| Tape Number: |
WCHFT006 |
| Title: |
WW2 Home Front Interview with Marie Fricke Ponschock #2 |
| Title Type: |
Element
|
| Program, Series or Collection Title: |
Wisconsin WWII Stories: Home Front
|
| Format: |
BetaSP
|
| Creator: |
Hestad, David//Producer
|
| Contributor: |
Soetenga, Everett (Butch) //Videographer
Naunas, Tom//Sound Engineer
|
| Date Created: |
2002-11-21 |
| Publisher: |
University of Wisconsin Board of Regents//Copyright holder
|
| Subject: |
war
|
Description:
Tape Number WCHFT006
06:00:28;04 06:00:32;13 [00:00:04:09] WCHFT006
:keywords:
World War II
Home Front
Marie Fricke- interview
continued
Interview conducted on November 21, 2002
former Manitowoc County purchasing agent
shipyards
welder
office work
economy
salary
submarine
Navy
shoot date: 11-21-2002
transfered from Hestad laptop: March 2004
06:00:35;15 06:00:39;11 [00:00:03:26] WCHFT006
:Q- You were saying how you got around. Did you go out of town?:
06:00:54;15 06:01:52;26 [00:00:58:09] WCHFT006
:train to Milwaukee to shop:
Q - You were saying how you got around. Did you go out of town? Could you just tell that part of the story?
M - Oh, yes we girls often wanted to shop in Milwaukee because even during the war years, Manitowoc was not a place to... it had nice dress shops, althought there were a few. Wagner's was a very nice place and there was a place called Thelma's, but we liked to go out of town and we would get on the Chicago Northwestern Railroad car up here in Manitowoc at about 8 in the morning, and we'd get down to Milwaukee about 10, and then we would shop at the three stores on the east end of Wisconsin Avenue-- Boston Store, Marshall Fields, and I'm trying to think of the third one. I can't think of it right now. And stopped some place for lunch and then we would get on the train again around 7:00 and we'd be back in Manitowoc at 10:30. And it was a day for an outing, and well, we'd all find something to buy.
06:01:52;26 06:02:41;13 [00:00:48:15] WCHFT006
:Gas to expensive to use for car travel:
M - And um,06:01:57;27 but we did not use a car to travel out of town. As I recall, just for entertainment, because you just didn't have the gas to do it. I had my own car when I started to work there. A little black Ford Coupe, and um, we girls did get together in the evenings, especially on weekends, going to shows or plays or whatever, but again, the use of a car was scarce because you just couldn't get gas.
06:02:41;13 06:02:42;27 [00:00:01:14] WCHFT006
:Q- So did you drive to work?:
06:02:42;27 06:04:19;27 [00:01:36:26] WCHFT006
:Drove to work / Shipyard Guards:
Q- So did you drive to work?
M - Yes. I lived with my parents at that time on 24th Street, and the shipyard was on 16th Street, and it was not a long drive. And we had guards at the shipyards. We all had to wear cardboard identification tags, and they had somebody standing there at the gate every morning, and also at night when you left, and inspecting. I think I mentioned to you or somebody yesterday, that Bill Fitzgerald was the guard. And, um he has tales to tell about a few times that, not that somebody tried to break in, but that sometimes they went to sleep on the job and it was time to go home and nobody woke them up (laughs). And there were a few times when there were some alerts. I forget what, but I know at that time they had certain men that he could call to help. Well, they did have a guard office and usually there was three or men in there all the time. But if he needed help, 06:03:58;23 especially on the 3rd shift, see we worked around the clock. The shipyard was open all the time. 06:04:07;13 And I think he told me once there were some troubles, but I just don't remember what entailed the whistles to go off or they called in extra help.
06:04:19;27 06:05:17;28 [00:00:57:29] WCHFT006
:The first aid dept.:
Q- There were some civil defense-type things going on? Do you remember anything about that?
