The 25th of April, and I am talking with Ted Priester at his house in Edgemere. Tell me a little bit about how you got to Sparrows Point, Ted.

Okay. I was born and raised in West Virginia in a coal mining town. Had seven brothers and sisters. My father was a coal miner, and this goes way back to the '30s. So anyway, in the '30s it was tough living. You was working three or four days a week making 50 cents an hour, 50 cents a day most of the time because he had to load slate besides coal, so things were poor, and then we lived day to day, and then also we were the type that had holes in their shoe where you put cardboard in there to patch the hole up so the snow don't get in or put them by the burn sod stove in the evenings and let them dry out. They would be stiff in the morning, but that's what you did, so things was tough. It was never put no food on the table, bowl of pork chops or whatever, the mother would dip one dip for you, one dip for the other kid, the other kid, so one of them wouldn't take all the food and everybody were to get an equal share. Things was tough.

Was it a company house?

Company house. We rented off the company. A company house up on the hill above the coal mines. So anyway, things was tough in the '30s, and anyway, but then the union came in. John L. Lewis brought the union in because the company used to -- they had yellow dogs, which were guards that the company hired, and if the guys didn't want to come to work, they would get guys they called scabs to work because the men was trying to get a union, they couldn't get a union, but John L. Lewis came in as the President of the United Mine Workers of America, and as he started organizing and these yellow dogs, which were really police security for the companies, would beat our coal miners up going to work or coming back. So they finally broke that and then they started -- got rid of the yellow dogs, that's what they called them and used to beat up the coal miners to no end, and then they had scabs came in there to work for maybe 25 cents a day or whatever at that time. Finally, John L. Lewis got it straightened out. He was the union president, and then from that day on I believe in the union, and without that I wouldn't have had nothing. So anyway, after I went to school, I had to quit in the tenth grade because we didn't have food, it was tough living, and I had to go to work to help the family out. I was making 50 cents an hour driving a coal truck, weighing coal. Anyway, after I got 17, I went and joined the United States Army, spent four years in the Army. Sent allotment home to my families to help them live because things was tough with eight kids.

What year was this that you joined the Army?

I joined the Army in 1949 and I got out in 1953, and anyway so I sent allotment home to help them out and then kind of got them straightened out when I came home. I came home from the Army in 1953 and then got a job in my hometown in Farmington, West Virginia where the coal mine blew up, killed 97 men, and I think it was in '68, and my father worked in the same mine, but that day he didn't work for some reason, so he missed it. So anyway, then I got a job in West Virginia, Fairmont, West Virginia, worked in an aluminum company for a little while. Then I met my wife there, my girlfriend at the time and start going with her. Then they laid me off. Then I married my wife in 1954, and then work was bad, no jobs. You could get a service station job, so I came to Baltimore, Maryland. We got in a car with our old television and her clothes, that's all we had. Things was tough, and I had $300 of mustard out pay that I saved from the Army. Came up here to Maryland, went down to Bethlehem Steel Company, and on the first day applied for a job as a mechanical helper. They gave me a test, I passed the test. They hired me and I started the next day.

Why did you go to Bethlehem Steel?

Because they were the highest paying job in the area at the time. I was going to go to Broady Highway to the Chevrolet plant or go down on the docks with the stevedores, but a cousin of mine said hey, Bethlehem is -- you are making good money, which at that time I think I was making $65 a week, somewhere in there if I remember right, 65 bucks a week, and boy, I thought I was rich. So after we moved in with my cousin, only had my $300 mustard out pay, and anyway stayed with them, and the third week -- they held back your money for two weeks. The third week I got my first check. We went out, rented an apartment to get out of their house, a furnished apartment, and that's where we started out.

Where was the apartment?

The apartment was like in Edgemere, Maryland, on Lynch Road, and I think it was $20 or $22 a week, and I was only making about $65, so it was tough. It was tough for actually for the first fifteen years because after we moved there, then we came down to this house that I'm in now on River Drive Road. I used my -- it was up for sale, I used my $300 mustard out pay for a down payment on this house and then I went into debt. Then I had to go borrow money for furniture, pay the house mortgage. I had a car and we was living week to week. Sometimes I would run out of money before the next payday, so the first few years from like maybe 1954 until probably '65 was tough years. Owed everybody, had to pay for the furniture, nobody would help. Then had two kids growing up then, too, and it was tough to make ends meet, and a lot of times I know our food was really low because I owed furniture payments, house payments, car payments besides your utilities and wasn't making no extra money, so anyway that's the way it was. Anyway, I'm still here today 40 some years later and Bethlehem Steel did -- I admire them, I worked for them, I provided them a service and they helped me buy a house and furnish the house and send my kids to school and clothe them and buy food, so I really was indebted to Bethlehem Steel until I retired. They went bankrupt, they cut off all of my insurance, and that really hurt, and I never would believe Bethlehem Steel would do that, but they stopped our insurance and cut my pension some, which I was relying on to live my golden years, which I didn't get to do because they really put a hurting on me and 50,000 more steelworkers. Anyway, I didn't like that.

Well, one of the things that you talked about in the period from '54 to '65 about things being tough, do you remember the 1959 strike?

Absolutely.

Tell us a little bit about the strike.

