Old porcelain plant sign

This popped up on CL.
I guess in 1920 Human Resources didn't cover it in the employee handbook in orientation on the first day.

maynah said:

This popped up on CL.
I guess in 1920 Human Resources didn't cover it in the employee handbook in orientation on the first day.

Click to expand...

They made capacitors in that plant.

They definately got discharged...

That sign dates to an era when men often settled their differences in ways that, today, would be considered 'politically incorrect'. Namely, cussing and swearing along with ethnic slurs were routine and hardly raised an eyebrow. If matters got to the next step, a fight would often occur. "Calling someone out", or taking a poke at them was commonplace years ago, and settling things 'at quitting time' or 'out back' were also commonplace.

As an example: a cousin of mine hired on at Federal Shipbuilding in Kearney, NJ during WWII. He was a boilermaker and was hiring in as a welder, having had ASME qualifications in another shop. He was hired on for the second (night) shift. After the usual quick processing-in, my cousin was introduced to a 'lead' man or foreman. This man then assigned my cousin to work with a journeyman welder for the first week to become familiar with the way things were done in the shipyard. The man my cousin was assigned to picked up on the fact my cousin was Jewish and immediately told the foreman: "I'm not working with a sheeney bastard". This remark elicited no response other than: "He's your partner, get to work." The journeyman and my cousin went aboard some ship under construction, and the journeyman was unrelenting in his insults, and hollered at my cousin to get the welding leads picked up and moved to the work location. My cousin grabbed some of the lead which had a twist-lock type connector on the end and gave it a yank and whipped it. He hit the journeyman in the face, minor damage caused. The journeyman immediately told my cousin he was a dead man come end of shift. My cousin said that was fine with him, and he'd see him in the parking lot.

Word of the impending fight travelled thru the shipyard with the speed of light, and the whole shift knew there was to be a fight in the parking lot at end of the shift. My cousin met the journeyman in the parking lot, and the crowd form a ring. The journeyman was a big slabby sort of guy with plenty of reach and muscle according to my cousin. What the journeyman had not reckoned on was the fact my cousin, who was a small and wiry man, had boxed during the Depression to put food on the table. As such, my cousin had the moves and was quick. The two men took off their coats and squared off. The crowd was going wild, all siding with the journeyman and some wagering was also going on. My cousin said the journeyman came lumbering out like a rhino and it was easy to avoid and get inside of his punches. My cousin quickly laid the journeyman out with a 3 punch combination before the guy ever landed a punch on my cousin. The journeyman was out cold, laying on the cinders of the parking lot. The crowd, who had previously been rooting for the journeyman flipped just that quick and started buddying up to my cousin.

The next night, my cousin reported for work at the shipyard. The foreman told my cousin that policy required a one week suspension without pay, probably some minimum penalty. The foreman said he knew full well what had gone down, and assured my cousin he would assign him a better partner when he returned to work. The matter ended just that quick. Imagine all that chain of events would have ignited in today's world. Sensitivity training, anti-discrimination, anti harassment, and political correctness training (whatever the flavor of the week from corporate or some consultants is) would be mandatory, as would anger management counselling and similar.
The result for the long term would have been worse in a workplace like a shipyard for someone in my cousin's situation.

Another funny incident comes to mind with that sign. It happened years ago on a powerplant job out in Wyoming where I was working as a site engineer for a contractor. We had a rowdy crew of boilermakers, some of whom were some real hard cases and brawlers. What they did on their own time was their business, and as long as they showed up on time and got the work done, that was all that mattered. One day, after lunch, the shop steward brought the boilermaker foreman into our trailer. He had hurt his hand badly and it was swollen and he could not move his fingers. The explanation given was that he had been on a ladder which had slipped and slid, landing him solidly on concrete. I asked the circumstances, as to why the ladder was not tied off or some other means used to keep it from slipping. The answer I got was that the ladder had been leaned aqainst a smooth concrete pier of a turbine pedestal and was landed on smooth concrete. They did not want to put any anchors into that finished concrete, and the foreman had climbed the ladder to mark a centerline or elevation bench on the side of the concrete pedestal. I accepted the explanation and the steward took the foreman to the local hospital ER. The foreman had busted some bones in his hand and was off work for a bit, and drew Workman's Compensation. Some short time later, the story came out. The foreman, who had a hot temper, got into a fight during lunch in the parking lot outside the project gates. He apparently slammed some other guy in the head and busted his hand doing it. At that point, things were a done deal, no calling Workman's Comp and telling them the foreman had defrauded all of us. Nothing to do but get on with the work and laugh about it. Hence, signs like the one the OP posted were there as years ago, Political Correctness, peaceful dispute resolution, and fear of arrests and lawsuits were not on most guy's radar.

My own enamel sign in the garage comes from an ancient powerplant down in Texas. It is an old workman's comp sign: "If you are injured, no matter how little, tell your foreman immediately". Same dark blue enamel background with white lettering. Another reality of the old days was on the job injuries were a lot more common.

Does "fooling" apply to management, too? Asking for a friend...

I have a porcelain sign from the manufacturing area where I used to work. Always brings a smile to my face:



The area made a blend of solvent, cellulose acetate, and plasticizers for the casting of plastic sheeting for the manufacture of photographic film(film base). The origin of the sign dates back to cellulose nitrate base that had a very similar composition to the "dope" used to coat fabric skinned aircraft.

I am always tempted just to let the dopes burn...

I was watching a video of some factory,
making car bodies I think. In the video
there was a sign in the background that said
"If you have no business here, Don't go away mad,
Just go away."
I always like that one. I think of it in my mind
from time to time, when some annoying person is
trying to talk to me. LOL

--Doozer

That sign misspells "employee".

I can vouch for the verbal and physical intimidation that went on in post WWII shipyards. Those were rough places to work and generally the guys that worked there were pretty rough too. Logging camps were the same way. In the early '70 anyone with long hair got harassed beyond belief and more than one got held down while others shaved his head. We learned to coil our hair up under our hardhats and stick together. Most of that hardass stuff was gone by the 1980s, though, at least where I worked.

metalmagpie

"Do not look at Laser with remaining eye."

"Department of Redundancy Department."

Joe in NH

We had the laser sign above for years on the wall at a shop I worked at and no one noticed it was a joke sign, (I guess they couldn't see very well out of the remaining eye) Jim

Our site has a problem with groundwater intrusion during heavy rain - after an event like that there are trash cans and buckets around in the back hallway. Occasionally a sign will appear on one of them that says :

"Plutonium Tri-arsenide. Danger do not drink."

Cool sign.