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Murphy, Bette (audio interview #2 of 6)
INTERVIEW DESCRIPTION - As before, the second interview with Murphy was conducted around her kitchen-dining room table, which was piled high with union documents. Because of her very deep involvement in the union, it was not easy to schedule interviews, but the lapse in time between interviews did not affect the rapport that was established in the first interview. She had considerably less trouble remembering details of her life in this second interview. Although we recorded for more than two hours, Murphy did not seem to tire. There is a problem with the audio quality on sides b and c, with the sound fading in and out, especially on side c.
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- 2021-04-12
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- SUBJECT BIO - Bette Murphy was one of those women who eagerly joined the ranks of defense workers in 1942, pleased to be patriotic and to leave her lower paying service job. Born in 1918 to a military family, she spent her childhood in the Philippines, Virginia and San Francisco, before the family settled in Los Angeles in the 1930s. She married an Army dental technician when she was only eighteen, and by the time they separated two years later, her daughter had been born. Murphy went to work first as a waitress, and then as a practical nurse. When the war broke out, she and her daughter were living with a family in Washington, and she served as a "nanny." When she heard about the jobs opening up at Douglas, Long Beach, she returned to southern California to seek work there. She remained at Douglas, with only a brief period of layoff after the war, until her retirement in 1978. From her earliest days at Douglas, Murphy began to recruit her fellow workers to join the union (UAW). Over the next thirty six years she held various posts in the Local and at the time of the interview she was an officer of the Retirees chapter. Because of her extensive involvement in the union, a very long oral history was undertaken with Murphy, whose bright red hair earned the nickname, Red. (In all 14 hours were recorded in the course of six interviews.) Because of her busy schedule, it took a full nine months to complete the first four interviews, Then, an impending strike in 1980 and various health problems led to a one year hiatus in the interviews. Despite the long interruption, the rapport that had been established initially, made the resumption of interviews relatively easy. The interviewers own union activity contributed to this rapport, and to Murphy's candor about the problems she had with her union over the years. TOPICS - menstruation; gender expectations; physical activities; dating; courtship; husband; marital relationship; family life; socioeconomic status; living arrangements and housing; and work as practical nurse;practical nursing; hiring process, Douglas; work clothing; production work roles; wartime security; production process; work injuries; training; and working conditions; Note: the audio quality of this interviewwages; labor force demographics; promotions; training; working conditions; unionism; union organizing; UAW vs; IAM; UAW election; UAW maintenance of membership agreements; domestic responsibilities; and postwar laworking conditions; gender and race relations; sexual harassment; labor force demographics; union organizing, UAW; social activities; marital relationship; postwar layoffs; postwar employment; and work in El Segunpostwar work at Douglas; postwar layoffs; UAW; family life; daughter; family history; parenting; domestic responsibilities; work hours; job classifications; social activities; rationing; and patriotism;
- *** File: rrrbmurphy4.mp3 Audio Segments and Topics: (0:00-4:00)... Murphy's mother did not talk to her about menstruation and she died just before Murphy started her period. Murphy occasionally talked to an older girlfriend about menstruation, but she did not understand why it happened. She finally learned the details during her third cycle when a teacher pulled her aside to tell her that her sanitary materials were protruding from her clothing and should be worn less conspicuously. Although Murphy viewed menstruation as a normal part of life, she also saw it as one more thing she "had to learn how to handle." She never considered talking to her father about menstruation or sex because he was strict about his children behaving modestly while in his home. Her own experiences convinced her that she would talk to her children about these topics when it was appropriate. (4:00-6:03)... She enjoyed athletic activities like tennis and basketball when she was a young girl. Her parents did not object to her being physically active or think that her activities were inappropriate for a girl. After her mother died, however, Murphy began playing touch football with the boys and girls who lived on the army base. She believes that her mother would not have found this sporting activity very ladylike. (6:03-13:45)... She met her future husband on the tennis court when she was about fifteen years old. Although her siblings knew she was dating, she did not tell her father because he would have forbidden the relationship. They were married by the justice of the peace about a year into their relationship while her husband was stationed in San Diego. Murphy loved her husband and describes him as a loving and warm man who was very athletic and clean cut. She saw marriage as one way to get away from her father's house. Even after her husband returned to San Pedro, she stayed in San Diego to avoid her father. She lived there for about six months and supported herself as a live-in domestic. When she returned to San Pedro, she and her husband rented a small house and lived there for approximately one year. She enjoyed being a housewife, but finances were tight. When she got pregnant, they decided to move in with her father in order to minimize their