Okay. The strike, okay. I started at Bethlehem Steel down at Sparrows Point in 1957 in April. That was April the 1st or 2nd was my first day at work, and so then like I just said we borrowed money for furniture, bought the house in '58. Then my wife was pregnant, and then I owed everybody in the country and had to charge to buy kids toys for Christmas and never had no cash money. But 1959 the strike happened, and so here we are, I owed everybody and they wanted to sell my house and this and that and whatever else, so I couldn't get no help. So me and the wife, I had one daughter then, little girl about a year old, year and a half old. Anyway, we went stayed here for about four or five weeks, we couldn't make it no more, didn't have no money, no job. I tried to get other jobs around here but they wouldn't hire you because they knew you was on strike from Bethlehem Steel, so we went to West Virginia. We lived with her parents for awhile and went to her sister's and I worked on the farm. They had farm, we cut his grass and run his tractors and all just so they would feed us. That's all we asked, and then my parents fed us and her parents did, too, so that's where I stayed for the next 12 weeks because it was a 16-week strike, but things were tough and they were going to foreclose on my house, but then they had 20, 30,000 other people that owed them money, too, so they didn't close on me. I couldn't pay them one penny. They wanted interest and all. They didn't get a nickel from me. Then when I did finally go back to work after the strike was over with, then I started paying regular payments after that, but they wanted -- I said do whatever you've got to do. You want the house, take it, because I don't have it and my family comes first anyway.

Do you remember what any of the issues in the strike were?

Not really now. I think it was for more money, but he knows more about it, he's up on that. But anyway, it was naturally always ask for more money and better benefits, and then vacations, too. So I don't know really what made it last that long. I think the company was trying to break the union and so they wanted to starve us out. They talked about hiring scabs. That's what we call a scab, a guy comes down there off the street and takes your job, but we fought it, union fought it. We had picket lines and we stopped them coming in there, and finally, the company finally settled with us because they were losing money and the foreign steel started coming in then because the automobile factories and the can factories needed the steel and Bethlehem couldn't provide it because we were on strike, so they finally settled because they were hurting for business. Then they had to sign two, three, four-year contracts with foreign steel for them to buy steel. The automobile companies did that and the can companies, so it was a tough time. So I forget what all the reasons were, but I know it was money, vacations and better working conditions. So we finally got it settled, things got better.

I know you said you went to West Virginia for most of the strike. Were you picketing at all in the early days?

Yes, I was for the first three or four weeks because they assigned you a certain day to picket. You began from 9:00 to whatever, give you a time and all, and I did walk the picket line several times of those first four weeks or maybe five weeks, I'm not sure now, but then after that I couldn't make it here no more, so I went to West Virginia and we lived with her parents, my parents and her sister.

How was the spirit of the guys during the strike?

It was tough, but they said they don't care if they starved, they will get in the soup line, but they are not going to give in, we are not going to give in. We fought too hard over all these years to get what we had at that time, and we will not give in to them if we have to go and get in the soup line or go on welfare or whatever, but we were not going to give in and that was it, they don't care what, so we was not going to give in regardless of what -- the company could have shut down, burned the plant down, we could care less. We were not going to give in to them because they tried to break us, they tried to break us, but they didn't make it.

Well, when you started working there in 1957, there was still people in the mill who had worked there before the union?

Yes.

Did they ever have discussions about what it was like and what the union meant?

Yes, they had a rough time, and then I heard stories, I don't know how true it is, but if the boss said hey, when you get done doing whatever, you go over there and do this and do that, and then if you told him no, he said you are fired, you are gone, you are leaving, you are fired. You had to kiss butts or whatever you had to do, you brown nose and bust your butt to hang in there because you couldn't give the supervisor or the foreman or whatever you want to call him any hard time because you would be gone. So that's whenever the union entered, they stopped that stuff. Hey, they couldn't pick on you or fire you because you just disagreed with them to a certain extent. So anyway, yes, the union -- hey, the union was the greatest thing that ever happened and made better living conditions for all the workers.

Did you participate in the union at all as a steward?

No, I was never -- no, I never did, no. No. I attended meetings now and then, not all the time, but then no, I did not participate, no.

Let's go back to the day you started at the Point. What was it like your first day there?

Okay. The first day when I went in the steel mill to work --

Which mill were you in?

They started me out in the 68 hot strip first, and I was there for six months, and then they was going to lay me off. Then they said there's a job open over there in the open hearth, would you like to go over? I said oh, yes, because hey, I needed a job. So anyway, the first day in there I seen that steel and those hot steel coming out of there and the big roll machines was rolling down thinner and thinner, thinner. I said this place is not for me, it's hot, it's dirty, smoke all over the place. I said no, what is this here, but then I said -- I stopped, I had to keep this job regardless of what I've got to do because I need the money, I've got to support my family, but I did not like it the first day. I said no way, I want to get out of here, I want to go get me another job, but I never -- I stayed there because the money was better there than it was in most other mills at the time, automobile mills and can companies or whatever else, so I stayed there, but I did not like it at all. And then when I went over to the open hearth, they said well, we are either going to lay you off or you go over there, and when I walked in that place over there and they took me on a tour when they hired me, I said no way, that was worse yet, hot, dirty, dusty around those furnaces. I said I will die from the heat. I will die from the sweat. I could never make it, but then again, I have a family to support, I needed the money, so I accepted it. But my impression the first time no way, I will be out of here in a couple of days, I'm going to find me another job, but I never.

Now you came from a small town in West Virginia?

Yes.

And You are working at a place now with 31,000 people. How did the size of the place --

It was awesome. I never seen nothing like that before. We have a couple little factories down there maybe a couple hundred feet wide or couple hundred feet long or nothing hardly bigger than that, except the coal mines, and it was kind of spread out. They have a temple where they load the coal and coal cars that they load, but it was awesome. I couldn't get over how big the place is, and when they took me on a tour, they take me here and there, I figured they are going to take me into this next building and that was going to be it, but then they went to number one open hearth, number two open hearth, number three, number four, that's a long walking down through there seeing all them furnaces cooking and hot, guys around there. You couldn't hardly even stand the heat, and I'm 30, 40 feet away from the furnaces, but it was awesome. I said I'm getting out of there right away, but I stayed. I had to stay.