M - Well, I know that the guards especially were all trained. They had to take sessions being trained in that phase of it. And we also had a first aid shop that was manned by two or three nurses around the clock, and somebody was always cutting a finger or stubbing a toe or we had people having an appendicitis attack. We'd have to call the ambulence and have them come in, take them to the hospital. With that group of men working all the time, there was bound to be injury. Even somebody maybe with a wheelbarrow rammed into somebody else, knocked him down, not that he meant it, but it happens. So the first aid department was quite busy.
06:05:17;28 06:06:20;13 [00:01:02:13] WCHFT006
:Women become welders for higher pay:
Q- How did it go as far as men's work and women's work?
M - Well, they needed welders, and the men were trained. I believe our vocational school at that time had what they called classes for welders and the men had to go through that class because a lot of these men that came in were farmers and they had never handled a tool in their life. So they had to be trained, and then when there was still a shortage, they, I guess there were a few women found out if you were a welder you got very good pay, so they said, "Hey, we can do that too!" So the vocational school then started to train women. And there's one of those girls still living. I keep in touch with her once in a while. I'm not saying that they liked their job, but they liked their job because they were getting good money. Better than some of their other friends were getting.
06:06:20;13 06:06:48;00 [00:00:27:17] WCHFT006
:unusual for woman to manage department:
Q - Was it unusual for someone like you to be managing a department of that nature?
M - Yes, yes. And after the war, I seemed to be in the right place at the right time, and it furthered my career all the way through. I don't know. To me, it was just pure luck and being at the right place at the right time.
06:06:48;00 06:07:55;21 [00:01:07:19] WCHFT006
:difficulties with women working in an office:
Q- How about when you were first hired for the project, in charge of all the girls. Was that unusual?
M - Well, no, because... no. Um, they just knew that when you have a group of girls, you're going to have problems. You know what I mean. And especially a lot of these girls were also homemakers and housewives and from the country and we had to train them to be office workers. It wasn't easy, but, well again, everybody had that feeling that you were coming in to do this for Uncle Sam, and you made the best of it. Some of the girls didn't like the hours getting there at 7:00. Well, those were the rules and you better show up. Nobody got anything as an incentive that I know of.
06:07:55;21 06:08:49;00 [00:00:53:07] WCHFT006
:Dwarf who checked out submarines:
M - I think some of the men did get incentives, if they, um. Well, I know we had this Mr. Paul Holschbach, which was, uh, uh, a dwarf. He was a little guy, he probably was only four feet, not even four feet high, uh, tall. And he had to go through these big tubings after they were all installed to check for welds on the inside. They had him on the inside and a man on the outside, and they would check where the welds were. And I know that he got quite an extra pay for this what you call hazardous or the fact that nobody else could do it. We were fortunate to have one. In fact, he wrote a book after a while on his experiences in the shipyard as a dwarf.
06:08:49;00 06:09:49;19 [00:01:00:17] WCHFT006
:Shipyard pay scale:
M - The pay scales, of course, through the years, like everything else, if you started at a dollar and hour, I forget. I don't know what the wage scale was anymore, but if you start at a dollar, the next year you probably got $1.10, and the next year you got $1.25. In other words, you got your raises, and the men also often took a job in a different department if they could get it, if they knew they could earn more there. Because some jobs paid more than others, especially if they were dirty jobs or, um. Like we had men that were, well they had to wear a mask all the time. After they welded, you know, there were a lot of, there was a lot of extra weld sometimes, and they had to go in there with chisels and get that loose, and it was dusty and I know those guys were paid extra money because of the hazards. And I don't think the masks they wore were as efficient as the ones you would buy today. But that's the way it was.
06:09:49;19 06:11:20;29 [00:01:31:08] WCHFT006
:best-paying place to work in Manitowoc:
Q- All in all, how would you describe it as a place to work during the war?
