The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-06-15
Post Office
Ventilation
Unbearable
Workers Speeded-Up in
Heat That Reaches
95 Degrees
By a Post Office Worker
CORRESPONDENT


NEW YORK.-Our post office is
one of the biggest in the city and
is considered above the average in
working conditions and treatment
Of employees. Our supervisors are
worthy lackeys of their worthy
masters, ignorant brutes placed in
their position through the influence
Of some rabbi" (as a politician is
called in post-office parlance) and
the ability to bulldoze and speed-up
to an inhuman degree. Since one
Of them has gained the position Of
superintendent, due to his ability
Of economizing on the working time
allotted the substitutes by the de-
partment and due to his mercilesS
disregard for the most elementary
rights and feelings of his subor-
dinates, all the foremen are Yieing
with each other to emulate him,
and, If possible, to do even better
in the treatment Of their employees.
Sanitary conditions are indie
scribable. The antiquated ven
tilating system is long out of order
and we are forced to work many
times in 95 degrees of heat, so that
during the summer it is almost a
daily occurrence that some worker
collapses from the heat and has to
be carried out, but only after he
has been revived long enough to
punch his card out.
There are enough openings for
spying, though, to make Argus turn
green with envy. The drinking
water is tepid, as we have to dis
pense with such "luxuries" as ice,
in order to balance the budget, and
the basin of the fountain is caked
with heavy layer of dust, as is
everything else in the place. To
complete the picture and just to
make our. drinking more appe-
tizing, right under the fountain
there is an overlooking pail for
refuse and sputum.
If you are fortunate" you get
permission to go up to the toilet,
but just try to be there over 10
minutes, or try to go up there every
day, and you find yourself in great
disfavor with the boss. The toilets
are filthy, and if you are dauntless
to use one of them nine times out
of ten you find that you get ter
rible itching around certain
region of your body, and ten times
out of ten you find no toilet paper,
and that brilliant idea was actu-
ally proposed by one of our "effi-
cheney experts" that everybody
should bring his own toilet paper.
So much for the working environ
ment.
All day you hear the menacing
tone of some foreman: Come on,
come on, come on, keep your hands
movingl" while you struggle with a
large pile of work in front of you
feeling hot and miserable, the mad
dening noise of the cancelling ma
chimes crashing upon your brain
4 l1t SuDS Ic1Il ~ VI dCICQ Ill dl1y
time of the day or night, kept wait
ing around for hours and then sent
home without any remuneration. If
you do get a few hours of work,
you are driven even more than the
regular employe, and the fewer
working hours you are given the
better are the chances of your fore
man to climb into a superintendent
ship on your back.
We have learned many things
these last few years. We have
learned that our position of Secur-
ity is and always was only a
mirage; we have learned that we
are no exception from the rest OF
the workers in outside industry;
we have learned that our conditions
and fate are ineXtricably bound up
with the conditions and fate of the
rest of the working class, even If
we are called federal employees
Last, but not least, we have learned
that only through united effort,
only through organization, only by
mass pressure, can we wiring con-
cessions.