Now, when you were living in Edgemere, how did you get to work?

I had a car that I was paying payments on every month. I think it was a '57 Chevrolet or '55. Anyway, it was several years old, so yeah, I drove to work every day. Only took about ten minutes, but I drove to work.

Were there car pools, because there was a whole community of steelworkers over here?

No, I didn't car pool with nobody. I drove my own vehicle for all the time I was down at Bethlehem.

Tell us a little bit about the job. When you applied for the job, what was the test that you got; do you remember?

Some of it was like from -- it was a mechanical test, could you read a rule, and then they would have the numbers like 5/16, 7/16, 3/8 on there, they have them mixed up. They say put them in order, which is the lowest up to the highest, quarter inch, one-eighth, and you did that. Then you read the rule, then you had triangles where you had to multiply to find one side of the triangle, and then they asked you about if the gear is turning to the right clockwise and this shaft is turning to the left or which way -- if it turned counterclockwise, which way would the shaft turn, and you had to answer it, you had to figure it out whichever way, and then they asked you about oil, what types of oil there were, and then about bearings. You had to know -- I forget exactly what the questions were, but they asked you about bearings and about seals, what kind of -- they have different kinds of seals, leather seals, maybe plastic -- I don't know about the plastic at the time, but anyway, a lot of mechanical questions and then math. You had to do math, add and subtract, multiply and divide and fractions and changing fractions to decimal, decimal to fractions. You had to do that also. So it was a pretty tough test, but then like I say I did good because they hired me. Right after the testing guy checked the answers out, he said okay, you've got a job.

And what was your job then? Describe a little bit --

I was a mechanical helper, but then my first job was a bearing changer helper in the hot strip. So when you get in there, they have these big rolls that they put in the roll machines that when the steel, the hot steel comes down, there's two rolls, it's like a washing machine rolls on -- when you have a washing machine, the old washing machine had two rollers on there, and so you run your clothes through there and crank it by hand and the clothes came out. So the steel would go between these two rollers. So after awhile the bearings would get hot or go bad, so then they would take the roll out and put a new roll in there. They would put them on a rack. We took the bearing, big box bearing off the end of it and put a new one on there and tightened it back down again, so I was the bearing changer, I was the helper on the job. I helped the bearing changer himself change the bearings on the end of the rolls that they rolled the steel with.

So there was always a backup roll and a rack?

Yes, we did that all the time. We had to grind on them sometime and shine them up and clean them up, too, while they were sitting on the rack, get them ready for whenever they needed them. The roller says hey, got a knick or whatever on the steel that he is rolling, change them rolls, right, so they would change them, set them on the racks. They would take the new ones, and we would take the bearings off and check the bearings out and clean them up, whatever we had to do to then put them back on there again.

Because steel had to come out perfect?

Yeah, couldn't have any kind of blemish or say a piece of dirt happened to land in there, and when it went through the rollers, if it made a mark on that steel, it ruined the whole coil of steel, so they had to -- it had to be nice and clean.

And this was used for automobiles and appliances?

Yeah. This steel was -- yeah, automobile, appliances or pots and pans and probably also steelworker, I-beams and girders and all, too. When It left us, it left us in coils. Then it went over to the plate mill where they would need to roll it out flat for ships or whatever else it would go. They would send it (inaudible) they call it, it was six inches thick and maybe three foot wide by six, eight, ten foot long. They would roll them down to whatever size the order called for. So they would squeeze it down with the rollers, so that was my first job.

Now, were you on shift work at the time?

Yes.

And How was that for your family?

That was no good. I didn't like midnight shift because you wasn't home with the family. I wanted daylight, but hey, you are a young man, you take what's left. They had shift work, and that was new to me. I couldn't believe I would be working when I should be home sleeping, so it was hard. Then I would try to sleep in the day time, and then the kids were younger and they are making noise, the wife is trying to keep them quiet, so it was tough. Didn't get a whole lot of sleep for several years there.

And You also ended up working Saturdays and Sundays and holidays?

Oh, yes, a seven-day job. They scheduled you so you couldn't go on vacation or plan ahead of time because sometimes -- anyway, the schedule I think would come out once a month and show you what you were working, but Sunday was just like Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday. It was just another day, and I didn't like that either because I was -- Sunday was the Sabbath, and I'm a Christian guy and I believe in the good Lord and Sunday was rest day, but here in the steel mill it was just like another day. It was tough to get over it to have to work on weekends, so it was. Then turn work, one or two, three days one schedule was on daylight and two or three days 3:00 to 11:00 and a couple days on midnight. Some weeks they would schedule you the whole week for 11:00 to 7:00 or 3:00 to 11:00 or whatever, but I didn't like it to start with. It was tough to get used to, but I finally -- I had to do it, so I did it.

Also you had to work like holidays, Easter, Christmas?

Absolutely. It was tough sometimes because you are a younger guy, I don't know who made out the schedule, but the older guys got to have Christmas off or Thanksgiving or Easter, and us younger guys, we had to work it. That went on for 20 years. I Always worked the holidays. Or when you picked vacations, the older guy got seniority, he picks first, which I respected that, and so what was left was May and June or whatever else because they took the good weeks, and it was tough, and hey, you've got to go to work Christmas morning, your kids is getting up. It hurt, it was a tough life.

Did you ever feel that you were often closer to the people you worked with than to your own family because of that?