M - If you were in Manitowoc, it was about the only place you could work. Mirro Aluminum was, of course, in business at the time. Mirro Aluminum pots and pans, and they were busy. But, um, I think the Manitowoc shipbuilding paid more per hour than they did at Mirro, and so therefore they gravitated to our place. We had Invincible Manufacturing Company. They put out metal desks and chairs and cabinets. And they were busy too. But I think we had the higher pay scale. And we could do it because the Navy was footing the bill. And I believe we got, there was an incentive. If we finished a submarine before the allotted time, I think we were paid an extra bonus of some kind for that. And I know that's what Mr. West was always striving for, to get that extra money.
Q - A lot of pressure to crank it out.
M - Right.
Q - I think we've gone through most of what we talked about earlier. Anything else you want to talk about?
06:11:20;29 06:12:16;02 [00:00:55:01] WCHFT006
:From old building to corner office:
M - I will say that when I first started there, we were in an old building. I believe it was the building that was moved up from down on Quay Street, and then they built us a new office. Um, put up very quickly. And um, well, I think that lasted through the war, and they used it for some years after. But then of course this, what we call the Blue Building, went up, probably in 1950, and we had wonderful offices then. Air conditioned and carpeting and all the little things that. I had a corner office with windows on two sides, which was, like you said, not, most women weren't treated that way, but I was.
06:12:16;02 06:13:39;03 [00:01:22:29] WCHFT006
:All workers in one room:
Q- During the war it was pretty...
M - But, just we, yeah. During the war, we girls were all in one huge room. It was desk after desk, and the men were right with us. They were off on the side, but they were the ones that were doing the purchasing, doing the telephoning, ordering this and ordering that. And then they would come back and give the girls their cylinders that they were either confirming an order or they were writing somewhere to get information about some equipment or what have you, but we were all in one big room. And I can't say that we had trouble acoustically. Um, I, of course, the men, even if they were on the phone, and they were over here and the girls were probably 50 feet away over here, nobody ever complained that it was too noisy. Of course, the typewriters were going all the time, and those were those old typewriters, clackity clack clack clack all day long. We went through reams of paper. And we had a desk over on the side and we had underneath there we had these packages of 500 sheets because of that ditto machine that used up all that paper.
06:13:39;03 06:14:30;17 [00:00:51:12] WCHFT006
:would have been easier with PC/high telephone bills:
Q - Cranking it out.
M - I think how much easier it would be with the equipment we have today. You know, with your computers and your, where you can type something once and you can replay it over and over and over again. And your contact with your customers or your suppliers would have been much easier. A lot of telephoning going on. That it was. I know our telephone bill, sometimes I saw $8,000 a month. Might have been $10,000 back in those days. There was a lot of telephoning.
Q- You're trying to get a hold of people from all over.
M - Mmm hmm.
06:14:30;17 06:15:30;18 [00:00:59:29] WCHFT006
:difficult to requisition rationed materials:
M - And our suppliers had trouble too. They were struggling to make up the copper tubing, the electric wire, and they were looking for help around the country depending upon who we were working with. It was shortage all over the country, really. Because your copper tubing had to come from copper mines from the ground. It wasn't something that just materialized out of nowhere. And, well, your electrical wiring was the same thing, was copper and aluminum and what have you. And then when we bought these items that were rationed, then we had to put some extra paragraphs on our purchase order. Giving us, that we had permission to buy this rationed material. Had to give them numbers and so forth. There was a lot of rules.
06:15:30;18 06:16:56;09 [00:01:25:19] WCHFT006
:Economic change when sub program ended:
Q- It must have been quite a feeling of accomplishment.
M - I think that we did. And I think our Manitowoc merchants were very unhappy when the shipyard program was pulled. We didn't build the last three that we were supposed to. See, we built 27. We built ten and ten, and we were supposed to build another ten, but then the last three were cancelled because the war was over. And of course, then everybody went back home. Everybody went back to Green Bay and Sheboygan and where they came from, and our merchants um, missed the trade. The restaurants, the hotels, eating-places, clothing stores. The money vanished. Not that we had a depression right away, but it changed the economy. That it did. And that's when the cranes, then Mr. West by that time had gotten into the crane business full force, and so when the shipyards left, the cranes just sort of took over. And then of course, after the cranes came the ice machines which now are top shelf in the company.
