Subseries: Kohn, Alice L.

INTRODUCTION

BIOGRAPHICAL BACKGROUND
Scope and Content Note: Parents were dairy farmers in Juneau County area. Father also had a threshing machine and did threshing for other farmers. One-room grade school. Kohn graduated from high school, 1941, and came to Delavan with her fiance. Wanted to be a school teacher but could not afford to attend normal school.

FIRST FOOD STORE WORK--NATIONAL TEA COMPANY, DELAVAN, 1941 TO 1943
Scope and Content Note: Began as part-time in late summer of 1941 and went to full-time in the fall when summer help returned to school. Fiance inducted into service; came home on leave; got married; and they went to Texas.

WORKED IN A MORE ADVANCED STORE IN TEXAS
Scope and Content Note: “They were already supermarket down there.”

HISTORY OF KOHN'S EMPLOYMENT WITH NATIONAL IN DELAVAN
Scope and Content Note: After the war, worked part-time while her children were young. Worked as vacation fill-in and on Friday nights and Saturdays, when her husband was home with the children. Husband worked at Borg Instruments (called Borg Clock Factory then). National store remained at the same downtown location for several years; then built a new store, still downtown, in the 1950s. Remodelling of that building at least twice.

DESCRIPTION OF WORK AT NATIONAL, 1941 TO 1943--RATION STAMPS
Scope and Content Note: Small store, full service. “It was during the war, and it was really tricky to check out people” because of rationing. Four female clerks filled orders. Had to total “points” and also the price on an adding machine; then ring the total price into the cash register. Hard feelings caused when clerk had to tell customer she did not have enough points to cover all her purchases.

MORE ON DESCRIPTION OF WORK AT NATIONAL, 1941 TO 1943--FILLING ORDERS, BULK FOODS
Scope and Content Note: Two counters, two adding machines, one cash register. Description of filling orders item by item. “It was really a lot of foot work.... It wasn't very efficient.” Not much in bulk, but did bag cookies, cut butter and cheese. Men did most of the stocking.

OTHER EMPLOYEES AND THEIR WORK, NATIONAL, 1941 TO 1943
Scope and Content Note: How she got the job. Training on the job. Store had a manager, assistant manager, and four or five other men in addition to the four women. Unloaded trucks by hand, case by case. Had a full-service meat department.

HOURS AT NATIONAL
Scope and Content Note: 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Closed Sunday at first. Worked a five-day week. When first started opening evenings, in the late 1950s, were open on Saturday night; later changed to Friday night. Sunday opening in the mid-1960s.

CLEANING THE STORE, 1941 TO 1943
Scope and Content Note: Very few customers on Monday, and most of the day was spent cleaning up after busy Saturday. Often clerks would arrive before the manager in the morning. One of the first things that had to be done on Monday morning was to heat the store. Squeaky wooden floors had to be cleaned and waxed. Manager was very fussy about cleanliness, especially the window display area.

PAY, 1941 TO 1943
Scope and Content Note: Hourly pay, 30 cents per hour. During busy holiday season, would sometimes have to stock when the store closed. Got extra pay for that. Manager or head checker signed time card daily.

“IT WAS A NICE PLACE TO WORK, REALLY”

CHANGES AT THE NATIONAL STORE IN DELAVAN, 1943 TO 1945
Scope and Content Note: When she returned from Texas in 1945, the store had been converted to partial self-service; electric cash registers at two new checkout lanes. This all still seemed primitive to her after her Texas experience. Checkers still unloaded the customer's cart. This might have been a means whereby the checker was able to keep items for the different departments separate since the department key on the register had to be physically released each time a different department was to be entered. “It was really a back-breaking job because the carts were deep.... In fact, I was short, and some of those (carts) I could hardly reach down over in.” Store stayed pretty much the same until moving to the new building in the 1950s.

THE NEW NATIONAL STORE IN DELAVAN
Scope and Content Note: Big windows and plenty of light. No conveyor belts at checkouts yet.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

NATIONAL STORE IN DELAVAN HAD A WOMAN MANAGER DURING WORLD WAR II
Scope and Content Note: She had been the bookkeeper/head checker prior to that. Had a male meat cutter and a male produce head under her, plus some high school boys part-time; the rest of the employees were female. A good, efficient boss. “I got the highest recommendation for her.” She kept the job as manager for awhile after the war while the previous manager was recovering from war injuries. She then returned to her job as bookkeeper; more or less managed the front end.