Sometimes. There was a few, okay, few you get close to. Our gang had 300 guys in it I think at the time, and then anyway, I got close to a couple guys that I had met where we would talk about our families or whatever else, and Bob was one of them and then another guy we had was Hensley. We kind of maybe at break time we would hang together just two or three of us. The rest, you know, they were nice, but I worked close to them, but we didn't talk about things, about our cars or trucks or whatever, but yeah, you do get kind of close to a couple of them and you rely on them, they are working with you, because me and this gentleman right here worked together for years as a team. We did our repair work, mechanical work all the time, too. So yes, sometimes you get close to them, too, but family was still number one, but they were close so you kind of relied on them.

When you were here in Edgemere with your family, did you socialize with other steelworkers?

No, no, no. I had a few friends and maybe I would see them down the road, but a couple of them I think yeah, we went out together maybe to a Saturday night party or to dinner at different times, but not often. We couldn't afford it for the first nine, ten, fifteen years, things was tough. So I couldn't take them to a restaurant and spend 20, 30 or 40 bucks for a meal because I didn't have the money.

So then you went over to the open hearth, and you were a maintenance person over there also?

Yes. I went over, started as a mechanical helper and then in the open hearth. So mechanical helper was a tough, tough job and you work on them furnaces. Only had open hearth furnaces then and we used to have to work around those furnaces during the steel work. If they burn through or whatever, and then we change lances on top of the furnace, and you would walk on that catwalk up there to change the lance, and you were like two or three foot from the roof which was cherry red. You couldn't even breath up there. In the wintertime, summertime, it would be so hot, but we would have to change it. We do it as fast as we could. Then sometimes when the cable broke, it would open the doors on the furnace, it's up in the girder, and you've got to go up there and realign that cable around, and man, you couldn't breath. I bet you it was 200, 300 degrees in there. You get up there and if you got a little bit frightened or whatever, you would pass out in a second. How hot it was, it was so hot, but working on top even close to the furnace it would burn through whatever and you are working there, and the brick is red, it's cherry red.

Did you ever worry about safety hazards?

Oh, yeah. I worried a lot of times about hey, the roof is going to fall in and burn me up in a second, or it's going to -- be working around it and it's going to fall in for whatever reason because the building change when things happen, oh, yeah, I thought about that a lot of times. What if I fall in, I'm going to disintegrate.

Did you ever see any accidents in the open hearth?

No. I actually never did, no. Came there after it happened, but no. We had a guy on the forklift over at the BOF on the third floor they called it working around the furnace. Anyway, he would move material. Anyway, he just one day he dumped his dirt down three floors, would fall down in the pit they called it. So one day he went over to dump that, too. Something happened, the brakes didn't hold, whatever, and down there he went. So they found him down below with the hot steel, got burned up, but I came there after it happened, and then I've heard where guys had fell through the hole behind the furnace where the steel comes down, they tap it, where the furnace cooks, it's ready. They put a torpedo in the hole, and they shoot it off with electricity or with batteries and blows the hole in there and steel comes out and goes in the ladle, and I've heard where guys would be working back there because they had to plug that hole up after steel comes out, put their whatever in there, and they would fall down in the hole. That's 30, 40 feet down to the bottom. There's rubble, bricks down there, work junk. Anyway, they didn't survive. It was terrible working. It wasn't a whole lot of safe -- no handrails and this and that. Some places they had them, some places they never. It was unsafe and it was tough for the first so many years.

Well, did it get better?

It got better later on, yeah. Then they started to enforce the rules. You had to put a handrail up before you worked there because sometimes you would be working and the ground is down there 30, 40 feet away and you are right on the edge and there ain't nothing -- if you slip or turn real quick, you are going down there. But it took the union, they argued and argued about safety and the company said well, no. Anyway, they put it off for a whole lot of years until the union finally got tough on them to make it safe for us because guys were getting hurt.

Do you remember who the officers of the union were that fought for this stuff, your committee guy?

I'm trying to remember who was it? We had several over the years for 2610. I can't remember their names. Joe Capp was a president for awhile. He was a good president. I thought he was anyway. And they fought and they had meetings with the company and meetings and more meetings to try to make it safe. And when you go up a ladder sometimes, say you are carrying a burning torch, you've got to go up there and burn something. You are supposed to always have one hand free. That's what we finally got, but otherwise you go up there or you are going to burn something and the welder goes up there and he's got to take a piece of metal and hold it up there and weld it so he ain't holding on to the ladder. He is using both hands, and we fought against that, and the company let it slide for so long a time. Then finally the union, which he was a part of it for 30 years, Bob, good union man. Anyway, they fought for us and finally got hey, one hand you hold the ladder as you go up, whatever you are carrying, not two hands. It was tough to get them to break them that hey, go ahead and do it, whatever, right. So then I figured hey, if I don't do that, they will discipline me or whatever and lay me off for a couple of days, I couldn't afford it. So I did it like the rest of us did, we all did it, but it was tough. The company was tough on us. I think they wanted to make the money and no safety. Hey, get the job done, I don't care how you do it, get it done. So what it's too hot, we need a handrail, we need to build a scaffold, this and that, that's okay, get on the \ ladder or lean over there and hang over. The union finally got that stopped. That's why the union fought to try to make the working conditions for a worker safe anyway, not go up there and get knocked off and get hurt, so the union is number one. I believe in the union 150 percent.

How long did you stay in the open hearth?

I was over there 37 years.

So you stayed in the open hearth for 37 years?

Yeah. I started in the tin mill. I almost had 38 years. I think I was in the hot strip for maybe six, seven months before they wanted to lay me off and they send me over there, so I spent the rest of my time in the open hearth.

