On the Assembly Line

By Gene Richard

(Time-Clock No. 1135284)

[GENE RICHARD — it is his real name — is an automobile worker twenty-three years old, weighing one hundred and thirty-five pounds and standing five foot seven. He describes the effect of mechanical pacing, in the assembly line, upon his mind and nerves. He is probably more sensitive to the strain of routine operations than the average automobile worker; before entering the factory he had some slight experience as a professional musician. Again, he is not typical because he is more articulate in expression than most of his mates, few of whom could identify and express the tensions which harass them. The fatigues which he describes are not those of muscles, but of nerves. They arise, perhaps, from the fact that man as a physical organism is made for sudden bursts of swift energy rather than a steady pull through a long period on an inexorable schedule. To be considered, also, is the resentment which arises in a human breast when a man finds himself so completely mastered by a machine.
The public, aware that the automobile industry pays high wages and maintains high factory standards, has been mystified by the degree of heat generated in its labor relations. With all parties in the industry now searching for a comprehensive formula to ensure lasting peace, we believe that a recognition of these strains may perhaps bring a measure of amelioration. — THE EDITORS]

As I walk down the steps with many others, I am disturbed by the thought that the day is only beginning. I suddenly realize in one sensation that there is no escape. It is all unavoidably real and painful. How much energy I must expend to-day has been predetermined by my employer. I try to disregard the thought that is causing this nervous tension which will be with me throughout the hours. Around me I sense a similar reaction. It expresses itself in silence. Men are laughing insincerely. They are ashamed of their emotion. They would rather feel that they were at peace and not a part of this herd who can hide nothing of their day from each other.

The men wander quietly into their places. The shop is beautiful. Machines, blue steel, huge piles of stock. Interesting patterns of windows are darkened by the early hour. This is the impression one gets before he becomes a part of the thing. The beauty is perceivable then. The unbiased observer cannot relate it to the subjective outlook he later acquires.

There is a shrill note. It is impersonal, commanding, and it expresses the entire power which orders the wheels set in motion. The conveyor begins to move immediately. Mysteriously the men are in their places and at work. A man near me grasps the two handles of the air wrench he holds all day long. This is the extent of his operation. He leans forward to each nut as the machine does its work. One nut — two nuts — one motor. It is not necessary for him to change his position. The conveyor brings the next motor to him. One position, one job all day.

Noise is deafening: a roar of machines and the groaning and moaning of hoists; the constant pssffft-pssffft of the air hoses. One must shout to be heard. After a time the noise becomes a part of what is natural and goes unnoticed. It merely dulls for the time the particular sense of hearing.

Truss works next to me. We are breaking a man in. There is a lot of experimenting to find out how to divide the jobs so as to achieve the maximum of group efficiency. The job is new to me, too. We are putting fuel connections on the carburetor. Between Truss and me we do three men’s work. We cannot keep up. Luckily we know enough not to take it out on each other. We cuss and work in a fit of nervousness. The nut which is supposed to be previously tightened for me won’t screw down because it is a bit undersized. I try to tighten it with my fingers, but I keep slipping behind. I am losing my temper. The foreman and relief man have been filling in occasionally for the man who should be there. We just can’t do it. Truss snaps out, ‘Hell with ’em! Let their damn motors go by if we can’t get ’em!’ We work and mumble curses. I finally discover how to put my wrench in the hole in such a way as to bite it into the soft brass and twist the lock nut down to where I can get a wrench on it. My ingenuity works out to save my fingers, but to my disgust is merely adding to the possibility of Truss and me doing the job without help.

‘Watch your quality to-day, men,’ says Sammy, the squat line foreman. We are working so fast I don’t see how anyone can think of quality. The old fellow next to me seems to be having trouble keeping up. He is supposed to run in a bolt on a clamp that I straighten and tighten with a hand wrench. When he gets behind I get behind, too. I take his ratchet wrench and do the added operation myself. I do this to two or three motors and give it back. Finally I just keep the wrench and do the added operation myself. I’ll get sore each time I’m put behind anyway, so, to guarantee my own peace, I assume the extra work. He looks at me with mild appreciation and I go on feeling that I have big enough shoulders to make it easier for him. At least I’m younger and he’s probably quite tired.

Up in the lavatory I usually lean out the window for a breath of fresh air. The out-of-doors smells fresh and free and reminds me how different it was when I could be outside and away from all this overwhelming noise and steel structure. But I can’t take more than two or three breaths, for I must hurry back to the call of my stimulated conscience.