financial burdens. (13:45-17:34)... She and her husband separated when their daughter was about two years old (around 1938). They separated because of financial reasons. Murphy realized that her husband would never be able to provide her with the kind of lifestyle she desired, which included owning a home and staying home with her child. When the family moved from San Pedro to Lomita, she began working as a part-time waitress for George and Irene Stewart, the proprietors of a restaurant located at the 22nd Street landing. She worked there for a little over a year and then decided to move in with her sister's employers and take classes at LBCC. (17:34-24:38)... Murphy received nursing assignments from Doctors Pillsbury and Van Dyke or from mothers for whom she previously worked. Working special cases provided her with an income of $25 a week and more than $20 in tips. Most cases required that she be on call for twenty-four hours, which is why eight-hour shifts at Douglas appealed to her. Typically, special case assignments lasted two weeks, but could run up to eight weeks. In addition to providing nursing care, she was occasionally responsible for cooking and cleaning for her patients. She describes her experiences witnessing her first delivery. Normally, she was not present during labor and delivery, but provided post-delivery nursing care for mothers and their children. (24:38-28:14)... Murphy talks about the custody problems she had with her husband after they divorced, and an incident that led her to kidnap her daughter from her husband's home in Colorado. In retrospect, Murphy thinks that her actions were dishonest even though she had legal custody of her daughter. (28:14-30:20)... She describes her responsibilities during the ten-month position with the Harris family in Seattle. The Harris's were wealthy people who wanted their perfectly healthy children to be well cared for. Even though Murphy was expected to provide care for the family around the clock, she enjoyed the work because her daughter was with her. Occasionally, she and her daughter took the day off and visited friends in Bremerton, but most of the time they spent their free time at the Harris home. End of tape. *** File: rrrbmurphy5.mp3 (0:00-3:14)... Murphy continues to discuss her position with the Harris family in Seattle. She decided to return to California when a girlfriend told her that Douglas was paying women .60 cents an hour. The work also appealed to Murphy because the hours would enable her to spend more time with her daughter. When she returned to California, she figured that she would work in defense for the duration of the war, after which she would enroll in nursing courses and continue her career in that field. She felt a little guilty going to work at Douglas because there was a shortage of nurses during the war. Douglas management offered her a job in the dispensary; however, her thoughts were "If I'm going to work in the war effort, I'm going to be Rosie the Riveter." (3:14-6:33)... Murphy applied for a job at Douglas at a makeshift office in a car dealership on Long Beach Boulevard. The interview process lasted three days and involved interviewing, taking an examination and a physical, and a lot of waiting. The office was a "mad house" and crowded with applicants seeking positions at Douglas. After she turned down a position in the dispensary, she was assigned to work as a riveter. She had no idea what riveting was and it did not matter. She was so excited about earning money and spending more time with her daughter that she "could do it no matter what the heck it was." (6:33-14:02)... Murphy began working at Douglas about five days after she was hired. She moved her family from Lomita to a three-bedroom home on Orange Avenue in Long Beach so that she could be close to work. She took a bus to work on her first day and then arranged to carpool to work with coworkers. She was required to wear coveralls and Oxford shoes to work. She also had to wear her hair up. When she arrived at the plant, she went to the personnel office where she signed papers and obtained an identification badge. A bus then transported her and a group of new employees to Building 12 where she was assigned to rivet and buck panels in the fuselage section of B17 aircraft. She recalls the lighting in the plant made people look like "zombies." When Murphy was given her assignment she thought "Gee whiz this is really something. I believe that I have bitten off more than I can chew here." She was overwhelmed by the plant and nervous about the work. She did not want to make any mistakes for fear that she would be labeled a saboteur because security was so tight during the war. She talks about an incident in which she accidentally damaged a B17 skin and feared that she would be jailed. (14:02-17:33)... She describes the skills involved in riveting and bucking. A riveter would warn a bucker who was working on the other side of the panel by tapping the skin. She thought that bucking was a little more difficult than riveting because she frequently had to work in uncomfortable positions. It was also a bit more dangerous because if she did not hear the riveter tapping the skin she would get hit by the rivet gun. She talks about the injuries she incurred working as both a riveter and a bucker. (17:33-22:09)... When she started at Douglas, she was shown how to clean out holes in panels and then how to rivet. A short time later, another individual was assigned to work along side her bucking rivets. Murphy started bucking a couple of weeks later. The rivet gun was a heavy instrument and awkward to operate at first. However, she was less concerned about the weight of the gun than making a mistake and ruining a panel. As her skills improved, she began to appreciate the work she was doing. She describes the way the work was organized in each section. She could easily finish an entire panel in an eight-hour shift. There were ladders and scaffolding placed at