The Waterbury Democrat., 1942-11-05

increasing numbers, women are joining the ranks of var workers at the plants of the thrso divisions of United Aircraft Corporation until today more than 6,700 of them are on the factory pdSroll, A few months ago there was only a scattering of women at Pratt & Whitney Aircraft, Hamilton Stan- dard Propellers and Vought-Si- korsky Aircraft, Today trip through any of the big plants shows women in practically every department,
 The employment rate for women has increased by leaps and bounds and Is continuing its upsurge. Of new employees placed on tho fac- tory payrollS last week women made up T2 per cent of the total at Pratt x Whitney Aircraft; 66 per cent at Hamilton Standard PropellerS and 6S,5 per cent at Vought- ht-SikorSky,
 The training schools show 6 sim liar high percentage; at Pratt & Whitney Aircraft sS per cent of the trainees are women and at Vought- Sikors&y they constitute 70 per cent of tho total,
 Formerly women were employed only on inspection and other Simi- lar light, routine jobs, Today they are operating machines of all kinds latheS, millers, grinders, horers, drill presses, punch presse. spot ,.,>1sss,e.. ,.Hnn1> iaau aud rt1,ikara
 At Pratt & Whitney Aircraft the engine division-the 4,00oth woman has been hired, Vought- Sikorsgy, which is building the new CorSair Navy fighter, has more than HOO women: and Hamilton Standard has more than 1000,
 In the deector department at Vought- -SikorslSy. employing 629 people, more than half are women; one department at Hamilton stan dard has 45 per cent women: while in the piston department at Pratt & Whitney Aircraft S7 per cent are women.
 These women come from the cities and from the farms. Some have college degrees while others have only high school education.
 Whatever their background. whatever their age, whatever their appearance-these women all have one thing in common. They hve an overwhelming desire to do their | part in the war effort,
 Many of them have very direct reasons for Q strong feeling in eorrNNtioN with tho war
 There is the grey-haired woman in inspection in the piston pin de- partment at Pratt and Whitney Aircraft, She and her husband, who | also works in the department. left | a married daughter in the Philip l pines when they returned to this country shortly before Pearl Harbor, Only a week ago they received, through the State Department, the, first word of the daughter and her husband, "well in Santo Tomas Uni versity Interment camp"
 She has yet to hear from her brother who also was in Manila when the Japs struck. And 6 son | is with the U. s. Army in Australia while a brother is a Major in the Air Corps,
 At Vought-Sikorsky a woman from Massachusetts came to wrok as & rivter shortly after her husband. a boatswains mate. first class, in the Navy. was reported mis- sing in the Pacific area, They were married last Easter Sunday.
 Months ago. United officials req lized that the time would soon come when available manpower would be insufficient to meet the needs of war production. According ly, the corporations training pro- gram, one of the principal reasons why United Aircraft had already been able to increase production many fold over pre-war require- ments, was enlarged.
 Studies were made in the plants to determine how jobs which once had been considered too difficult for women could be changed or ad- justed to permit them to take over.
 The corporation adopted policy of equal pay for women and men for the same work. Tn some cases ad- JuobttlSAAto WSkC ACQuAAVN " PSAihtt women to take over.
 Then the large-scale employment of women began. They started through the training schools. re- ceiving the same instruction in theory and practice that had been used in training men. Tn from four to six weeks they were graduated" and entered the plants.
 There they have made an excel- lent record. As one production ex- ecutive said recently. "these women learn rapidly, they are good workers they pay attention to their jobs. and they are anxious to move on to the more complex machine operations"
 "There is one all-important prln- Cipal, however, which must be ob- served if quality of product is to be maintained" he continued, we must be allowed Co retain sufficient experienced nersonnel--and that of