Men about me are constantly cursing and talking filth. Something about the monotonous routine breaks down all restraint. The men in most cases have little in common, but they must talk. The work will not absorb the mind of the normal man, so they must think. The feeling of isolation here leads one to the assurance that his confidences will never escape. Truss, without a trace of conscience, speaks of his more intimate relations with his wife. We work on and on with spurts of conversation. Suddenly a man breaks forth with a mighty howl. Others follow. We set up a howling all over the shop. It is a relief, this howling.

II

As the long-anticipated whistle blows for lunch the men burst into the aisles. There is a rule: ‘No running.’ Some of the men have developed a lunch-hour walk which is hard to distinguish from a run.

I am sitting on the greasy floor of the lunchroom leaning my back against the rail at the head of the stairs. The lunchroom is a great hall with many tables for the men to eat on. At the top of the stairs is a series of cages wide enough for a man to pass through when he rings his clock card. Twenty or thirty clocks are ringing, ding-dong, ding-dong, steadily for half an hour before the men go down to work. The floor is black from the dirty shoes. Some men’s shoes are so soaked with oil that the surfaces shine and ooze at each step. The general manner of dress is not neat. The average worker probably wears a pair of work pants or old pants and a blue, brown, or black work shirt. Some wear vests. An old vest will protect the shirt and make a man feel dressed. In the cooler weather the whole costume can be covered when leaving the shop. In many cases it is done in such a manner as to create the illusion that the man is dressed much better than he really is. He usually has an old hat which, although it has become worn and dirty from handling, still retains form. An old topcoat then serves to disguise the rest.

In spite of the poorly regulated lives of these men, many gain weight. There are a great number of big massive hulks. This creates the impression of power. But I seldom see a man with a wellproportioned body. Some have a high left shoulder while the right droops. Some have large gnarled hands, the fingers of which fail to respond readily. Many hands lack a finger here and there. Most of the older men have a larger amount of beef in the region of the buttocks than they need. A protruding belly is almost the rule with the men who have been here long. The stomach muscles become relaxed and deformed from standing long hours in one position. I wonder if these men can be healthy. I suspect that they all have some nature of illness. The prevalence of halitosis might be accounted for some way.

Some of these men develop a surprisingly self-important air as though they were not a part of the group. They flaunt their independence. It has had me fooled since I’ve been here. Their attitude is effective, yet I sense there is something in it that is off color. The place has robbed these men of their true capacities and denied them a life of growth; but it cannot force them to be humble. Their outward front expresses an ownership of all those things they have n’t got. They do even the most menial jobs with an air of great responsibility.

III

The shrill whistle blows. Some men start. It works as well as a whip. There is a rustling of clothing, a dropping of feet, and a prayer-like flow of voices as we go down the stairs.

This afternoon I am transferred to the rod department. My job is to weigh one end of the rod and stripe it with paint according to the colors indicated on the scale. There are usually a few piles of rods beside each man. The men figure it looks better to work this way. I take a rod off the pile and throw it on the scale, which is so made that the rod will sit on two pegs. The color is posted on the indicator instead of the weight, so all the operator needs to know is one color from another. I then pick up another rod, and as I take the first one off I put the next one on. While the scale is coming to a rest I paint the small end of the rod in my hand with a stripe corresponding to its weight. No time is lost. One soon gets so he can take a rod off the scale before it comes to a rest and predict where it will stop. As a matter of fact, to paint 5000 rods a day this is almost necessary.

As I am painting the small end of the rod I realize that I am not conscious of what I am doing. My accuracy surprises me. I seldom make a mistake, yet I never have my mind on my work. Perhaps this is why I am able to obtain accuracy, because my subconscious is more capable of this monotony than my personality.

IV

It is soon after lunch. Someone has heard someone who heard someone else say the line was going home at twothirty. Gradually it becomes a subject of discussion. Karl says to the bearer of the news, ‘ You would n’t kid me, would ya? ’Cause that’s a dirty trick.’ ‘Well, I heard a guy ask a foreman,’ he said. We all know a foreman does n’t usually know any more than anyone else, yet we wishfully take stock in the rumor. The spirit of some men rises. Two o’clock finally arrives and there is no word yet. Karl curses the fellow who started the rumor. We still have hope, however, because we hate to abandon any chance of such a pleasant anticipation. After two o’clock we lose spirit.

Sometimes my thoughts will not hold me down. I think about all the mean things I have done, and all the things about myself I disrespect. Or I grow angry at some person out of my past. My thoughts go on and torture me. They are thoughts which I am sure are not sane. I try to stop thinking them and find that I don’t really want to. I want to think them through until they satisfy me, and hope they will not come back. They do — and the process begins all over again. I cannot think them through to any finality because my work is constantly bringing me back to consciousness. These days and hours are bad. Sometimes I can lick my anxieties and think more objective thoughts. When I have contact with outside interests I can live them through the long hours of the day. Some days I have two or three good topics for thought. Then I am at peace and will postpone each pleasant thought smugly and with anticipation. As a beginner, I would try to think how fast each period of the day would go. This is a hard thing to get any satisfaction from. The day is just so long, and one gets to be as good a time reckoner as a clock.

