Home Town Makes Good

On his way west to trouble-shoot a critical manpower problem at Boeing Aircraft Co.'s plant (Renton, Wash.), WPB Chairman Julius A. Krug is stopping off this week in his home town of Madison, Wis. The citizens have something for him to see. They want to show him the R.M.R. Corp. plant, where practically everybody in Madison works at one time or another, turning out special batteries for Army walkie-talkie sets.

Over a year ago the Army moved the Crown Can Co. from its Madison plant to make way for the newly formed R.M.R. Corp., a subsidiary of RayOVac Co. R.M.R. had the scientists, the know-how and the Army orders for a new kind of battery needed in the South Pacific.

After six months of experimentation, the Army raised the December production goal from 100,000 to 400,000 cells a day. For this the new plant needed 1,500 full-time workers. In Madison, no such labor supply existed. RayOVac President W. W. Cargill decided to form a civic committee to mobilize bank officers, professors, corporation executives, housewives and white-collar workers with free evenings and leisure time. Fortunately, the work was simple. Anyone could learn some job in ten minutes.

No Bells, No Beginning. Regular shifts were discontinued. Workers were fitted into operations whenever they reported at the plant. Since September 1944, the plant has been operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week, with no bells ringing and no beginning or end to work. Production of cells (72 cells to a battery) for September jumped to 1,218,000, about twice the output in August, when the new scheme was started.

Earnings range from 53-c- to 75-c- an hour. But many workers chose R.M.R. over other plants paying the same wages because "the gossip is better." High-school girls work next to soldiers on pass from Truax Field. Said one businessman: "Here's me so soft I get out of breath tying my own shoe laces. So I'm tossing 75-lb. boxes around. I look down the aisle, and there's one of my biggest, toughest employes working with an eye dropper."

Last week R.M.R. officials had cause for celebration. Average cell production was running about 500,000 a day, with only 783 regular full-time employes. But, in addition, some 4,000 people collected paychecks for regular part-time work, and there was an average of 500 casual workers a day.

Said Plant Manager Gerold P. Wieden-beck, well aware that his plan is expensive, and of no help to more complicated production jobs: "We could set up an efficient plant, but the batteries can't wait."

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