Eula McGill Interview 10

EULA MCGILL: -- worked with the mayor and he said, "My God, how long does this line go?" I said, "Tell me about it." I said, "I've been trying to get this darn light to change for I don't know how long. And he ain't never got nothing to him so I try to avoid it as much as I can. I usually go around the other way and come down this way to avoid that light. I can remember when nothing was here but woods. This street wasn't here, had to go way around through Irondale to go to Atlanta. No -- this -- nothing -- it all was woods down here, the big artesian well.

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MCGILL: That's the longest, widest intersection right here. It takes forever to get over the hill.

HELFAND: Eula, could you tell us like a typical week like which kind of meetings you would go to and what you might be working on?

MCGILL: Well there's all kinds of meetings I've been on. We got an AFL-CIO retirees group that meets tomorrow in the morning of course I can't go tomorrow. And we have a luncheon meeting. And then one day a week it's a union meeting of the League of Women Voters. And once we have a meeting for our Democratic club. Those are just regular things. But in the meantime there's things like tomorrow, this environmental meeting. No, that's Wednesday. And a meeting on our transportation problem. We're trying to -- our committee is trying to do something about it. I told the people they're fools because as 00:02:00long as we've got a place to park, people are going to drive their damn cars. You can't them to use public transportation. There's a lot of people that need public transportation, but there's not enough people riding just to pay them to put it out in these outlaying areas. And as long as people can park their cars -- and they was talking about Atlanta this. I said, "You can't compare Birmingham with Atlanta. Atlanta, the people had no place to park their cars downtown. They had to get rapid transit because the people couldn't get no place downtown to park. Birmingham, there's plenty of parking space. And people is going to drive them cars as long as they can get a place to park. You can't compare Birmingham and Atlanta, they're like daylight and dark.

HELFAND: So you're working on transportation issues?

MCGILL: Yeah, we got a committee and trying to -- like Leeds don't have any 00:03:00service at all. All of these outlining little towns, and they won't pay nothing. They want Birmingham to pay for it all. And they cuss Birmingham and they cuss us then. But if it wasn't for the city of Birmingham, we wouldn't have nothing. Ooh golly, that's a bright sun. I don't like [Arlington?] too good. He don't do nothing but labor, but he's done things for me personally through the [Dobbins?], you know, they were goods of mine. And he was -- he's done things for me -- for the organization because of me, not for me personally, but he's done things -- on my eightieth birthday, he declared 00:04:00it Eula McGill day, had a big proclamation, had me down at city hall that was because of [Mike and Peggy Dobbins?]. And then too -- I wish you all could see the civil rights museum while you were here. You seen the civil rights museum we built?

HELFAND: Were you involved in the civil rights movement here Eula?

MCGILL: No. I wasn't here. See, I was away during the '60s.

M1: Hey Eula, do you think that the civil rights movement has had some effect on the union movement, like the way in which white --

MCGILL: There wouldn't have been no civil rights movement if there hadn't have been a union movement first, giving them job security so they could, uh, do as they pleased without being fired. You know, the union actually led it. They founded the [Brandoff Institution?] which is formed out of the Pullman Porters 00:05:00union. And the union -- you got to have economic freedom before you really have politically freedom, you know that.

M1: How about the other way around? Do you think that the fact that black workers -- that the black people go involved in struggling for justice in the '50s and '60s has changed the way that union people work now?

MCGILL: No, nu-uh. I don't think --

HELFAND: Yeah, but in cotton -- in cotton mill unions now you've got a lot of black with it.

MCGILL: Yeah, I think -- oh, oh, oh, I think it had -- like I said, you go around now and white people want the black people to take the lead because they're scared. They think they're afraid to fire the black people. I told a girl one day, I said, "In other words, you down with just you giving them credits for having more guts than you got," is what I told her.

HELFAND: Do you think there's a lot of white working people in the south who have a fear in a way that blacks don't?

