A
neighbor of ours, Dorothy Weekes, worked at the telephone company and
was going to part-time in order to continue her studies at the
university. I had graduated from City High School and was looking
for a job. Dorothy knew that her going to part-time would make an
opening, so she suggested that I put in an application at the telephone
company - then located at 227 East Washington Street. I went up
on a Friday and Miss Hattie Goody, the chief operator, hired me to
start work on the following Monday, September 20, 1926, at a salary of
$10 a week. This was for the six-day, forty-eight hour week,
which was the usual work week then.
There was no formal training
for operators. You listened in with an operator, then she watched
you at work. Soon you were on your own at th switchboard.
Conditions were strict in the operating room. There was to
be no talking with adjacent operators. You were to keep your eyes
on your own board. Chewing gum was an absolute no-no.
You
really had job security then at the telephone company. Once you
were hired, and if your work were satisfactory, you were assured of a
permanent job until you married and/or resigned. Changes came
slowly in those more leisurely days and it seemed as if operators would
go on forever in Iowa City.
I began as a local operator, and
after about six months, I learned long distance. Freda Hills and
Margaret Grady were two of the supervisors I remember from this
time. I did learn the rural board too but I did not sit there
much. Anna Dvorsky was the regular rural operator and she sat
there most of the time. I do recall though that during lightning
storms all the drops on the rural lines would fall down - quite a
nuisance for the operator. Of course all the rural line phones
were still the old crank type.
Around Christmas time the
operators used to get fruit from Lagomarcino's and candy from other
merchants in the area. The company did discourage this practice
and the fruit and candy soon stopped, though an individual operator
would occasionally still get a box of candy from a satisfied customer.
The Academy Cigar Store, across from Yetter's Department
Store, had a slogan, "If you want to know, call 8-1-0." This slogan
invited you to call the cigar store if you wanted to know the score of
any of the university or local high school football games.
Believe me, the store got lots of calls on game days.
We
operators would often go to Tony Marlas' store in the Englert building
and get delicious sundaes, with peanuts on tops. Tony also had
candy, and even sandwiches, I believe.
The telephone girls had
lots of parties at Youde's Inn, a business which served meals to
groups. The Inn was located north of the campus on Capitol
Street, not far from the present-day Womens' Gym. For one party,
we dressed as kids; another party was a "hard-times" affair and there
were other costume parties too. I often helped Hattie decorate
the table at Youde's. There was no committee, and Hattie did most
of the work in getting things ready for a party. Sometimes we
would have parties at the office, in the third-floor lounge.
I
would characterize Hattie Goody as strict, but fair. She used to
walk up and down behind the operators and supervisors as she kept a
close eye on the ongoing work. I'm sure that everyone was hoping
that she would not see anything out of the way!
When I started
at work, Margie Goody and Marcia Boone were in the business office.
Carl Cone was the manager. Esther Bouquot, Helen Gaulocher,
Ethel Hills, Mamie Kesselring, Blanche Lukosky and Laura Peet were some
of the people I worked with in traffic. Of course, there were
many others, far too many to list them all. I do remember Gwen
Wiese, who worked for the company before I did, but she had resigned
when she married Art Pudil.
My sister, Martha Huffman, started
as a part-time operator in 1928 or 1929 while she was still in high
school. After graduation she became a full-time employee and
worked altogether ten or eleven years before she married and had to
leave the company. In those days the rule of "no married women"
was enforced routinely.
After I had been working for less than
eighteen months, and not long after I'd learned information I became
the traffic clerk for the force of about forty persons. The pay
was the same as for operators but since I did not work evenings,
Sundays, or overtime, I made less than when at the board.
Now I
had very different duties. Among other things, I counted the
girls every half hour. I went along the board and read the
registers. I figured the load sheets and subtracted the peg count
sheets and double checked them and there were no adding machines or
calculators at the clerk's desk in those days. I also did the
scheduling and figured out the payroll - which I then sent to Des
Moines. Twice a year I had to take a very complex toll
supplementary county off the tickets. This only took up most of a
working day. At busy times I was expected to help out at the
board; and when all the supervisors were in a meeting I acted as the
duty supervisor. I did all the paperwork involving employees -
signing p the new operators, resigning any operators when necessary and
so on. In addition, I handled line assignment and took care of
the office correspondence. Since there was no typewriter, I had
to write all the letters by hand. I also answered the chief
operator's telephone when she did not.
We had a constant
complainer among our subscribers. He was always calling in on the chief
operator's line with some complaint or other. When I answered the
phone and found him on the line, I always tried to give him to the
chief operator. However, he always wanted to talk to whomever
answered the phone. Aside from trying to reason with him,
management paid little or no attention to his stream of complaints. He
was a real pest, but after Iowa City converted to dial, we heard no
more from him. That was one of the great benefits of going to
dial.
I do recall one incident quite vividly. One day I
looked up from my desk in the old office, and happened to glance out
the window and across to city hall. Just then, a man fell from
the steeple of the building, slid down the roof, and hurtled to the
sidewalk below. That was indeed a shock.
Iowa City changed to
dial service on July 31, 1932, but as I remember, the business office
moved to the new building at 302 South Linn Street about two years
before the operators and the rest of the force did. I was working
at the manual board at the actual time of the dial conversion and I
answered one of the last calls made though the old board. When
the cut to dial was made, I removed the number plate from my home line,
and left the manual board for the last time. I still have that
souvenir - number plate 3612.
After we moved to the new
building, we finally got some office machines. Also, a new trick
was added to the schedule. It was for a part-time clerk who helped with
clerical duties in the morning and worked at the board in the
afternoon. The operating force had risen to seventy while we were
still at 227 East Washington, but it decreased to fifty-five at the
time of the dial conversion. However, the number of operators and
others in the force group steadily increased until during World War II
there were one hundred fifty persons employed. I was glad to have
even part-time help and as the load of clerical duties increased, the
part-time clerk became full-time so then there were two clerks.
By that time we also had a full-time dial assignment clerk, and I
remember Betty Stephens as one who worked dial assignment.
We
clerks were kept busy and the time passed quickly. Since I
married in 1948, long after the "no married women" rule had been
dropped, my service with the company was not interrupted. The
company had started hiring married women during World War II and could
not have gotten along without them. There was quite a turnover in
our work force, as well as many changes of name at marriage. This
meant even more paper work than before. Also, there was now a form to
prove citizenship which had to be filled out for every new employee. It
was a long, complex form, and I was glad when it was finally dropped.
I
was president of the union at the time of the strike in 1947. The
union held meetings at the community building and I especially remember
the big meeting just before the strike. The strike was scheduled to
begin during the usual working day. I was supposed to get up from
my desk at the appointed time. That was to be the signal for the
operators to follow me from the room, down the steps, and out of the
building. The operators kept glancing at me until the time
arrived and I got up from my desk to leave. Then all the
operators at the board got up from their positions and we all marched
out of the building. I was reluctant to start the strike this
way, but I did.
As we got up to leave, management people were
standing by, ready and waiting to step into our shoes as best they
could. This was the beginning of a strike which lasted much
longer than anyone ever thought it would. And it took a long time
to make up the wags we lost while out on strike.
The telephone
company was a good place to work and I think that the wages and
benefits have been very good indeed. IN fact, better than at most
other places of employment in Iowa City. I always enjoyed working
for the company, and I never thought when I started that I would be
there as long as I was. I retired in 1967 with over forty years
of service - forty very pleasant years.
Page Created 8 Apr 2016