certain sections of the aircraft for people to use when completing their jobs. (22:09-24:33)... She recalls her initial reaction to the noise level and lighting in the plant. The earplugs she wore blocked out some of the noise. Some people also wore custom-made headsets for this purpose. She started working at Douglas in December 1942. Although the temperature outside the plant was cold, the temperature inside the plant was comfortable. She was "impressed with the way people were trying to get a job done....People were dedicated." (24:33-26:41)... She preferred riveting to bucking. However, both jobs required that she work in awkward and uncomfortable positions. In some instances, she had to crawl into very tight spaces and would occasionally get cuts on her arms and legs. Her work was much easier when she had a good partner. She would switch off between bucking and riveting in order to be fair and give her partner a break from bucking. (26:41-29:11)... Murphy was "rung out" at the end of her first day of work. Even though "I didn't know if I was going to be able to hack it or not, I kept going back." Her arms ached because of the repetitive motion and the weight of the rivet gun. She was not mentally or physically prepared for the work or given any formal job training. The men she worked with simply introduced her to the rivet gun and its accompanying equipment, and she was shown how and where to use it. She did not practice on any panels, but immediately started riveting panels on the production line. (29:11-30:21)... When she arrived in her assigned section, she was introduced to her foreman who then took her to her leadman. Her leadman then introduced her to the two men with whom she worked for the first couple of weeks at the plant. She gradually met her coworkers once she got acclimated to the work. When she was a supervisor, she made it a point to introduce new employees to their coworkers. However, during the war they did not have time to do this because they were preoccupied with getting the work done. End of tape. *** File: rrrbmurphy6.mp3 (0:00-0:54)... Note: the audio quality in this segment is poor. The personnel office provided Murphy with a slip of paper denoting the department in which she was assigned. A bus transported her to Building 12, at which time she met her foreman who then introduced her to her leadman. The leadman then assigned her to work with two men who showed her how to rivet. (0:54-1:54)... Murphy was told about company policies during the interview process. There were no medical benefits available for employees; however, she was told her that a dispensary was located at the plant in case she was ever injured. Employees received job reviews every sixteen weeks and they received a .025 cent raise if they passed their review. (1:54-6:01)... She liked her work and progressed fairly quickly. She was promoted to an installer about a year after she started at Douglas and her wages increased .10 to .15 cents more per hour. A short time later, she was promoted to be a fabricator. The company reclassified this job and combined the fabricating and installing positions into one. Murphy worked with a partner in these operations and they finished a section in an eight-hour shift. It was important that they meet this production schedule so that the rest of the employees working on the line could meet their production schedules. (6:01-7:20)... She was surprised to see as many men as she did when she started at Douglas in December 1942. Most of the men were older and some were 4Fs. The company spent the previous year hiring women in clerical capacities. However, Murphy was one of the first groups of women hired in manufacturing at Douglas. She estimates that during the war the work force was eighty to ninety percent women. (7:20-10:27)... Employees received breaks throughout the day. Murphy and her partner socialized while they worked and their leadman had no problems with that as long as they got the work done. Some of her coworkers were not as mechanical as she was and had a difficult time adjusting to the work. Murphy and her partner occasionally helped others with their work in order to keep the production line moving. A lot of her coworkers were from Midwestern states and the work, as well as the pay, was new to them. They wanted to do a good job, but some of them were treated unfairly and afraid to speak up for themselves. Murphy digresses regarding her promotion to a C job classification as a lead person. Her training for this position involved learning how to read a production chart and interpret project sketches. (10:27-19:38)... Murphy's upbringing as an "army brat" with access to medical, dental, and pension benefits made her think that the lack of employee benefits at Douglas was unfair. Around 1943, she began working as a union organizer for the UAW which she believed was a more progressive and militant union than the IAM. She secretly organized employees both in and outside the work place and collected union dues of .50 cents a month. During this period, Murphy was working as a riveter earning .95 cents an hour and also training as a lower level lead person. She felt she deserved $1 an hour and pestered her foreman until she got the raise. She was told not to tell anyone that she was making $1 because she was the only one in her department earning that amount. At that point, she began dedicated organizing for the union and encouraging her coworkers to stand up for their rights. (She digresses regarding the cooperation between the IAM and UAW when negotiating contracts.) (19:38-23:25)... Murphy continues a discussion on union activities at Douglas. In particular, she focuses on the UAW election in 1944. She also attempts to explain how employees who signed maintenance of membership agreements were transferred into the UAW following the election. (23:25-30:33)... Murphy describes what a typical day was like for her in terms of managing her domestic and job responsibilities. Towards