MCGILL: Uh, I think -- I think that whites feel that they have to have somebody to look down to. And they don't want to do nothing to help black people, most of them don't because they might -- if they'd get on equal footing with them, they'd get their job. It all goes down to economics and race. But black people -- a lot of people had this erroneous idea that all black people stick together. They don't. I've had just as many black people be stooges to the boss as I have white people.

M1: Don't you think it's remarkable that white and black people are working together in the union movement now though? Is that --

MCGILL: Yeah, I remember when the first blacks went to work down in Bremen, 00:07:00Georgia in the Arrow plant. [Darice Kettle?] at work, she said, "Would you know they talk just like we do." So many people had never known a black. You know what I mean? I said to my daughter-in-law's mother, they live in an area where there's practically no blacks at all -- and back during the integration -- when it started back in the '50s, she was, "Oh them blacks are going to take over." And I said, "Miss Logan, have you ever known a black person?" "Yes, so and so." I said, "But did you know them or just know who they were?" "Well no, I've never known one." I said, "You haven't ever talked to one or really known one well enough to say I know that person?" She said, "No I don't." I said, "Well that's the difference. If you ever know any, they're just like us except they have the same feelings we do." 00:08:00And I said, "During the segregation integration days, the black people was just as worried about the white people -- the white teachers would do to their black children as the white people were of what the black teachers would do to their white children." I said, "They had the same fears that we did." "Well I didn't know." I said, "No, because you don't ever think about their side of it." And a lot of never think about it, but they take care of their children just like white people care for theirs.

HELFAND: Are we coming near the mill?

MCGILL: No. I told you it was way over here across town. I'm going the nearest way too.

HELFAND: When was the last time you were here?

MCGILL: I don't know. I think one day when I went over to [Terrence?] for something, I came back and I said, "I believe I run over by [Van Belt?] Road and I went over there. Now we were ways way over on the other side of town, not in town, outside the own. It was way over.

M1: Eula I'm just going -- I'm curious about this -- about the race thing. I just want to ask you again, the people -- the unions now seem to be pretty mixed and I wonder how long that's been.

MCGILL: Well when more jobs opened to women and people come out of jobs educated, they didn't come back -- if it had not been -- in New York, they tell me had it not been for the Puerto Ricans and the blacks coming to New York, the industry would've had to move out, so many people -- the young people didn't go in the garment plants. They was qualified to get better jobs. And those women like the -- young women like to work someplace where they have a chance to meet men. You wouldn't think of all those things to enter into a woman when she's looking for a job. And they like to go where they can dress 00:10:00and have their high heels. And they just didn't enter the industry. And the blacks helped the industry get employment. You understand what I'm saying in case you do. I'm going to go by our old -- where we used to meet in our union hall. No, I guess I better go to the mill first. No, I can't turn down here.

HELFAND: Why don't you take us to the union hall?

MCGILL: Well we're going to come back there. See all them -- there's a lot of industry over in this space, see. On the north and east side of town there's a lot of industry. It runs like a -- right down [Village Creek?], on down into [Bessman?], the industrial part of town. I think I can go to the union hall. I just go there on Tenth Avenue. If that's Tenth I'm coming up on -- I think it is. Some folks come out here, I got to watching. I come over here for something and -- is this Tenth? Yeah. Turn left. You have to turn 00:12:00left there I think. This place was organized. This was [Stocking Valve?] was organized and this all down in there, all is unionized, has been for years. Like I say, the industry runs down Village Creek down into Bessman. I don't think any of the steel mills and all of them align. Alice Berry used to -- I think their house is torn down where they used to live. I know it was somewhere on Tenth Avenue. Her husband worked in the laundry, Alice worked in the mill. And her brother went -- we were educating her brother and he went to school to become a minister. See that building up here on the red building. That was our 00:13:00union hall. There was a drug store there and that was our union hall. This is East Birmingham.

HELFAND: Right over here?