EMPLOYEE HOURS CUT AFTER THE WAR BECAUSE OF HIGH UNEMPLOYMENT AND DIFFICULTY IN GETTING CERTAIN ITEMS, ESPECIALLY PAPER PRODUCTS

MORE ON THE NEW NATIONAL STORE IN DELAVAN
Scope and Content Note: Three checkouts. Three times as large as the old store. Gradually added brand names to National's own label. Started getting more pre-packaged items.

CHECKING
Scope and Content Note: The bookkeeper checked drawers in and out. There must have been a certain leeway given for shortages and overages, but the checkers never knew what it was. Always wore uniforms. In the old store, wore “a real heavy twill.” Could wear a sweater under it, but not over it. National made no deliveries and did not extend credit, except for business customers.

FIRST REMODELLING OF THE NEW STORE
Scope and Content Note: No space added; changed the shelves, putting in lower and wider shelves. This made the aisles narrower, but the lower shelving was a big help for clerks when they were stocking and for customers. At this time also organized the merchandise better. “They put it where it should be as far as the housewife was concerned.” Things rather scattered previously.

STOCKING AND OTHER NON-CHECKER CHORES
Scope and Content Note: During remodelling, got some overtime stocking in preparation for grand opening. In addition to checking, she was in charge of the spices, jello and cookie sections. “It seemed like I was always in the cookie section.” Men took care of the dairy section. Milk was in paper cartons and glass jugs. Had to clean those jugs which were returned with a little sour milk in the bottom. “Oh, that's one thing that was a real pain.”

MORE ON UNIFORMS
Scope and Content Note: Got new uniforms when moved to the new store. The green checkered ones National used for many years. “Got rid of the gunny sacks, and we got the little silkish ones.... I suppose they were nylon.” The store's second remodelling was done in the winter. Very cold, and checkers still had to wear dresses without slacks. This was in the 1960s. “I remember just freezing down there....”

CHANGES IN THE STORE AT THE TIME OF THE SECOND REMODELLING
Scope and Content Note: Increased the size by about a third. Went to five checkouts, which is what is still in that store (which is a Super Valu today). Increased the number of employees. Women did very little stocking after that; mostly just checking. Still had one small section to stock. Annoying to have to leave stocking in order to check out a waiting customer. “That would be really annoying when they'd come through and check to see that you hadn't gotten your spices all up..., and you were spending most of your time running back and forth, which to me wasn't very efficient.” Put in new cash registers and conveyor belts at this time. Late in getting conveyor belts. New registers were easier to punch the department keys.

KOHN WENT TO WORK IN THE NATIONAL STORE AT ELKHORN ABOUT 1965
Scope and Content Note: In order to get full-time work, she worked in both the Delavan and Elkhorn stores part-time for a summer. Then the Elkhorn manager asked her to work full-time in Elkhorn. Put her youngest child in a nursery in Elkhorn.

LAYOUT OF NATIONAL STORES
Scope and Content Note: Elkhorn, Delavan and Lake Geneva stores all remodelled about the same time, and all laid out similarly. Description--automatic doors at the entrance, office first thing, carts, bread, produce and meat. Customer complaints about having soft items so early in the trip through the store. “They (management) would say those are the three most important things that they pick up. But to us it still didn't make sense.” Dairy was over on the opposite side of the store. Thus, heavy dairy items put in the cart last on top of soft items. Also, someone coming in for bread and milk would have to visit opposite sides of the store. “In the meantime, you're going to see all these other items..., and that was a sales promotion I suppose. You can see that now, but at the time we worked in the store, it was just the terriblest mess you've ever seen, and the ladies would be mad because their tomatoes would be squashed.... And I don't blame them.”

S & H GREEN STAMPS
Scope and Content Note: “They were nice, but they were a pain...because there were so many things that you couldn't give S & H stamps on, like cigarettes, and you'd have your total already totalled up.” Could not give stamps on taxable items.

END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 2

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON S & H STAMPS
Scope and Content Note: A good drawing card.

TAXABLE ITEMS AT THE CHECKOUT
Scope and Content Note: For awhile had to separate taxable and non-taxable items at the checkout. Had a tax key on the cash register, “but it was never opened up.” Thus, had to subtotal twice.