Did you move up in the jobs?

I was a mechanical helper and then a ladle repairman, which is three jobs higher. Ladle repairman, I bid on the job. They post the jobs that this job is open, so you bid on it. If you are qualified and whatever else the requirements were, then you got the job. So I bid on this job, it came open, and besides maybe half a dozen other helpers because that's a step up, more money, and I got the job, ladle \ repairman. So working this ladle repairman for several years and this consent decree law came into effect, and then a few years after that I'm a ladle repairman, they said, "Okay Ted, you are going back to helper." I said, "Why?" They give it to a black man, okay. I said he didn't take no test, he didn't do nothing. They give it to the black guy, just give it to him. Besides, the black guy has got like three, four -- I know one guy in my department, he told me he got $7,000. I didn't see the proof, 7,000 bucks. White boys didn't get nothing. And that burned me up, too. But anyway, what made me mad, I bid on that job. He had a chance like everybody on my department, but I bid on that job and I got it, and then they just give it to them. Oh, man, then they cut me back to helper. I lost money per week, less money and just give it to the guy, and then oh, my, I was so upset, and I will never forget that. That wasn't fair.

Let go back because this is a topic that's obviously interesting to everybody. When you started there in '57, what were the race relations like?

They were okay. I mean we had white guys in my department, we had black guys in there, too. We got along okay. I don't remember no\ trouble or you say I ain't going to work with you because you are black or nothing. We got along okay, it was all right.

Were there still separate bathrooms at that time?

Yes, there was. They had black ones and white. Yes, there were separate bathrooms, yes, indeed.

Were there discussion about that?

No. I mean we just kind of took it in stride, and then later on then they finally integrated. We had bathrooms and locker rooms, white locker room, black locker room. Then they finally integrated it, put the blacks in or put the whites in with the blacks. I don't know whether people disagreed with it. Hey, I accepted it, because back in my hometown where I was born and raised, we lived -- blacks and whites lived in the same neighborhood in a company house up on the side of the hill, so there was some black families there, too, and they went to their schools at that time, we went to our schools. There was no trouble. There was no all this racist stuff, I never heard that word until I come over here.

Well, one of the things about the United Mine Workers and John L. Lewis was that was from the founding in 1890, an integrated union was one of the few in the country and that may have affected how things worked out in West Virginia.

It could have been, but I know in the '30s, it was still -- like I said, my dad worked for 50 cents a day. Sometimes he would get 50 cents, he would be there from daylight to dark, go in dark in the morning and come home night time. Then he hand loaded coal in the coal mines, and so if the roof fell in, all this slate and junk is there, you've got to -- you dig that up, load that in cars to get the good coal, so you don't get nothing for that so that might take you six, eight, ten hours to get that junk out of the way, so it was tough until John L. Lewis came. I think Phil Murray was in there, and then John L. Lewis became president and then things changed, but the union, union, union, hey, that's the only way we had a decent living after that. If we didn't have a union, they could have said hey, go dig that ditch. You don't dig the ditch, you are up the road, you are fired.

Well, did you find that the activity around the consent decree before the consent decree had a positive effect or negative effect on the union at Sparrows Point?

I don't really know then, but I didn't like it and I still don't like it because I didn't pick on them people and my father never. Maybe his grandfather never. It happened way back when, so why did we have to pay for it now, and I didn't like it at all because I don't think that's fair. I don't care if you are black, white or green. I'm black, you are white, we apply for a job, whoever qualifies gets it, and then don't say well, the black guy didn't get no education and he was deprived. I don't want to hear that stuff because now it's been 40 some years since that consent decree went in and they ain't no smarter now than he was then. That's how I feel about it, and they still -- you've got to hire so many blacks before whites and all this stuff, I don't like it. How long is it going to take? 100, 200 years they are going to keep saying racist and picked on? 40 years. So hey, if you can't learn in 40 years, you ain't never going to learn. That's my opinion and I don't like it one bit. When that consent decree come in there, I said hey, I didn't do nothing to them. Why pick on me. Why give them the benefits, and that's another story.

Did you go to the local? Were there meetings discussing this consent decree?

No, I never, no. I think some guys -- we just -- I think overall, I could be wrong, we kind of accepted it. The government said okay, there are going to be equal rights now and this and that and whatever else and you've got to hire whatever. Anyway, we just kind of accepted it because hey, you can't fire them anyway. I can bitch about it and you can bitch and fire the guy, but it ain't going to do no good.

Well, some of the guys hired lawyers, and were you involved in that at all?

No, no, I was not. I know that McClelland guy that you talked to, yeah, he got involved. He was always involved in this and that and whatever else. I didn't agree with a lot of his thoughts over the years.

Did it affect your personal relationships with people in the mill, the consent decree?

No, it never. I worked with some black guys, they were my helpers, and hey, we got along fine. You always had a few guys if you said hey, we better paint that wall black, and they would get all upset about it. Hey, we ain't even talking about race. They were hard heads or whatever they were. But anyway, some of them got upset that way and didn't even talk about it, but the majority of them was okay. Hey, we got along, we worked. However your personal feelings was, that was your business, but we got along, okay, we helped one another.

So then can you remember some stories about the open hearth? You worked there for so many years. If people said to you hey, tell us a couple good stories or friends you remember or things you remember particularly about the open hearth.