MCGILL: Yeah, right there was where we met. That was the union hall upstairs. There's nothing there now. We went in that back door and that was a masonic lodge. This was a real busy place then, real neighborhood and good business center, east Birmingham. And we walked up this railroad track from the factory to the union hall. Eating their supper. This used to be real nice 00:14:00neighborhoods over in here. It's all gone down. Now back then this viaduct wasn't here. We had to come across the railroad track on a streetcar. The streetcar would come out through here, the [Terrence City?] streetcar. I rode the Ensley-Fairfield car to town and then transferred to Norwood-Terrence City car. I think I'm right by turning here. Yeah, Vanderbilt Road. I forget, this one didn't come through here at that time. The street car would come 00:15:00around through there to the plant and turned around right here. Now I had to walk from right here, where that car's coming out or where that shed is, I had to walk from there to the mill. Of course this highway wasn't here then. And I'd have to walk from here on down to the mill. This is the Norwood section.

HELFAND: A lot of the mill workers live in there?

MCGILL: No, no, no, no, no, they couldn't afford to live up there. Any of them that lived, lived over around east Birmingham. Didn't none live up here. This was a middle class neighborhood. You see this all. None of this was here 00:16:00then. You see, I had to walk down here. And they just built a new bridge here. I'll have to determine which was the mill when we get out here. I can't hardly recognize it. Oh, nothing was here, nothing here, nothing -- all these mills weren't here. There had been one of these buildings, wasn't no sidewalks. That's the old -- I see it, right there. That's the old mill. That was the mill and that was the office. What is it called now, Vance -- Vance -- it must've been more than one thing in here. Vance Tool and Die. See that was the mill. Now the spinning room is up yonder. Do you see that little part up on the second floor, that was the spinning room. You want to get 00:17:00out, you get out if you can. This is what we're doing I thought. This was the only thing on this street was this mill at that time.

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MCGILL: All the rest of it -- the spinning room was upstairs. All of the rest of the mill was downstairs. The weave shop and the card room and all the rest of it -- that was the spinning room upstairs.

HELFAND: (inaudible)

MCGILL: -- but I don't remember that part there being built there in front of that building. You went around there and go in and that was the office. And you went around there and go in the factory because this is beautiful. The yards and everything out here now is pretty. But there wasn't no such thing 00:18:00then. There wasn't no trees here. There weren't no bushes of no kind.

HELFAND: Let's walk a little and you'll show us the picket line.

MCGILL: Well that was where we had to walk. The sidewalk was over there, you couldn't come up here. That sidewalk right there was where we walked and the gate was right there where that driveway is. There wasn't no driveway there then. Nobody drove no cars as far as I know. Nobody would drive any cars to work. They walked to work or rode the streetcar. And very few people had automobiles. Very few people had automobiles. But there wasn't no lawn and nothing like that, just dirt. Of course I can say a plant called Link Belt was out here after that. They fixed the place up. It looks nice out here.

HELFAND: So your picket line was over here?

MCGILL: No, the gate was right there. We couldn't walk no picket line because they had a fence. There was a fence. We had signs there, but the gate was right there, the entrance. Notice how the gate to go in is all fenced in. You didn't drive no cars then. Like I said, nobody had any cars. If they had one, there was vacant space up there they could park them. And there was an old store there just about there. It's gone I see now. That building is all gone. It was vacant and we used it for relieving our pickets and distribution the food. But see that -- that building looks in bad shape to me right there.

HELFAND: Is that what the building looked like?

MCGILL: It looks like bad -- it's in bad shape. It was 60 years ago. That looks in bad shape to me, that building. The back part -- now this is a -- right here is new that worked there. All that -- that blue part down there is 00:20:00new, it stopped up here. I mean, it's not new, but since I was here. That was part of the -- that was one part of the mill. You see it's pinched off separate now. I think it's separate than this. I think it's separate from this now, Vance Tool and Die, I don't know if anything is operating in there. There must be something operator in there.

HELFAND: Let's take a little walk around.

MCGILL: I have no idea what it is.