the end of the war, Murphy was transferred into "pick up" work which involved fixing or repairing portions of the B17 that failed inspection. Employees at Douglas were laid off after V-J Day was declared. "They went out in droves....It was sad because a lot of them did not know what they were going to do." Murphy was not sure what she was going to do after the war. As the interview ends, she is discussing miscellaneous topics including her second marriage. End of tape. *** File: rrrbmurphy7.mp3 (0:00-5:35)... Douglas employees received two ten-minute breaks and a forty-five-minute lunch break. The plant was equipped with a small canteen that was located outside the building. Murphy disliked the canteen and thought the environment was unpleasant. Most the time, she packed her lunch and ate it at her work station, but when she became a UAW organizer, she spent her lunch breaks eating with other workers, trying to organize and recruit them. Employees were allowed to take restroom breaks at any time. Smoking was not allowed in the plant and people often broke the rules by smoking in the bathroom. Eventually, the plant hired restroom matrons and then women security guards to patrol the women's restroom. Reprimands were frequently handed out because of smoking violations. A substantial amount of the grievances that Murphy handled involved smoking violations. (5:35-9:59)... Some male supervisors at Douglas exploited young and attractive women by offering them raises and promotions in exchange for dates. This behavior angered Murphy because she felt that no woman should have to sleep with a man in order to get a job. People from Oklahoma and Arkansas seemed like foreigners to Californians. The farmers from Midwestern states had a difficult time adjusting to production work. Murphy does not recall there being any racial problems at Douglas. There were a couple of Black women in her crew, but generally, there were very few Black and Mexican women employed at Douglas during the war. Later, when she went to work at the El Segundo plant, there were departments staffed only by Blacks. The work in these departments was mainly non-mechanical, some of which required the use of dangerous chemicals. (9:59-12:28)... Murphy continues her discussion on gender relations and sexual harassment in the workplace. When women talked to her about sexual harassment, she encouraged them to join the UAW because she thought the union would protect women in these instances. (12:28-14:39)... Murphy was sworn in as an official member of the UAW. When she first joined the union, she did not think about running for an office and was concerned only with getting union representation for herself and her fellow coworkers. She did not attend meetings on a regular basis, but continued to organize for the UAW and pay her union dues. She was aware that some union representatives were members of the Communist party. She was interested in attending CP meetings because she believed their ideals were progressive, but people warned her that if she got involved with the group in any way she may get into trouble. (14:39-21:19)... Murphy worked eight to ten hours days during the war. On her days off, she enjoyed going to nightclubs and dance halls with her girlfriends. At this time, she met her second husband, who was a third class radio man in the US Navy. They dated for about a year before marrying in 1944. For the most of their marriage, he was away at sea and came home on leave for only two or three days at a time. During this period, Murphy and her family purchased a three-bedroom home in Long Beach with a $200 down payment that Murphy got by selling her car. When her husband returned home at the end of the war, his personality had changed and he was no longer sexually attracted to Murphy. They separated two months later and divorced in 1946. (21:19-26:33)... When the war ended with Europe, Murphy was working as an installer and fabricator at Douglas, Long Beach. As the workload decreased there, she was among a group of workers to the El Segundo plant to complete production there. She anticipated that she would eventually get laid off and thought that she would be content as a housewife. She figured that her husband would get a job with the California branch of American Can Company or they would move to Maryland. She was one of the last employees to be laid off at Douglas in 1945. She collected unemployment until she divorced her husband, at which time she got a job at a market. In 1946, she was offered a position at Douglas in the Santa Monica plant. (26:33-30:43)... When Murphy went to work at the Santa Monica plant, she was hired into an A classified job and worked on the emergency exits of DC6 aircraft, earning .10 cents an hour more than the man who trained her. She carpooled to work with five men and remembers that the length of the drive was horrible. The plant was organized by the IAM and she joined the union and paid dues. She took an honorable withdrawal from the UAW so that she would not have to pay union dues there. While working in Santa Monica, she was recalled to the Long Beach plant as a B classified assembler. End of tape. *** File: rrrbmurphy8.mp3 (0:00-4:52)... Murphy and her father shared household expenses when they lived together in Long Beach. After the war ended, Murphy was transferred to the Santa Monica plant and took a cut in pay of about .30 cents per hour. The UAW seniority contract stipulated that she would lose her seniority if she did not return to the Long Beach plant, or was not offered a job, within two years. When she left Long Beach, she was categorized as an honorable withdrawal and was placed on a recall list. According to the UAW contract, she was obligated to accept recall within seven days or lose seniority. When she was recalled to Long Beach in 1947, she was reassigned to Building 12 where she was worked on a spares project cutting chains for gas caps on B26 aircraft. She did not complain