Toy Story

        In the summer of 1973, in between my sophomore and junior years of college, I worked on the assembly line at the Fisher-Price toy factory in East Aurora, New York. My Dad, at this time, was a salesman for Strate Welding Supply, and Fisher-Price was one of his occasional stops. My Dad’s sister and my godmother, Aunt Norma, worked in the office at Fisher-Price.

Dad and Aunt Norma 1972

        Whenever Dad stopped by the toy factory, of course Aunt Norma would chat with him. And invariably someone in the office who did not already know about the two of them would ask Norma, “Who was that?” and Aunt Norma would say, “Oh that’s Jimmy. We used to live together when we were younger.”

        So it was through those two connections that I managed to get a job, and since I did not drive, Mom found two elderly women who lived up the hill on Zimmerman Road and happened to work the assembly line at Fisher-Price to give me a ride to and from every day. I think you can see from this scenario that the parents were very proud at having finagled all this for their child, while the ungrateful college-age, should-have-been-doing-this-herself-but-was-too-lazy daughter, was mortified.

        When I say elderly women, I think one was in her early sixties because she mentioned that she and her husband were celebrating their fortieth wedding anniversary that summer. Forty years! That meant they were married in 1933! My gosh – ancient! And the woman who did all the driving was even older and was not married, although I don’t recall if she was a widow or had always been single. They both had huge gardens and talked about them all the way to work and back. They were nice enough to me, and I don’t think they even charged me for the rides. I should have documented more of those drive-time conversations because the only thing I remember now after all these years is the 40^th anniversary statement and the comment the driver made one day about eggplant giving one’s bowel movements a different color. I don’t remember the women’s names.

        The assembly lines were much as one might imagine. I was usually at a different one each day – probably because I was temporary. Most of the permanent staff were older women who used the line as their social life – chatting and joking. I don’t know how they did that – the machinery was so loud. Most of the lines were long with people on both sides adding parts to the toys as they came down – each line worked on just one toy. The supervisors would stand in for each of us once in the morning and once in the afternoon for a bathroom break – and of course if there was an emergency potty need, the super could be summoned for that also.

        Some toy parts did not need a line – I recall working on a swing set all by myself – one piece had to be put into a machine where something else was snapped onto it – I picked the piece up on my left side, put it into the machine, pressed one button here at the same time as pressing another one there – hence clearing my fingers from the machine, and the part snapped onto the swing set – then I placed it into a bin on my right. I of course, preferred working alone rather than on the line with all the other folks.

        One day, and one day only, I was put on the round table. It was the task most dreaded because just the description of it makes people nauseous. The round table sat, I think it was, 6 people. The first one put a little Fisher Price person on a stand – that day it was the Fisher Price baseball kids – the table then moved and the little person rotated to the next worker – she would add something to the baseball player – it seems odd to think that five things would get put on the baseball player as it rotated around the table – maybe we only did every other little person as it came ‘round or maybe even every third little person? – I do remember my job was to put the baseball cap on, sideways. The table was not quite as bad as I thought it would be, but by the end of the shift I was indeed nauseous and did not want to ever do the round table again. The regulars at the round table were all old women who enjoyed it very much – it did not make them seasick, and the noise level was a little lower so they could talk more easily and make fun of the college kid who was turning greener by the hour.

        Another day I was supposed to take flat boxes and open them so the Fisher-Price telephones could be packed in them as they got to the end of the line. There were about five of us summer kids there shaping the boxes – others were putting in the phones. I thought I had gotten good at opening the boxes fast – they wanted them fast. Then a woman came by and showed the five of us how it was really supposed to be done – her way was about 10 times faster than how we were doing it.

 How was I ever going to make it in the workplace? Can’t even figure my own way out of a box!

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