HELFAND: Why don't we just go around this way?

MCGILL: You can't get through there. You can't go around the building because there's a walkway of blocks to go in the building from the main office. You see, they closed --

HELFAND: Was that the mill office?

MCGILL: Yeah, that was the mill office. You used -- you could go out through them, but they built something on there. You can't get through there now.

HELFAND: Maybe we can -- Eula?

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MCGILL: -- office and you walked out around that and would go in the plant.

HELFAND: So let's walk through the gate. Let's walk through where the gate was.

MCGILL: OK.

HELFAND: No, can't we walk? We're not going to drive.

MCGILL: (inaudible)

HELFAND: Oh.

MCGILL: Well I take a pocketbook wherever I go. See, all this was nothing over here. And see people were -- when I'd come to walk, back then hobos would be laying down there and they'd bathe in that creek, wash their clothes down there in that creek we just crossed. There always was some hobos under that bridge during the depression. You see, this is where the gate was and you went in this gate and then you walked down there and turned up and that walk went around the mill, see. I should've brought my walking stick with me, but I 00:22:00didn't. Let's see what it -- what's it say on the front of that building? What does it say on the front of that building? Can you read it from here?

HELFAND: Barron Flo-tech.

MCGILL: What?

HELFAND: It says Barron Flo-tech.

MCGILL: It looks like a team -- it looks like it's got a teamsters emblem above it, don't it.

HELFAND: It does. I don't think that is right.

MCGILL: It looks like a teamsters emblem though don't it, from here. Doesn't it?

HELFAND: It does.

MCGILL: It looks like a clock or -- no, it's a clock I guess. But you see there was a fence. All this was fenced in. See that's still more of the mill up there. Barron Flo-tech, I don't know what that means. I wonder what kind of work that is. It sounds like it has something to do with [TCH?]. I see they got part of that released. That weave shop was right in there, in that section 00:23:00down there was the weave shop. That little old store was right up there just where you got to that street. It sat right up there. Look at the mailboxes. There must be a lot of offices in there. Let's see, HW Wilson, [Aaron Craft Instrument?], Birmingham Computer, [BEI?]. There's a lot of things in there. [Vance?] too, that's their mailbox -- Birmingham Cabinet Company, [Mengly Brothers, Jeff Cole?], a lot of businesses in there now aren't there. That's all of them businesses that are in there now. But there wasn't nothing over here, nothing but open spaces. That's new there, I mean since I was here, that part here built behind that office.

HELFAND: So was this a gate over here --

MCGILL: No, there was no gate here. There was only a gate there. Trucks and things had to go in around the back. There was fences. All this property was fenced in.

HELFAND: Could you saw something like this was the Selma Manufacturing Company 60 years ago when I was here and --

MCGILL: Yeah, I came to work here. I guess it was 1929 when I came to work here at the Selma Manufacturing Company --

HELFAND: We're just going to --

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MCGILL: -- came to work here in 19--

HELFAND: One sec. OK, ready.

MCGILL: I came to work here in 1929, the Selma Manufacturing Company. A man had some mills in Mississippi and he called this the Selma Manufacturing Company. I don't know why but when you say that people thinks it means Selma, Alabama, but it's called Selma Manufacturing Company. A man names Ames owned it. It 00:25:00was privately owned. He had a mill over in Mississippi somewhere. And we worked 60 hours a week. And I worked the night shift, six at night 'til six in the morning. It took me two hours by streetcar to get to work in the evening, to get here by six o'clock, because I had to walk about -- from the car line about a mile to catch the car and then I had to transfer in Birmingham to go out to the Ensley Highlands. And in the, uh, uh, evening, I could get to work faster, but in the morning the streetcars didn't run as regular and it took me longer in the morning to get home than it did at night to get to work.

HELFAND: Could you say that -- can you give us a little orientation about, again, like just sort of where the strikers might have stood in 1934.