06:16:56;09 06:17:32;26 [00:00:36:15] WCHFT006
:Bologna sandwiches:
M - I can't think of anything else that I can, can mention. I know somebody said once that even with rationing, that the men survived on bologna sandwiches because everybody came, they only had a half-hour for lunch, everybody came with a lunch pail and it was usually bologna sandwiches.
06:17:32;26 06:18:53;26 [00:01:20:28] WCHFT006
:Generations of same families worked:
M - And there was a lot of, sometimes three generations of the same family. It was like the grandfather was still working, and the father was working, and then the sons, and maybe one or two or three sons. We had some family, I know the Jacobsons, they had I don't know how many people worked. It was all one family. Well, the younger ones, if they weren't, well most of them were drafted of course, but there were some that were exempted either because of a disability or their eyesight or their feet or something or another. And then they would come. You didn't have to worry about a job. All you had to do was come down to the guard office and you were hired. And we lost some people through attrition. I mean, some people in the course of four or five years, they grew old and couldn't do the work anymore, and they retired and had to find somebody to take their place. The employment office. They were under pressure all the time to find people.
06:18:53;26 06:19:37;21 [00:00:43:23] WCHFT006
:today's communication would have helped:
M - I don't think I'd want to go through those war years again, but I supposed we would if we had to. If we go to war and it would turn out that they needed all kinds of things, why, the younger generation today would do it again. But things would be different. Much much different, because of all the equipment available, and like you mentioned, communication. Something happens in New York this morning, we know about it at 10:00 or 12:00 our time. And that would help.
Q- A mix bag..
06:19:37;21 06:20:16;01 [00:00:38:10] WCHFT006
:prices of dress, pie:
M - But I do know this, that, like I say, I can't remember what my salary was, but I know that we girls, we could, in town we could go anywhere and buy a dress for $2.98. You could buy shoes for $2.98. Piece of pie was usually 15 cents. Coffee was 10.
06:20:16;01 06:21:56;29 [00:01:40:26] WCHFT006
:labor shortage:
M - I do think that the farmers were under pressure too, because I believe that they couldn't find help. You had a mother and a father who ran a farm and maybe had two sons and they were in the army, and there was a lot of cooperation between the farmers. If this guy needed help to cut his wheat, this guy would come and help on Mondays or Tuesdays, and then when his was ready, everybody would go over there and cut his wheat because he couldn't get help. And some of the women, the farmer's wives were drafted. I mean, just within the family, I don't mean at the shipyards, but they were just used to doing the cooking, the washing, and the ironing and all of a sudden they were out in the field helping too. There was such a shortage of labor. And your newspapers, as a geneologist, I read a lot of the old newspapers looking for articles, and the papers every night had a list of names of enlistees. People who, young boys that were drafted and were gone, and then you had articles about the war. And then you had articles about local people having trouble doing this, that, or the other thing. The news was all war war war. There was nothing else. But we won the war
06:21:56;29 06:23:34;19 [00:01:37:16] WCHFT006
:Entertaining at home:
M - I believe, if I remember right, quite a few of our executives entertained at home a lot. Today the idea is if you have an anniversary or something, you take them out to Mahoots (sp) or some place to eat, but there was a lot more entertaining at home. And I know that some of the Wests and Wallaces, they had maids who helped, well, they were hired by the week, and they were there everyday helping with the washing, the cleaning, and that, but as soon as there was a dinner party, then they were forced-- not forced-- but asked to help serve and heat things and help in the kitchen and get things ready. And I guess at those parties there was quite a bit of... there was liquor at those parties. (Laughs) I'm not saying that... I've never seen anybody at the shipyard that was drunk, never, but I can't say that, but most of the time, this was on weekends, and so if they overindulged, you probably didn't know about it because by Monday they were ready to work again. But a lot of entertaining in homes. And I think even ourselves, we didn't go out and entertain as much as, we had more things at home. Lot more things.