because jobs were scarce and she felt fortunate to have a job. When she was promoted to an A job classification, she began working on larger spare components. (4:52-10:46)... After working ten hours a day, Murphy came home and usually prepared dinner for her family. Murphy's youngest sister (Rosemary) and daughter (Mary Beth) also cooked and shopped for the family . Murphy's father was always there for the girls and Mary Beth considered him both a father and grandfather. Her father was very strict with younger sister, Rosemary, and she ran away from home at the age of twelve. When she was found a few days later, Murphy's father sent her to the Church of Good Shepherds in Los Angeles. She came home for Christmas, when she was fourteen, and stole Murphy's jewelry and money and ran away with her boyfriend. Murphy felt guilty for not being a mother to Rosemary and often had nightmares about Rosemary living a life of prostitution. When Rosemary was twenty-one years old, she wrote Murphy a letter informing her that she was living with her husband and child in Minnesota. (10:46-13:39)... Murphy's daughter adjusted well after Rosemary left home. In some respects, she assumed a mother role for the family, often telling her grandfather and mother what to do. Murphy was not strict with her daughter because she did not want her to rebel. She raised her daughter to live a moral, Christian life and encouraged her to pursue a college education. When Mary Beth was seventeen and still in high school, she wanted to marry her boyfriend so that she could start a family. Murphy approved the marriage on the condition that she wait until after she graduated from high school. When Mary Beth graduated, she joined her boyfriend in Montana and the two married. (13:39-15:24)... Even when she was working ten hours a day six days a week, Murphy managed to do her family's laundry and clean the house. During the war, she worked the day shift. After the war, when she was working on the "shakedown" of DC10s, she worked the pre-shift, during which she came in at 2:00 a.m., and occasionally worked two shifts that amounted to sixteen-hour days. (15:24-19:07)... Murphy describes the job classification process at Douglas during the war; after the union organized the plant, the process changed. Leads often were responsible for completing both the administrative tasks required in their supervisory positions as well as the production work for which they were classified. Murphy believes that she was the first woman promoted to a lead position at Douglas during the war. As the number of employees grew, Douglas promoted women into lead positions. The women frequently exceeded the quality of work performed by their male counterparts. Employees were not promoted based on seniority during the war. During the postwar layoffs, Murphy, along with some other women initially were retained on skeleton crews. When she was finally laid off, at least one woman she worked with received recall rights. (19:07-20:51)... During the war, her social activities included visiting girlfriends and occasionally dating. She enjoyed participating USO activities in Long Beach and Los Angeles. Douglas also organized big band performances at the plant for employees to watch during their lunch breaks. For the most part, however, Murphy was very busy during the war and usually spent her day off doing household chores. (20:51-22:43)... Rationing was not a difficult adjustment for Murphy because she her family was use to scrounging around for things. They always seemed to be short on meat rations because her father liked to eat meat. She had an abundance of C rations for gasoline because she had a car and worked in defense. She liked to save up C rations and used food rations to purchase alcohol and cigarettes so that her brother could enjoy himself when he was home on leave from the Merchant Marines. She also kept her eye out for young, single women at Douglas so that she could set them up with her brother. (22:43-26:15)... Murphy worked seven years without taking any time off. She liked to use her accumulated vacation pay to purchase household items such as a refrigerator and a stove. The burden of work and home responsibilities left her feeling tired at the end of the week. However, "I felt good about what I was doing and I was very pleased that I could earn enough money to have my little girl with me and support her." She also felt proud that she was doing her part for the war effort. By the time the war ended, she had not made any decisions about returning to school to pursue a career in nursing. With this in mind, she returned to Douglas in 1947 and was determined to get the best job there. She remembers feeling dejected when Douglas began scrapping B17s when the war ended. (26:15-27:19)... There were Women's Counselors at Douglas; and in order to get approval to take time off, Murphy had to go to a counselor to get approval. She could not recall anything else that prompted her or her co-workets to seek a counselor's assistance. She quips that the company did not provide anything that could "take the place of a good solid [union] contract." (27:19-30:08)... She was very patriotic during the war and did what she could to aid the war effort. Her life was very busy and it was all about work. She probably would have had a much more difficult time raising and supporting her daughter without her father's assistance. She digresses regarding a close friend who also was working and raising a daughter during the war. Occasionally, Murphy and a group of girlfriends went out to dinner in their spare time. (30:08-30:39)... There were older women who worked in Murphy's section. The leadmen were a little impatient with them, as were some of the younger girls. The older women wanted to do a good job and the way they were treated frustrated Murphy because when she started at the plant she "didn't know a damn thing" either. End of tape.
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