By Doris
Doris and father at the bank
Following graduation in 1953, I began working at the bank where my father had worked for 25 years. Fidelity Union Trust Company was New Jersey’s largest bank then. Banks could only operate within one county at that time and could not cross state lines. The main office was in Newark in Essex County and my job was in the Personnel Department, now known as Human Resources. There were six of us, including the Personnel Director, Mr. Weisleder, who knew me from the day I was born. So I benefited from a little nepotism plus a family friendship, no interview needed!
My job as receptionist was to greet people, give three tests, and type and file letters using carbon paper to make copies. Correcting a mistake meant making erasures on multiple copies, a messy proposition. Whiteout did not exist until it was invented by Michael Nesmith’s mother. A bit of trivia, Michael was a member of the popular rock group, the Monkees. Progress was coming, and one day some elaborate equipment was set up to replace carbon paper and whiteout. The operation of this machine was very involved, feeding paper through lights, chemicals, and some kind of liquid bath in a back room. The finished product was dark and not very readable and I thought to myself, “this will never fly.” How wrong I was, this was the genesis of the Xerox machine and the demise of carbon paper!
Our hours were the standard “9 to 5,” made popular by Dolly Parton in the movie 9 to 5 years later. We had one hour for lunch and I would go out to one of the many lunch counters nearby, sometimes with others or else alone. I loved going out to lunch! The first time I went “out to lunch” I was ten years old and a friend and I went to a restaurant at the top of a hill near my home in South Orange. I had 75 cents to spend and in 1946, that covered a roast beef sandwich (35 cents), a coke (10 cents), a hot fudge sundae (25 cents), with 5 cents left for a tip! I was very proud of myself. Today I am a much better tipper.
Every morning my father and I walked a mile to the bus stop for a 30 minute trip to Newark. After a time a small group of fellow travelers sat together in the back of the bus. It was an unusual mix and a very interesting cast of characters, brought together by our neighbor, Mrs. Dutton. Her husband had retired early so she decided to go to work as a receptionist. A woman ahead of her time. She was so outgoing that this diverse group of people bonded and enjoyed our commute together for several years.
Our group in the Personnel Department consisted of a Vice President, Personnel Director, Assistant Personnel Director, Jobs Analyst, receptionist and a Personnel Assistant/executive secretary. The job of executive secretary was the highest rung of the ladder for women in business in the 1950s. The “glass ceiling” did not exist. In our department the executive secretary was easily qualified for a true executive position and was married with a five year old son.
Women accepted these limitations. It was company policy that pregnant women would leave when they started “to show.” These were accepted conditions throughout the business world at that time.
The bank was actually a very caring place and at times carried employees at full salary during year long illnesses. My father, along with many others, was a member of the Quarter Century Club, people who had worked there for more than 25 years, some as many as 45 years, by the time they retired at 65, the mandatory retirement age. Many of these people were lifelong friends, and knew me, my father, and had known my mother. It was truly an extended family.
As a footnote to progress, a girl who was hired in 1954 in a clerical position became a Vice President in 1979, after 25 years with the company.
My immediate boss, the assistant personnel director, was quite progressive. When he needed additional workers for a temporary clerical project he recruited older women (in their forties!) from his church and through current bank employees. Most of them had been stay-at-home wives and mothers. They took to the job like ducks to water and did a terrific job. Some of them became permanent employees and voila! A new untapped workforce was born.
The bank put out a monthly magazine called The Fidelions, for which Personnel was responsible for producing articles about employees. The company paid for employees who wished to take American Institute of Banking courses.
We had a company picnic, a Miss Fidelity Union was selected, and we had a bowling team. Each week we crossed town after work by bus, ate dinner and bowled, returning home by bus, after dark, in Newark! Impossible to do now in 2019. The city has changed.
Each summer our boss would host a picnic at his family cabin at a lake in a beautiful area of New Jersey. We were after all the “Garden State!” At Christmas there would be a party at his house, including husbands and wives. Mr. Britain would ask us what we would like to have for dinner. His wife was of Swedish descent so we chose a smorgasbord — Swedish meatballs, pickled herring, etc. — without realizing just how much work was involved. A simple roast would have been a simpler choice, but that never occurred to me until Don and I were married.
Doris, Herb, and Carol
Have I mentioned that I didn’t learn to cook until I was married? My grandma and Joyce (my stepmother) cooked all of the dinners and although I loved to eat I wasn’t motivated to cook! I excelled at drying dishes — we all have talents! Doing dishes in the 1950s was a nightly ritual in most homes. There were washers and dryers and conversations covering a lot of topics. Dishwashers were coming in the future, along with with electric washing machines. My grandma used a washboard in the basement, along with a wringer washer and we dried clothes on a clothesline in the backyard using clothespins. At one point we had an actual ice box where the iceman would deliver a block of ice for refrigeration. And there were no freezers, even in our first electric refrigerator, so ice cream was a rare treat which we had after a Sunday drive to the Alderney milk barn. Sunday drives and a midday Sunday dinner were a highlight of the week. Hard to believe now but NO businesses were open on Sundays, and malls were nonexistent!
Mama Leone’s was a famous New York restaurant and our little troop from the bank decided to go there for dinner. At 17 I had not been to many restaurants so this was a very big deal, I had never seen a menu with so many choices. It was surprising to learn that spaghetti (my favorite) was only one of several courses! And then was an entire meal with dessert yet to come! My culinary education was off and running, and still continues. A funny story involving tipping at a restaurant happened on one rare occasion when the Karg family (seven of us, including Grandma) went out to dinner. Finishing dinner, we were all on the way out, when Herbie who was about five and lagging behind, came running up to my father with a dollar bill in his hand, exclaiming loudly that Daddy forgot his money! The dollar of course was the tip on a meal for seven people in 1949!
Another bank outing took us to the Empire Burlesque in Newark. I don’t recall whose idea this was but at 18 I could legally attend and Burlesque was still big in the fifties, live entertainment with funny skits and comedians and scantily clad girls. This was not to be missed! Many comedians like Bob Hope, George Burns and Gracie Allen got their start in Burlesque and went on to great success in television and movies. It was a great show live, musical and very funny, with risqué jokes that went over my head but a part of history I got to see. Here at our retirement community, American House, we have a friend whose father was on the vaudeville circuit, with his five piece band and their own troupe. Ruth’s Dad was the smallest in stature so he always had to play the girl’s part. Ruth, her mother, and sister often traveled with them and like a sponge, she can sing routines that she learned as a child around these guys who were like family. The pictures she has are priceless.