The Vacuum Cleaner Department

((A Chick Evens Story, 1966) (out of Minnesota))


They had brought in a ‘minute-man’ into the Vacuum Cleaner Department of the factory, third floor (off Arcade Street, St. Paul, Minnesota, in the summer of 1966).
They are the efficiency experts—as most everyone knows. His job is to come into our area of work with his time-watch on, set it accordingly, ready to click it at any given moment. And then simply stand about—timing you.
Let me explain: if you can staple together with the standup (ten-foot tall) staple machine—more boxes in less time, all the better (boxes for vacuum cleaner that is)— His question is, or will be to himself: “Is Mr. Chick Evens doing all he can do?”
Consequently, a portion of Mr. Evens’ pay is based on piece-work.
Well, he stands by the staple machine clicks that watch to go, counts “one second, two seconds, three seconds—one box, two boxes…) times me. He says “Just be natural!” (He doesn’t mean that, he simply says that.)
Then when I stop to go to the toilet, he questions if it should have taken me three minutes or seven minutes? (Which it took me all of seven minutes to do what was natural. And had I had to do—a number one and number two, all in one setting, he might have had to reset his watch.) In any case, He also questions if I really should have stopped for five-minutes to help my fellow worker (perhaps thinking, it’s someone else’s job, which perhaps it is.) He says nonetheless (placing it in a different category) “You don’t get paid for gossip, you could have stapled twenty-boxes in the time you stopped to chitchat... (two minutes had elapsed).”
He now sees your face is annoyed with him, and says, “There are plenty of people out of work, god knows, so don’t get smart with me fellow!”


No: 540 (12-5-2009) SA (the second part has been left out of this story)