COMPUTER MEMORIES, Chapter 09

THE IBM DEPARTMENT AT IHC
When I was discharged from the Army, I returned to International Harvester in Chicago, and got a job in the IBM Department, rather than on the diesel engine assembly line, where I had worked before being called back into the Army for the Korean War. I remember the pay as $82.50 a week, a whole two dollars a hour, a fortune in those days.

That’s an interesting name for a job. If you worked with a car, you weren’t in the GM business, if you worked with a tractor, you weren’t in the John Deere business, but in those days, if you worked with IBM equipment, you were in the IBM Department, and in the IBM business.

My job at IHC was on the second shift, so in the daytime I worked part time for Statistical Tabulating Company in downtown Chicago, running various IBM machines, learning all I could about them, and incidentally, earning money to support my family. A couple of times a week I stopped at a nearby office building to pick up "raw material" for Emmy to type at home. I also delivered the final typed product, and collected her pay check. She celebrated with joy the first week that she had earned a whole dollar per hour. A wonderful income that did not require dressing for work, commuting to an office, and hiring a baby-sitter for our son.

Stat Tab had one of the first IBM 603 Calculators, one without any lights on an outside panel, that could be used to step through a wired program, to see what was happening. I seem to remember the IBM repairman could open the door, and see lights on the inside, but that was a slow and laborious process. IBM took the hint, and designed the IBM 604 with an exterior light panel that was helpful in seeing what the wired program was doing, or in most case, was not doing.

ON THE ENGINE ASSEMBLY LINE
Prior to being called back into the Army for the Korean War, I had been a Stock Boy, on the TD6 and TD9 Diesel engine assembly line at International Harvester. That is, a dozen other stock boys and I, kept the bins full of pistons, valves, oil pans, bolts and nuts, and all those things needed to build the engines. Most of the men on the assembly line were Union members, and each job was carefully controlled — assembly men could assemble, and stock boy could stock parts, but never should they do any other job.

One time they needed to establish a night shift for 6 weeks, to assemble some needed spare parts. One of the foremen quietly told me that if I worked that night shift, I would return as an assembler on the day shift, with a nice pay increase. A union man accompanied the General Foreman as he went to each stock boy, in the sequence of their seniority, and I heard the foreman say, “You don’t want to work the night shift do you?” Of course most answers were “No,” but when he got to me he said, ”It would be a great idea for you to work on this special shift, do you want to?” Then he bumped me with his elbow, to make sure I got the hint. I of course said “Yes,” went on the night shift, and to the horror of the union man in charge, returned as a daytime assembler.

It all turned to naught, as I was called into active duty in the Army just a short time later. When I visited with the General foreman (as mentioned in a different chapter), he said he wished I had come back to work with him, rather than in the IBM department.