MCGILL: Well it was down there at the gate because the area was fenced in and you didn't have such a thing as called like a picket line, but you had pickets at the gate. We didn't have too many trouble. Only one time did people try to scab and go in. And a few of them got in, but didn't enough to get in to do any work or anything. And we didn't have to really -- we had no trouble on our picket line. We had no trouble with the law, no violence, and never had any fights or anything down here because like I told you before, most of these people here weren't really -- they were just -- you might say temporary workers. They didn't have no stake in the company. I had only been here, see, a couple of three years. Very few people had any seniority in there 00:27:00because they would work a while because it was not a good place to work. No textile mill was, but this was really a bad place to work. Yeah we're near the airport. It's right near the airport.

HELFAND: Why don't we just take a little -- it would just be nice to just be able to film you walking a little bit around here. Maybe we'll sing one song.

MCGILL: Well it's not even like it. It's not even --

HELFAND: It's not even close to it, huh?

MCGILL: No. This building here is the only thing that -- I don't believe nothing's going on inside that tonight. It seems like there's several businesses in there from that indication.

M1: Eula, does this being here, does this bring back --

MCGILL: Naw, don't feel no relationship to it whatsoever.

M1: But how about to the strike and to the picket like? I mean that was your first activity in the union movement, doesn't it --

MCGILL: Not activity, but it was the first strike I was involved in. Like I 00:28:00said, I've been sung the union praises since I was a kid.

M1: Isn't there something special --

MCGILL: -- in Gadsden.

M1: -- about your first picket line? I mean, doesn't it bring back something?

MCGILL: No, no, I've been on so many since then for other people that, uh -- I've been on a lot more active picket lines than this one. I've been in jail a lot of times since then off of picket lines too.

M1: This is the beginning of it all.

MCGILL: Yeah, right here, as far as my activity -- direct activity in the labor movement.

HELFAND: Can you say that, that it began right here?

MCGILL: Yeah, right here is where my involvement -- activity in the labor movement started outside of just sympathy. And then I was directly involved here. And when we in to ask him for bargaining -- we organized and went in to ask him for recognition, he shut the mill down, we didn't strike. He shut 00:29:00down on us. He locked us out. And we put up picket lines so he couldn't operate to protect our jobs, but we did not strike because he locked us out. He went on strike against us. And we stayed out until the end of -- then the general textile strike until we said our strike was over and went back like we came out. Of course, we didn't gain anything out of the strike here. I'll say this for posterity. A lot of people say the 1934 strike, to me, it was not a strike, it was a failure. They say it's a failure. To me it was not a failure. Alabama gained some good, strong, viable local unions out of that strike in Huntsville, Jasper, Cordova, Winfield, Prattville, Anniston, just to 00:30:00bring some to mind that I know in north Alabama and stayed -- some of them lasted for 30 -- 40 years until the industry began to have competition so they had to close.

HELFAND: Let's take a walk past this -- across the office.

MCGILL: I don't think we -- there's probably a watchman there. But I don't think -- if he comes down, we'll tell him what we're doing. I'll tell him. I think there's a watchman there, I see a truck. But they don't have no sign posted no trespassing do they. They must have wanted to rent that there. See that part down there was the weave shop. It sure looks -- the 00:31:00ground sure looked prettier than what they did back then, I can tell you that. There weren't any grass, there weren't any bushes, and there weren't any trees, just old bare dirt. Nobody had any pride in the plant. I had pneumonia. I've still got some congestion. I don't think this -- I don't think this walkway was here at that time. I think that was the only entrance. I think the fence went through here and I don't believe this walkway was here going into the front gate. (inaudible) It seems like to me at that time that the walkway 00:32:00right down here because it seemed like I was walking down when he picked on the window to tell me I was fired. It seemed like the air conditioning of course wasn't there. We didn't have air conditioning back then. But I think there was a walkway that went right down through here that we walked to around to get in the plant.

HELFAND: Do you think it was over here that pecked on the window?

