"Bob Gentry" rgentry_AT_oz_dot_net@ wrote in message
...
snip--
Machinist's Third Bedside Reader, page 139, part of "That Last Half
Thou"
Quote
This brings to mind something Bob Haralson once told me. "When I find
a man in a shop I'm runnin' who won't show an apprentice boy anything
he wants to know, I fire him".
Knowing Bob as I do, I probably needn't have asked him if he ment that
he soon found some pretext for firing the guy.
"no. I _fire_ him! " said Bob emphatically. Ive chuckled over that
many a time since.
Close Quote

That brings to mind one of the supervisors at Sperry Utah. The company was
founded in '56 expressly to build the Sergeant missile. Location was chosen
where there was a 'right to work' in an effort to get away from the horrible
union problems of the '50's, particularly on the right hand side of the US.

The machine shop was initially staffed almost entirely with locals, some of
whom were, at best, questionable as machinists. Once so staffed, company
policy was to load the shop with trainees as they went from the R&D stage
into production, so they could groom them to work to gov't requirements.
Thus, a huge number of young people were quickly hired after a 6 month crash
course at the local community college.

Imagine the need for supervision of all these young people.

The older guys that were hired in were promoted to leadman, or supervisor.
One of them, who was promoted to supervisor, and shall remain nameless, was
overseeing the drill press section, and for a brief time, the grinding
department, where I worked.

One fine day I had to engage him in conversation regards a job I was
running. I found him in the drill press section, lapping a hole with a
Deltronic pin (I told you some of them were questionable as machinists). I
don't recall how the conversation went, but along the way he told me "do you
think I'm going to teach these guys everything I know? If they knew as much
as I did, they'd have my job".

Moron!

Truth be known, for the most part, the trainees already knew as much as he
did. The lucky ones are the ones that forgot it and learned proper
procedures.

Very unlike this fool, my favorite supervisor would go far out of his way to
teach and help the young guys. He was wise enough to know that the better we
were, the better he looked.

It never ceased to amaze me how people with no skills became leaders in that
facility, although, for the most part, leaders were well qualified. Some
individuals just slipped through he cracks. The moron was one of them.

Harold