06:23:34;19 06:24:15;17 [00:00:40:26] WCHFT006
:Kids more polite then than now:
M - I know we often talk about it now, you know, people say, well, they entertain outside the home, even for kids' birthday parties because the kids are so rough and they don't sit still and they wreck everything. That wasn't true in the war years. I remember even with entertaining and having couples come with their children and most of them were polite enough to know to be quiet and although we usually had games or something for them to do, they weren't rowdy, but that isn't true today. You ask some kids to come and your house is a wreck the next day. But it was done that way.
06:24:15;17 06:25:04;03 [00:00:48:14] WCHFT006
:sandwiches delivered to shipyard:
M - I do know that some of the restaurants in town had set up at certain times that they would be here at the yards at say 12:00, and they would bring in loads of sandwiches, and the guys would know ahead of time that they were coming in and the truck would drive up and these guys would have their money ready. I forget what they were, a dollar or something, and they'd get a sandwich made by a restaurant or something. I'm not saying they were ham, but they were sandwiches of some kind. Where they got their rations from, I don't know.
06:25:04;03 06:25:43;09 [00:00:39:06] WCHFT006
:people were proud to be shipyard workers:
M - But I think if you interview any shipyard people today that are still left, they all have good thoughts about the war, and they feel they accomplished something with their effort. That's about all I can think of to tell you. A good many of those people have passed on. Great great many. There's a few yet that I meet and can talk to, but mostly all the older ones are long gone.
06:25:43;09 06:27:29;15 [00:01:46:02] WCHFT006
:female welder and pipefitter:
Q - You said you knew a welder?
M - That's right.
M - Well, the welder, girl that I know is Mrs. Chester Knipp. Jane Knipp. K-N-I-P-
P. Jane. And she lives on South 10th Street. Almost out to Silver Lake Park. Now, I'm not too sure if her mind is real clear or not. You might call her and see what she has to say. Maybe-- I know her health is not too good. But I think her mind is still pretty clear. I really do. And then I mentioned that this Herald Bebritz (sp) is a pipefitter, was a pipefitter, and he's still living, and that William Fitzgerald was a guard, and he's still living.
Q - I think we did a program with him.
M - Yes, we did a program about three years ago at the museum-- the Maritime Museum. They had the three of us come in for a Sunday afternoon and we all talked about our specific jobs, and they both did a very good job. But when you think of all the hundreds that we had, to think that there are so few left, but that's life. |
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| Description Type: |
Log
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| Format Aspect Ratio: |
4:3
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| Format Generations: |
Moving Image/Original Footage
|
| FormatLocation: |
Media Library |
| Duration: |
00:26:54;00 |
| Format Colors: |
Color
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| Genre: |
Interview
|
| Genre Authority Used: |
PBS PODS
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| Language: |
eng
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| Date Of Record Release: |
2009-11-06 10:35:33 (W3C-DTF) |
| Date Record Checked: |
2009-11-06 |
| Format Tracks: |
track 2: right mono
track 1: left mono
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| Format Media Type: |
Moving Image
|
| Alternative Modes: |
No Captions
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| Subject Authority Used: |
International Press Telecommunications Council |
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Annotation:
Cataloged as part of the American Archive Pilot Project |
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| FormatIdentifierSource: |
Wisconsin Public Television |
| Date of Record Creation: |
2009-11-06 10:07:23 (W3C-DTF) |
| Identifier: |
http://wptmedialibrary.wisc.edu/SPT--FullRecord.php?ResourceId=459 |
| Date Last Modified: |
2010-01-14 09:48:16 (W3C-DTF) |
|
|
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