MCGILL: Yeah I think it was that window right there, see. And I wasn't that far away I don't believe because he picked on the window and I went in the back door and around there.

HELFAND: Mike, come here. Eula, could you say that one more time. That's kind of amazing.

MCGILL: I said there was a walkway here and when I was walking to go in the plant he picked on the window and called me in and asked me -- said, "I didn't think we had a union here." And I said, "We don't." And he asked me what I was doing in this thing I went to in Washington. And so that's when I got fired. I was allowed to go up and get my work shoes, but anyhow -- but of course the air conditioning wasn't there because we didn't have air conditioning. And I really don't remember this being two stories. I will say, I don't remember that stairs there. I don't believe it was but one story. I could be mistaken, but I don't believe -- there was one story to this office at the time.

HELFAND: So have you -- so you got fired at that point, then that was it.

MCGILL: That's it. That's all she wrote.

HELFAND: Not all she wrote.

MCGILL: He did me a good favor, got me out of this textile -- cotton mill. I'm dignifying it by calling it a textile mill. It was a cotton mill and a bad one at that.

HELFAND: Sing Hey Boss Man right now.

MCGILL: See all that's union over there, [Red Diamonds Union?]. The man who owns that Red Diamond, Bill Smith, he's had that A+ for trying to improve education in Alabama. That Red Diamond Coffee company, all of this is -- just about everything over here is organized. Red Diamond -- Bill Smith -- Red Diamond -- that's a Birmingham product, Red Diamond Coffee and Tea. It's the best tea. It will not cloud. It's the best tea made I think. I sent it to my granddaughter out in Texas. I didn't know Red Diamond was here, I 00:35:00thought they'd be on the Vanderbilt Road beyond here.

HELFAND: Eula, if all of these -- if this industry around here is all organized, you should feel pretty good coming back to this mill.

MCGILL: Well this was union. It was a mill later on. It was a union inn and the local was recognized and operated under contract. I was away from here. I don't ever know anybody that worked here. [Lloyd Davis?] told me about when he was still here. I know -- today is Lloyd's birthday and he's gone to Huntsville, but I would like you all to talk to Lloyd a little bit. It'd make him feel good. He's kindly out of it, can't remember nothing, but I would like you to recognize because he was one of the participants in the 1934 strike in Columbus, Georgia. Yeah, he was one of the old survivors. Of course he went into work -- he went into World War II and went to work to haze our crowd. He 00:36:00worked for a while as an organizer for the textile workers union. But that was his job. He was the loom fixer in the cotton mill in Columbus, Georgia -- I mean, down in Fairfax, down in Nevada.

HELFAND: Let's do one thing. I'm going to ask you [break in video] to walk around. (inaudible)

MCGILL: I know I was going to live as long as I took better care of myself.

HELFAND: What was that?

MCGILL: I said if I've known I was going to live this long I would've took better care of myself. Just think, 60 years, you know, 60 years, a little more 00:37:00than that because I'll be -- no, it's 60 years because I'll be 83 and I was 23. I'll be 83 the fifteenth of May. I don't remember when I got fired. I don't remember -- I think we went -- I think we went up there in June. I know it was in the summer and I got fired after I come back. But I'll tell you it was one of the -- getting fired because like my mother said, I was going to eat and sleep some way and that trip to Washington was worth getting fired for, to get to sit down and talk to Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt and Eleanor Roosevelt and spending that week in the White House. It was certainly worth getting fired.

HELFAND: Was it worth it also because you believed in the union and you believed in your ideas?

MCGILL: Well of course, but nobody -- very few every day, common people has ever spent a week in the White House, you know. You might get to go in and tour the first floor, but we had run of the house, so it's quite different.

HELFAND: Did you tell FDR about the strike or any of your thoughts about it or labor?

