 | The Worst Job I Ever Had was also connected with
Dodge. In fact, it involved working at the old Dodge Main Plant in Hamtramck during the
summer of 1949.
I'll start by explaining that the plant, now defunct, was an old one even then -- but it
stayed in production for many years after 1949. Built on the Hamtramck site in 1910 and
added to over the years, it was torn down finally in 1980. (Click here for link to site with
photo and more information about Dodge Main.)
My father started working there in the early 1920s as an assistant yardmaster in the
railroad freight yards that served the plant. After several short interruptions, he went
back to work there circa 1933 and retired as Head Yardmaster in the '60s. I worked there
during my summer vacation from the University of Detroit (between sophomore and junior
years), where I was a journalism major, English minor.
The job was a killer, the hardest I ever had. Which surprised me, because when I was
interviewed they offered me several choices and I selected "Trim Dept." How
tough could that be? I reasoned. I soon found out!
First, you must understand that Dodge Main was a vertical plant, built one floor on top of
another, so car components had to be moved from floor to floor during assembly. More
modern plants, of course, are essentially horizontal so the assembly process flows in an
uninterrupted manner. Second, massive automation & robots were only a gleam in
production engineers' eyes at that time. Manual,physical labor built cars of the day.
Okay, it turned out that the Trim Department was partially sited directly above the Paint
Dept. ovens. And the part over the ovens was where I worked. Most of the floor there was
sheet steel, not a great insulator.Car bodies rolled out of the 4th floor paint drying
ovens and were raised by an electric hoist to the 5th floor through hatches in the steel
plate floor.Another guy & I had to position a caster-wheeled dolly under each body as
it was hoisted in place (by a big Polish guy operating a hand-held control), then guide
the body down so that pegs on the dolly matched up with the body mount holes.Next, we
pushed the dolly forward about 15-20 feet and up an incline until cogs on the Trim
Department assembly line contacted a plate welded to the bottom of each dolly. Then we ran
over about 20 feet,grabbed another dolly and maneuvered it into position to receive
another body. When I started, we were running at 45 bodies per hour. About July 1, they
jacked the rate up to 55 bodies per hour -- almost one a minute!
A bit later some genius figured out that it would be easier for us if they routed out
depressions in the steel plate floor to help us position the dollies more exactly. Bad
idea! Now we not only had to position a dolly's caster wheels exactly so they fit in the
depressions, but we had to use extra effort to rock dolly-cum-body out of the new ruts and
get them moving toward the assembly line. It also meant we then had to go at a dead run to
get a new dolly, maneuver it into position and then make sure all four dolly wheels were
pointing in the right direction. It was really hard to keep up the 55-bodies-per-hour
pace, I kid you not.
We worked 8 hours, with a 15-minute break at mid-morning & mid-afternoon, plus 30
minutes for lunch. Meanwhile, heat blasted up through the two floor hatches every 70 to 90
seconds as two more bodies rolled out of the paint drying ovens below. Add that to typical
Detroit summer weather (80 to 95 degrees, 90 to 98% humidity) and you could get awfully
uncomfortable. I only weighed about 128 when I started, about 120 when summer ended. I was
the only one who stuck out the job for the whole summer; I had 5 or 6 different partners
during the three months. Toward the end, the foreman took pity on me and used me as a
break replacement on the actual Trim Line -- about 10 days before I quit to go back to
school!
Can't remember the hourly pay rate,but I think my take-home was about $50-54. It
certainly made me determined to finish college so I wouldn't have to work in an auto plant
for 40 years.
Next time I'll tell you about working at the Chrysler Highland Park plant, and how job
titles can fool you.
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