All I know -- well, not stories, but when you are working as far as the dirt goes, dirt and like we were working in the cellar -- I mean there's plenty of dirt, you breath all that dirt and junk, and anyway, the heat and the dirt, it's terrific, or it was anyway. But anyway, I had a buddy, Cliff Hensley his name was, he tried to stay kind of clean all the time. He was a helper just like me, and anyway, we were working in the cellar, down in the cellar of the open hearth, okay, that's where they have the checkers and whatever, and anyway, so they have machines down there that they pour this asbestos stuff at that time in there and they spray on -- mix it with water, it's like cement or you spray it on, it gives a coating and it kind of seals the brick and keeps the heat in the furnace. So he's down there working one day in this area and these other laborers are spraying the furnace and the hose breaks and that stuff goes all over the place. So I'm working down maybe 50 feet away from him, me and another guy. Anyway, and there he comes, this dust, you could see the white stuff floating around. Anyway, he comes out of there and he's coughing and all and he's all white, got that stuff all over him. I said ah-ha, they finally caught up to you, because every time if he would do something, he worked good, but he would wipe his hands, he didn't want to get dirty. I would be dirty, grease on me or whatever, and he's clean, clean, clean, but he did his job. I don't know how he did, it amazed me. But anyway, that's one story about working in the conditions, right, and that stuff -- so we breathe it all the time. It was terrible, but the heat, didn't like the heat. The heat and the dirt, that's a dirty job, and the hot, I don't know how stood it. Right now I look back, I say how did I climb on them furnaces and work around them with two, 3,000 degrees heat and I'm a couple feet from it or on the roof, which could fall in and burn me to death just like that. I don't know how I did it, but I did it besides us other 300 guys in my department at that time. Everything was work and go. I think we had about 300 in my gang, and then now when I left I think we had 30 or 40, 50, somewhere around there like that.

Did you start to see then by the '60s that the employment started to drop?

Oh, yeah. It started because in our gang we had some guys that was going to retire. That guy worked behind our blacksmith shop, or anyway they shut it down. He retired, they didn't replace him. Another guy retired, they didn't replace him. We got to talking hey, what's going on here. Well, then if they needed that job done, then they would say hey, Bill, when you get done with your job, go back there and do that job, so they gave you two jobs.

Like cross training?

Yes. Then they kept -- when people started retiring, they didn't replace them. I forgot what year that started, but it started and hey, we went right done on down to a little bit of people, but they never replaced the retirees. Somebody else would do that job.

When you were there, were there other people from West Virginia, Tennessee, kind of mountain areas?

Lot of our guys was from out of state, yeah, Virginia, Tennessee, Kentucky. Like you say West Virginia, Pennsylvania, yeah. I think the -- maybe, I'm not sure, but the majority were from out of state, they weren't local people.

Did you guys tend to hang around together at all?

Just by talking, you know hey, guy from Tennessee, yeah, well, I went down on vacation one year, this and that, and you talked a little bit about that, but no, a lot of them, I don't know how many or the numbers or percentage, but were out of state people and seemed like they hired a lot of out of state people because we were really looking for a job when we come here. Then you hire a guy off the street from here, maybe he just works for you a couple weeks, and then he works for somebody else for a couple of weeks. I think the out-of-staters came all the way up here, we want a job and we will take care of our job. We will work and earn our keep.

So when you went there, your expectation is you were going to work the rest of your life at Bethlehem Steel?

No. At the time -- like I say my first day, my impression was get out of there now, hey, this place is too hot and too big and dirty looking and dust flying around, whatever. I said no, this ain't for me. I'm going to just work here a little while. I'm going for another job in a clean factory or somewhere, a clean job, inside where they got air fans and air conditioned, not down there. But I always figured on just working there a little bit and buy me -- after I was there for a couple days and seeing how things were, I'm getting out of there, I'm going to go down the road and get me a job somewhere else, because it was too dirty and too hot. I just couldn't believe it. It was so hot to me, but I stayed there for 38 years plus.

At what point did you finally realize that you were going to be there for the rest of your work life?

Probably after I was there maybe five, six, seven years, somewhere after I had that much time, and the money was good. But then the other factories like General Motors, they picked up, started paying their people more, and in the end they were good pensions. They was making more money than we were, but at the time we were making more money than a lot of these other companies outside of Bethlehem Steel, so I stayed there because they paid the best money at the time. So then I figured I'm just going to stay here because they had a good -- the union fought for a good pension plan, and when you get so many years in, you get so much money, this and this and that, so the pension program at the time was good, too. So I said hey, I will stay here, work my 30, 40 years or 20 or whatever and get a good pension when I retire and health benefits was the greatest, so I said hey, what else can I ask for.

What finally made you decide to retire?

Well, I figured I'm going to get out of there, retire. I retired at 62 and then I would start getting Social Security also, but then you get less money if you retire ahead of time, so I took that, and then the pension was good at the time from Bethlehem Steel and the health benefits was good, so I said --

What year did you retire?

1995. So I figured I would retire, maybe I would live a year or two, enjoy myself instead of working up to 64, 65, and if you work longer, then you get more pension, money is a little bit higher. I said no, I'm going to get out now, maybe I will live for a little while and I can enjoy myself where I won't have to punch a clock, get up at a certain time or whatever, so I decided I'm going to get out then and maybe enjoy a few years before I kick out. So that's why I left at 62 -- I mean in '95 at age 62.

So by that time though there were already signs that Bethlehem Steel was in trouble?

Oh, yes. We was already -- our department was maybe 100, from 300 down to that and conditions -- their new program was hey, you are the mechanic -- in my time, I took a test and made C technician, moved up, made more money. Anyway, it was hey, the crane millwrights did their job; the mechanic, we did our job; the laborers did their job; electricians, whatever, but then they start implementing hey, you are going to be like a super mechanic, you are going to be an electrician, you are going to be a crane millwright, you are going to be your mechanic, so they start wanting to put that into play. I said that ain't for me, I'm doing my job. I'm not going to do the electrician's job or the pipefitter's job or whatever else, so I said it's time for me to get out of there.