MCGILL: No, when we went in and talked to him, we was talking to him about an [Ellenbogen?] textile bill that was trying to get passed. That's what we went into talk to Franklin D about. We were trying to get a bill passes to set wages and hours for the textile industry. And he said, "Well girls, just give me a little time. I think we've got something better than that coming up." So when I come out, I said, "Aw, just another politician putting us off," to myself. But it was a black contract which gives us wages and hours that covered all industries.

HELFAND: Could you sing Hey Boss Man out here.

MCGILL: (singing) "Hey boss man, won't you hear me when I call. You're not so big, you're just tall, that's all." Well let's go kid. I tell you, it sure does look better out here. There wasn't no trees, there wasn't no grass, there was no -- just an old bare mill with a fence around it, like you was in the penitentiary was all it was, like you was in the penitentiary. Yeah, all of everything out here is organized now, Red Diamond. You all ready, anything else? There seems to be a lot of little industries in here. I don't know, I have to --

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MCGILL: When you come out of this plant after being in that hot, it was cold there, you'd be sweating.

HELFAND: You just stay there one second.

M1: You were saying?

MCGILL: I was saying you'd come the mill, it'd be hot in there so you had to have a certain humidity. And you come out, even in the summertime, and hit this air, your clothes would be wet with sweat and you'd almost chill when you'd walk out of the mill, even in the hot summertime. Get off at ten o'clock at night after we went on eight hours a day. After the NRA went on eight hours a day, I worked from two in the afternoon until ten at night. OK?

HELFAND: That's great.

MCGILL: I'm going to go and tell that man over there what we're doing. I 00:42:00know he's curious. Turn your lights on. That's that Alabama cab company, I saw their address of Vanderbilt Road and that's where it is. That's the cab company. I call the cab sometime --

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HELFAND: Guys.

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MCGILL: -- in '29 it was a cotton mill and we organized a union and we had a strike, we lost, we had to go back. But later on, I was still active in the union and I went to Washington and I got wrote up in a newspaper. When I come back, the old boss come up, Ames owned the company, come up and fired me. That was 60 years ago and he'd done me the best favor he'd ever done me. So we're making a movie about the '34 textile strike and they're down from 00:43:00New York University and that's why I came out -- brought them out here to show them where we all were. Now it looks a lot different. It looked more like a jailhouse then.

M2: yeah

MCGILL: Because there was no trees, no grass, there was a fence around it.

M2: Pretty much was a sweatshop.

MCGILL: And filthy and dirty. It was like a hobo -- nobody would work here long. They'd just work long enough to get a payday and leave.

HELFAND: Did you ever hear about the '34 strike?

MCGILL: No.

M2: No, but the gentleman that owns the building now probably knows a lot about that.

MCGILL: How old is he?

M2: He's -- I believe he's almost 70 now -- 65 -- 70.

MCGILL: Oh well he's a spring chicken then. When I worked out here I was 22 years old. And you couldn't get much jobs and I went -- in 1931 when I turned 21 years old, I was working right here 60 hours a week for five dollars and ten 00:44:00cents a week. I borrowed a dollar and a half to pay my poll tax and I joined the Democratic Party and the union and I didn't go nowhere but up after that.

M2: I hear you.

MCGILL: He'd done me a favor. He did me -- I didn't have guts enough to quit and try to look for something else so I'm glad he fired me and I had to.

M2: That's right, give you a little ambition. I know where you're coming from. The same thing happened to me about eight years ago and I've been working here ever since, doing a lot better.

MCGILL: I don't believe that second floor -- I told them -- see, there used to be a walkway. I walked right by there and the old owners knocked on the window and called me in and said, "I didn't know we had a union here." I said, "We don't." "What's this thing you've been to in Washington." And his daughter thought it was wonderful. You know, she wanted to find out what all happened up there. She told her to shut her mouth. But she thought that it was wonderful that I got to go to Washington and stay at the White House for a week. That's how I got fired. It got broke in the newspapers --

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HELFAND: (inaudible)

F: Hi Susanne, we're really sorry.

M1: We're really sorry. We let us all down in terms of restricting --

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HELFAND: (inaudible)

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