I find now that I can put my mind to use. I have gained one thing from this hell. I have learned discipline. I can concentrate for an hour on one subject. But my efforts are fast losing direction. I have lost contact with anything to think about.

To-day I am thinking, as usual, depressed thoughts. I have heard these thoughts, some of them, expressed before, but now I am feeling them from dire reality. I have worked long hours this week. Each day I go to work in the dark and leave in the dark. I have not seen daylight since Sunday, and it is Saturday afternoon. I feel strangely unimportant and insignificant. The experiences of the day have exposed my mode of existence in such a way that I see my relative position here too plainly and deeply for my own comfort. I realize how unimportant is personal worth here. When I come in the gate in the morning I throw off my personality and assume a personality which expresses the institution of which I am a part. The only personality expressed here is the personality of the employer, through those authorized to represent him. There is no market for one’s personal quality. Any expression of my own individual self beyond the scope of my work is in bad taste.

When a man insinuates here by any action that he is an individual, he is made to feel that he is not only out of place but doing something dishonorable. One feels that even the time he spends in the lavatory is not a privilege but an imposition. He must hurry back because there are no men to spare. After hours on one operation I realize that the only personal thing required of me is just enough consciousness to operate my body as a machine. Any consciousness beyond that is a contribution to my discomfort and maladjustment. I am a unit of labor, and labor is cheap. There is no market or appreciation of my worth except my self-respect. I struggle to keep it. My mood is perhaps a result of a discussion over the bench with Glen. He says, ‘No matter whatcha do, they gotcha licked.’ It makes me depressed to see him take himself so cheaply. He is convinced of his lack of value here. I feel a sudden wave of fear that I might some day feel exactly as he does.

Some of the men are taking to horseplay. Horseplay among bench workers has less limitation than among line workers. The bosses are not intolerant of horseplay. It is a noticeable fact that they will tolerate it where they will deal severely with serious loafing. As we are working we are unexpectedly interrupted by the foreman. He steps up between Karl and me. While we stop work and look around, he starts slowly to pave the way for what is to be a bawling out. His Swedish accent drawls out: —

‘Now listen, fellas. I don’t know whether anybody ever tolja this before or whether ya know how it looks from the outside [glides his fingers over the bench in pattern of self-justification], but I’m gonna tell ya now. Now I ain’t kickin’ on how much work yer gittin’ out er how well yer doin’ it. Yer gittin’ out enough perductchin and yer work’s fine; but whatcher doin’ is shovin’ a whole buncha rods down the bench in a hurry and then gangin’ up an’ talkin’. Now if any one a those big shots come down ’ere an’ see one guy leanin’ on the bench like this, another guy over here standin’ around, some guys bunched up here, an’ everything all goin’ ta hell, they wonder what kinda buncha guys they got down here and a hellova man runnin’ it. Now I been takin’ a lot up there lately an’ I ain’t been sayin’ nothin’. Now I don’t want to be a ― ―, but if I hafta I will. Those guys been comin’ down here lately an’ I been hearin’ about it. They’re kickin’ an’ they got a kick comin’. So―damn it; you fellas work with me an’― damn it I’ll work with you, ’cause — well — ya see how it is, doncha? I ain’t kickin’ about yer work, but what I wancha ta do is — work a little slower if ya hafta and a little steadier.’

V

We start back to work in silence. It leaves a bad taste and we feel as though we really had been falling down on the job. Later we see him making the rounds, so we feel at least it was n’t meant just for us. We slip into some pretty childish ruts sometimes. We are so completely dulled by our work that trivial and boyish pranks amuse us. We cuss and talk filth.

When four-thirty finally arrives we get word that we are working until six. We have all settled into sullen moods. No one has a thing to say. We are grieved at this regular policy of detaining us without consulting us. Karl is working seriously for some time and finally drops back on one foot and bellows: '―damn it! I’m gettin’ sick of this stuff. I guess we never will get out of here before daylight.’ He grabs the nearest rod and slams it down on the bench. I am mad too, so I egg him on. We take it out on the most faithful man in the department. Later we take to hollering to build up a morale which will help us to lick the last hour. Finally we are walking out, punching our cards. Laughter is now sincere but weary. It is still dark on the outside. I am so dulled that I have gotten here without realizing it. I stop — ponder. I can’t think where I parked my car: the morning was so long ago.