So then after you lost your position as a result of the consent decree, you then came back and bid on another job?

Yes.

And came back up?

Yes. After that, after -- I forget how many years it was, but then they had openings for they called it technicians, they are millwrights, C millwright, B and A millwright. So I took the test then and I made C millwright at that time, so it was more money for me.

And you were still in the open hearth though?

Yes, I was a millwright.

And what does a millwright do?

A millwright repairs machinery and you fabricate, you make things for the steel mill. Mostly it's changing gears and shafts and bearings and cable for doors and all, and anyway lubricate them, you change them when they wear out and whatever. Mostly it's -- anyway, it's gears and bearings, shafts on when the BOF came into play, they bearings, it's always rotating and whatever else, too, but anyway to repair all metal work, all steel work if it broke down, burnt through or whatever else besides moving fans, and they have these big fans that we repaired them, take them out, put new ones in, overhaul them, clean them up or whatever else, so all mechanical work.

This was still shift work?

Oh, yes. Then after I got I guess about 30 years in or 35, then I had enough seniority then to get steady daylight, and that's what I went on, but it took me all that time. Whenever that 1959 contract gave us 13 weeks vacation, right, so they say every five years you was supposed to get 13 weeks. Well, it took me 22 years to get my first time. After that 1959, it was 22 or 23 years before I got my first -- I got it one time. Some guys got it four or five times, 13 weeks. Anyway, it took me 22 years because the way they set the program up or whatever else.

What was it like having 13 weeks vacation?

Oh, my goodness, I didn't know how to act.

What did you do?

I was ready to go back to work in a couple of weeks. I just stayed around the house. We went on vacations in West Virginia. I think we went down to Tennessee for awhile, but then came back after two or three weeks and I was ready to go back to work. That was too much time because I wasn't used to it. It was only one week at a time before then or we would get two weeks if you had 15 years or whatever or maybe three weeks if you had 25 years. That was so great. I was ready to go back to work after like three or four weeks, because that was the first time I was ever off that long working all them years.

Did you ever consider having your children go to work at Sparrows Point?

No, I didn't want them to. I wanted them to get a good education and get a white collar job, wear a suit and a necktie, or my daughter, hey, get a good office job where you wear high heels and dress up. No, stay out of the steel mill. No, I was against it and they never got into it. I said no, you are not going to go eat that dirt and dust and the heat and all that, no way, even though women start coming in the later years, right, and I said not my kids, not if I can help it.

How did you feel when the women started coming in?

I didn't like it at first because there was some cases where if you go around and the woman can't really lift her weight or climb up the ladder, do whatever else, so the guys, we would help them out when they should have carried their load. I didn't like it at first, but that's the way things were so I accepted it. Maybe I seen the wrong ones, but seeing some working out there in the pits, that's out there where they pour the steel and whatever, and they are out there working and hey, the laborer gang where they run a jack hammer, and the girl is standing over there leaning on a shovel and the guy is doing that work, and she's supposed to be doing that, but they took care of the girls, the guys did, and I didn't like that. I said they ought to carry their load. And then I also thought the woman should be working in the offices with high heels and nylons on, not in no steel mill with big Little Abner shoes on.

You didn't see the movie North Country; did you?

No.

We'll talk about that after this. It's a new movie. It's an interesting movie. So what happened then after you retired? What did you do?

Just stayed around here, visited my kids more often then. Like I said I have been a volunteer fireman for 40 years. That kept me busy. I'm on my church council, it's like a Board of Directors of the church. I do that job and do different projects for them, and for the fire hall, I was a volunteer, that would keep me busy, and then I coached little league baseball to keep busy or whatever else. Besides we traveled a little bit, not a whole lot, but a little bit. We went out more than we did before because we had the time. They say it's your golden years, then you get up and say ah, ah, you have the money but you can't go, you don't feel like going.

Well, did the bankruptcy at Bethlehem Steel affect you?

Absolutely. I lost the insurance after 30 days when they went bankrupt. Just cut us off. Didn't say hey, you go to whatever and get it cheaper. Just cut us off and cut our pensions down some, too. I was so disappointed, and I believe Bethlehem Steel helped me raise a family, buy a home and whatever. Then all a sudden -- it hurt, it hurt, and I had to go around and shop around for insurance and then naturally you pay more because Bethlehem, the price was right. I was disappointed to no end. I did not like it.

If you had to do it over again, would you go to work at Bethlehem Steel?

No, I would go somewhere else, fire department. We had a few guys had left, went into the fire department. Clean job. It's a rough job, hey, putting out fires, some of them can be terrific sometimes, or any other job, a cleaner job and not hot, because hey, we cooked and we froze down there. Everything is wide open. You stand beside a building in the wintertime, and your back side is hot and this side is freezing and you turn around and you are out there working on a fan or something wide open spaces, the wind blowing and you are all covered up. It was tough times. Hey, we earned our money. We earned our money.

What do you think should be done for steelworkers today? What's the answer?

I would like to see them get good pensions and make a decent wage to keep up with the times or even better because they deserve it. Any steelworker, I don't care whether they sweeped the floor or they are a mechanic or a roller, they deserve top money, but our money went down lower because I know General Motors was paying more money and better pension than Bethlehem Steel. Our union did a good job, but they could have maybe done better.

That's true about the active. How about for the retirees, what can the country do? Is there something we should do?