MORE ON S & H STAMPS
Scope and Content Note: “The ones of us who had gone into the grocery store business early, we were so used to rationing coupons that this didn't bother us too much, the S & H.... Now the new help that came in, it was hard on them.”

STORE COUPONS
Scope and Content Note: When they were first introduced, “the newspapers would be just full of these store coupons...and before the end of the day, you had to have all your coupons all grouped together.” After the coupons got going well, S & H stamps were dropped.

MYSTERY SHOPPERS AND DISCIPLINE OF CLERKS
Scope and Content Note: Kohn and her co-workers called mystery shoppers “spotters.” What they seemed most concerned about with checkers was whether the “three for something” items were properly checked. Checkers were supposed to charge the extra penny only on the first item if a customer purchased two items of a “three for something” item. “Spotters were real fussy on that. So you really had to learn that chart. And we didn't have time to stop and look at that chart all the time.” Spotters also checked to see if checkers only accepted valid coupons. Checkers were in the habit of checking the bottom of the cart first. Checkers had to circle the expiration date on coupons. Kohn thinks the spotters were employed by National, not by an independent security firm. If the spotter found the checker was performing all right, the checker got a certificate; if not, the checker got a talk from the manager. If a spotter found fault with a checker three times, the checker would get a three-day suspension. Sometimes a checker would be let go permanently, but most checkers were pretty good, having received six weeks' training. “You could tell the girls that were going to make it and the ones that weren't.” Firing of an employee depended more on the manager than the number of write ups.

MANAGERS
Scope and Content Note: Changed district managers more often than store managers. Had one or two managers at Elkhorn that the employees did not care for, but this did not seem to affect their work.

WORK RULES
Scope and Content Note: No written work rules. Sign on the mirror in the rest room which said “This is how you look to your customers.”

THE RETAIL CLERKS INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION (RCIA)--FRINGES AND WAGES
Scope and Content Note: The union (RCIA Local 1401) came late to Delavan, Elkhorn and Lake Geneva, about 1970. “Walworth County is not very well organized in anything.... I think the main problem was over our retirement and hospitalization.” The union health and welfare plan offered dental, eye and drug prescription coverage, and the policy offered by National had none of these. “And this was the biggest way that they got into the stores here.” Also a $10,000 life insurance policy. National had no retirement plan at all. After organizing, the wages gradually crept up to the level being paid in Janesville. Kohn was making $3.70 when the store was organized. Went up to $4.40 pretty quickly and stayed there for some time. Shortly before the store closed, clerks went up to over $5 an hour. She was in charge of the dairy department and was making $6.36.

PART-TIMERS
Scope and Content Note: She, the head checker and another were the only full-time women in the Elkhorn store at the time of closing. When the union came in, the store began to go more and more toward part-timers because they got lower wages and fringes. “It (the union) was not all that great for persons who wanted full-time work.” Difficult to enforce contract clause which forbade hiring of two part-timers where one full-timer could be employed. Had three categories of employees: full-time, regular part-time, and part-time, which included high school students, summer help, and those working less than 24 hours a week. Had one regular part-timer who did nothing but take care of the drug section--ordering, stocking and cleaning.

ORGANIZING OF THE NATIONAL STORES IN DELAVAN, ELKHORN AND LAKE GENEVA
Scope and Content Note: Union representative Harold Breithaupt of Beloit did the organizing. “They just hit us at the very time when everybody thought that you should be having a raise which we weren't getting. And we couldn't do anything with the fringe benefits.” There were many longtime employees, and “we were finding ourselves without any kind of pension plan whatsoever. I think that had the biggest.... Even the manager, he was not against us joining the union at that time.” All three stores went into the union about the same time. Union dues started low but increased rapidly.

THE CONTRACT
Scope and Content Note: Very similar to the contract in Milwaukee, except seniority for bumping purposes was contained within each store. Her seniority from working in Delavan, however, was taken into consideration at least for the purposes of pension and severance pay.

UNION MEETINGS
Scope and Content Note: Informational area meetings for the three towns. Also, had larger meetings in Janesville to which these stores would each send a couple of representatives.

