodman's at night. Shipments arrived three days a week after 6 p.m., and up to 12 boys came in to unload onto shelves. Checkers tended to dairy and other departments when not busy.

WOODMAN'S USED MEN AS CHECKERS
Scope and Content Note: Started women packing and carrying out groceries. They could become checkers “if they stayed that long.” “I think that's terrible.... I still say that is not a man's job at the cash register, 'cause they aren't interested....” Men became checkers only after Henning retired.

SHOPLIFTERS
Scope and Content Note: “Lots of them--lots of them.” Clerks report shoplifters to managers. Formerly could not stop them until out the door; now can stop them at the checking lane. Shoplifters sometimes prosecuted. All told by manager not to enter the store again.

CHANGES IN STOCKING
Scope and Content Note: Stores used to rotate; Woodman's does not--puts fresh in front. Women in Woodman's old Milton Avenue store rotated stock and also dusted shelves.

MARKING PRICES
Scope and Content Note: Formerly used black pencils, then gun labeler, which was faster.

STORE PERSONNEL HAS NOT CHANGED MUCH OVER THE YEARS
Scope and Content Note: “Usually, the people that work in the grocery stores are people that like that type of work.” More to do in grocery stores than in clothing stores. Job pays better these days. The union has helped, but young workers do not appreciate it.

PUBLIC'S IMPRESSION OF CLERKS
Scope and Content Note: Demeanor of clerks often determines whether a customer returns. “If you got a clerk that's pleasant, you're bound and determined to try to pick that...checker out when you go into that store the next time.” Anecdote about how even a new register which can cause checker to err can create an impression, although store manager readily gave refund. But it irked Henning, because “here she was telling me how she liked these new registers and then made a mistake on my tape.”

CONSUMER PROBLEMS OF CHECKING OUT AT A SCANNER
Scope and Content Note: Woodman's does not post all prices on the shelves. Therefore, it is hard to know if the correct price is being charged at scanner checkout. Also, she wonders if latest price changes are reflected on the Universal Product Code.

WHAT STORE EMPLOYEES TALK ABOUT AT WORK
Scope and Content Note: They talk about work, job tasks they do not like, and not getting the same hours as somebody else. Biggest complaints are job assignments and hours.

MOST COMMON FORMAL GRIEVANCES
Scope and Content Note: Inaccurate computation of wages was “the biggest grievance of all.”

END OF TAPE 3, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON GRIEVANCES

ANECDOTE ABOUT A CAUSE FOR EMPLOYEE DISMISSAL
Scope and Content Note: Employee had somehow pocketed money in a bottle exchange transaction. Henning might have been called as a witness, though she had little to tell because she was busy watching her own register. Case settled out of court.

MORE ON HOW GRIEVANCES WERE SETTLED
Scope and Content Note: Recalls no arbitrations. Business representatives usually able to settle grievances.

CUSTOMER RELATIONS
Scope and Content Note: -Customers avoid the grumpy clerks. Public image has become more favorable. Phil Woodman wanted checkers to tell customers to “have a good day,” but Henning could not do that, because some people do not have good days, especially when they have to pay high grocery prices. Store management not as interested in customers as previously. Want checkers to hurry customers out of the store. When she worked for Lyle Graves, a husband might have Henning tell his wife to bring something home from the store, or a child would ask Henning to tell his mother where he would be. “I got to learn families. You don't do that any more.” New Woodman's store not designed well for older people. Some items placed in back, making a long walk for the elderly. Store lacks “the personal touch.” Clerks not supposed to talk to customers, but rather “get 'em out.” Previously, people would tell her their problems. Her husband used to say people liked to get things off their chests.

HENNING ALWAYS LIKED WORKING IN GROCERY STORES
Scope and Content Note: “Grocery business has been my life.” She still enjoys visiting stores, checking prices, and observing checker interest. “I can't say there was anything I didn't like about the work.”

ASPIRATIONS OF YOUNG CLERKS TODAY
Scope and Content Note: One young clerk expressed hope to Henning she could work as long as Henning had in a grocery store, but she was laid off not long after Henning retired. Another young clerk asked for a week's vacation after having been at work perhaps two weeks. She, like others, are not interested in steady work. Creates much turnover. Some managers do not treat employees very well. Young employees do not want to work under such conditions.

MORE ON PART-TIME AND FULL-TIME HELP
Scope and Content Note: In the 1940s and 1950s, the union helped achieve gains for part-timers.

WAGE DIFFERENTIAL BETWEEN MEN AND WOMEN
Scope and Content Note: “Men always got more than the women did...because they figured the women weren't worth as much as the men were.” She does not believe in the Equal Rights Amendment but does believe women should be paid the same as men for the same work. But some jobs are for men only.

ANECDOTE ABOUT WOMAN AT WOODMAN'S BEING SHIFTED FROM PRODUCE TO BAKERY
Scope and Content Note: Woman worked there for years but did relatively little lifting. Woodman's nephew asked to be transferred from the back room unloading heavy crates because of arthritis problem. So he was put in produce, the woman transferred to the bakery where she works 4 a.m. to noon. Woman will not quit over that because she is close to retirement.

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CLERKS AND MEAT CUTTERS UNIONS
Scope and Content Note: “Far apart.” Meat Cutters were stronger than Clerks. Clerks not nearly as determined. Clerks and Meat Cutters honored each other's picket lines.

LOCAL 1139 HAD STORE MANAGERS AS MEMBERS AS LATE AS 1959
Scope and Content Note: Both worked for Woodman's. Stayed in the union because no one made an issue about it. “And the managers were smart. They knew that if they belonged to the union, Woodman's couldn't kick 'em out.” Managers are not supposed to be allowed in the union. These two managers are likely still in the union, but no longer managers. Another manager was a union vice president but was really “under the thumb” of the Woodman family.

EXAMPLES OF CHILDREN FOLLOWING PARENTS INTO GROCERY STORE WORK

WAGES IN TOWNS NEAR JANESVILLE
Scope and Content Note: Wages in nearby towns were lower because stores did not do as much business. Eventually wages raised to Janesville level.

ATTITUDES OF STORE OWNERS TOWARD EMPLOYEES
Scope and Content Note: Employers generally treated their employees “decently.”

THE UNION HAD NO SPECIAL INDOCTRINATION PROGRAM FOR NEW MEMBERS

TIME CLOCKS
Scope and Content Note: Put in in the late 1950s at the owners' insistence because people dallied.

BREAKS
Scope and Content Note: “I never took a break at Lyle Graves'.” But other stores had breaks.

HENNING SUMMARIZES HER YEARS OF WORK IN GROCERY STORES
Scope and Content Note: Stores are bigger. She still enjoys going in stores and looking at layouts. “People don't have the...really right down deep feeling for a job like they used to have.”