I think the companies that agreed to give us pensions whenever we worked or here's your future, you will get a pension, you will get this and that, but they reneged on it and spent our money that went into fund for retirees. Bethlehem Steel, other companies, Chrysler, a whole lot of them did it. I think they are crooked on the working class people, and they should not do that. I don't think that's fair. Hey, I depended on that and then it cuts down and every other man after working in the industry relies on your pension, besides you get Social Security, but hey, your pension, then all of a sudden the company says no, they done spent your money, we ain't going to give you no pension and then they pass laws in favor of the big man, the big business and the heck with our working class. Our government, I'm bitter about that. I don't like that at all.

Are you involved in political action at all?

No, no. I express my concerns -- I have been writing to my senators in the state about different things, about the oil, the electric and whatever else, but when they answer me, they get around the question, they get around the question. I think they are so lousy, hey, tell me how it is, but I know they play clickety click politics. Hey, whatever. So the bottom line, they don't treat the working class, the middle class people like they should. Seems like the rich is for the rich in my opinion. They don't care about me or the working class, the guy that makes $15,000 a year. They are taking care of the rich, and it's not fair. Our country is treating us bad.

Do you ever participate with other retirees in any activities?

We meet sometimes and then he gets us together with people from my gang or 20 of us more or less that meets every couple months. We have breakfast, shoot the breeze and reminisce. Once a month our union hall has a dinner for our retirees that you can go to. You pay a couple bucks, you get a dinner, and they have a little business meeting, which is nice, so I have attended them off and on.

Do you enjoy seeing all the old timers?

Yeah, because I see guys from other departments, brick layers or whatever else, electricians, but yeah, our guys, the guys I worked with all them years, like he's been real good, Bob has, he's organized this and he calls us and tells us where to go and what to do. You sit there and reminisce. I really enjoy it, seeing guys you worked with for 20, 30, 40 years, and hey, we are all getting up in age, but it's nice to see them. You reminisce and talk about different things, so I like that. That's really good.

If you had to tell somebody just briefly what it was like working at Bethlehem Steel, what would you say?

It was the hottest, dirtiest job I ever -- didn't even dream about before that it could be that bad, but hot and dirty. I don't know what else to say, but it was just terrible, under terrible conditions. I don't know how we stood it, but hey, I guess you are determined, you have whatever it takes to do it, you know you had to do it to take care of yourself and your family, but hot and dirty. That's Bethlehem Steel work.

I want to go back just because the reason we were over here talking about the consent decree, if there's anything else about that. Did relations get better as time passed as far as you were concerned, or was that still a block between good relations?

Well, in my case I also filled in as a temporary foreman for like 12, 14 years. When the foreman would go on vacation, they would step me up, pay me be foreman's rate, and I would be the mechanical foreman, and I didn't like it when I would go around catch a guy sleeping, especially if it was a different race than me, and I would come back and tell my general foreman and say hey, Johnny Brown is sleeping over there. Well, just wake him up. I said I'm going to write him up. No, you can't do that. After the consent decree came in, you couldn't do that, and I experienced that because I was a foreman and I seen how it was, even though we worked together good, but hey, they gave them favorable treatment over the white guys. That's my opinion.

Is it fair to say that there was never a white guy sleeping down there?

No, no, white guys did, too. Oh, yes. Even me, I slept, too. At lunchtime, I would sleep over -- you know you are supposed to go to work -- only get off a half an hour. I would lay there for 45 minutes or whatever. Oh, yes.

Like on the midnight shift?

Yeah. Your lunchtime or whatever, you lay out on a piece of cardboard. Yeah, I did it many a time.

But wasn't it true that on those shifts that people kind of covered for each other?

Yes. I'm going to go over there and take a little break for awhile. In case the boss comes around, you tell him you went to the bathroom. Oh, yeah, we covered, yes, indeed, but hey, whites and blacks both did it so...

Because it was really just survival in the mill?

Yes.

In the shift work?

Not that I'm that bitter against them, but you couldn't discipline them. The black people, too, but if I caught him sleeping, I would say hey, Bob is out there sleeping, I got him over there, he's not on the job, he's been gone for two hours or whatever, we will write them up, document it. That's what they told me to do when I was filling in as a foreman.

Well, by the time that you were ready to leave did you have black friends down there?

Oh, yeah, I got a good friend. One guy -- anyway, several friends, but I see them now every once in awhile when I go do my clothes at the laundry or whatever, and he was a great guy. His name was Stills, right, and just a wonderful black guy, good worker, and I respected him and I would do anything for him. Hey, I liked him, and it ain't that I don't like them because they are black or whatever, but hey, there's bad white guys and there's bad black people, but I had some nice black friends and I like them, and I figured they took -- the government took care of them. My buddy didn't say hey, government, you owe me because my great grandparents was slavery and all that stuff, he didn't say that, no. If the government said hey Ted, here's 7,000 bucks because you was a hillbilly from West Virginia, I would take it, but there was some good black guys, yeah. I had several friends. I like them, they are good, they did their job.

Last question that we ask everybody is why do you think Bethlehem Steel went bankrupt?

Poor management on their part. They was making money. They didn't invest right. I will call it without going into details poor management. They was making big bucks and they wasted the money. They didn't invest it right or improve the mills, and I guess they paid their stockholders or paid their chairman of the board big bucks, but I say poor management Bethlehem Steel went bankrupt; otherwise, they still should be operating today.

Anything else?

No, it was an experience, but if I had to do it over again, no, I would not work in the steel mill. I would work somewhere else, but they treated me good. I worked for them and they paid me good for it, and I enjoyed that time, but like I say back again bottom line, hot and dirty in the steel mill.