END OF TAPE 2, SIDE 1

INTRODUCTION

MORE ON UNION MEETINGS
Scope and Content Note: Each store had an Active Ballot Club representative, and that person or the head checker would more or less see to it that someone attended the meetings. The older employees were more interested in the Active Ballot Club.

THE COMING OF THE UNION DID NOT CHANGE RELATIONS BETWEEN EMPLOYEES AND THE MANAGER
Scope and Content Note: Good in-store relations brought in more customers and made more money for the store, thereby increasing the manager's profit-sharing. “I think this is more or less the theory that they worked on, because we did have a good running organization.... In fact, there is five to seven to ten of us girls from the National still get together once a month; so you know it had to be a good working relationship. Naturally, if you've got a bunch of good people up front and get the customers to like the girls and to like to come into the store, it was going to be more money for their profit-sharing.”

CLOSING OF NATIONAL STORES IN WISCONSIN
Scope and Content Note: The three stores in the lakes area (Elkhorn, Delavan and Lake Geneva) were making money when they were closed. Very seldom had a bad inventory. Very little turnover of employees. From the time National closed its Milwaukee warehouse and put Wisconsin in the Illinois district, “we started going on down.... We didn't have our close contact with our district managers anymore. They were losing their shirt in the Illinois stores.... They were being shoplifted to death.” Wisconsin sales were totalled in with the Illinois stores. “The stores in the Chicago area was just dragging us right on down.... I still think the Nationals would have been operating in Wisconsin if they'd've left us in Milwaukee.” National was bringing Illinois people into Wisconsin as district managers. “They had no idea how we operated up here in this lakes area. They had some of the goofiest rules and regulations you ever did see.”

FATE OF THE NATIONAL EMPLOYEES
Scope and Content Note: A & P and Sentry would not hire any of the National employees. The Janesville National was closed first, then Beloit, then the lakes area stores. Most employees went on unemployment. Three meat wrappers did get work in other food stores, but they were the only ones. Nearby part-time work in a food store would have been acceptable to Kohn in terms of income because the job she eventually got, with Borg Instruments, paid only $3.70 to start. The Sentry store in Delavan always had many part-timers; when that store had an opening, however, it was filled before anyone heard about it.

TOOK A JOB AT BORG INSTRUMENTS
Scope and Content Note: Job Service sent her there when she had only four weeks left of unemployment compensation. “We were already on our extension; so we were really getting desperate.”

DID NOT APPEAR TO BE MUCH DISSENSION BETWEEN MEAT CUTTERS AND CLERKS

MOST IMPORTANT CHANGES IN FOOD STORE WORK
Scope and Content Note: Conveyor belts at the checkout. “I really liked those.” Newer cash registers. Tile floors--beautiful and cleaner.

CASH REGISTER TRAINING
Scope and Content Note: Sent to Milwaukee for training when the new machines were brought in. “When you got your new register, you weren't working on it until you were qualified.”

NEWER EQUIPMENT MADE THE WORK EASIER PHYSICALLY, BUT THE MENTAL STRAIN INCREASED AS TIME PASSED
Scope and Content Note: Cutback in employees in the later years. “Every time you got a raise, they cut out an employee.” Had night stocking for awhile but cut that when the overtime got too expensive. “As you got a wage increase, they put on more of a workload.”

OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH HAZARDS
Scope and Content Note: Varicose veins and foot problems. Partly the fault of the checkers themselves because they did not always wear proper shoes. Kohn always wore nurses' shoes.

CUSTOMER RELATIONS
Scope and Content Note: Had strict rules not to talk with fellow employees while checking. Also, in the later years, supposed to visit with customers only before and after ringing up the order. “I think that may have made the clerks look a little cool towards the customer.”

WHAT KOHN LIKED MOST ABOUT THE WORK
Scope and Content Note: “I liked the customers.” Also liked the close relationship with the other clerks--picnics, parties, etc. usually instigated by the manager.

MORE ON WORK RULES
Scope and Content Note: Had a short-lived rule that a clerk could not check out a relative, and another that only the head checker could check out fellow clerks.

WHAT KOHN LIKED LEAST ABOUT THE WORK
Scope and Content Note: Sunday work and night work. Open until 11 p.m. for awhile and even 24 hours a day for awhile. “If I don't have to go to a grocery store on a Sunday, I still won't go.”

END OF INTERVIEW