Cutting Into the Meatpacking Line

Workers and Change in the Rural Midwest

Deborah Fink

• Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press
• Year: 2000
• ISBN:
  9780807861400
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Rural Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

The nostalgic vision of a rural Midwest populated by independent family farmers hides the reality that rural wage labor has been integral to the region's development, says Deborah Fink. Focusing on the porkpacking industry in Iowa, Fink investigates the experience of the rural working class and highlights its significance in shaping the state's economic, political, and social contours. Fink draws both on interviews and on her own firsthand experience working on the production floor of a pork-processing plant. She weaves a fascinating account of the meatpacking industry's history in Iowa--a history, she notes, that has been experienced differently by male and female, immigrant and native-born, white and black workers. Indeed, argues Fink, these differences are a key factor in the ongoing creation of the rural working class. Other writers have denounced the new meatpacking companies for their ruthless destruction of both workers and communities. Fink sustains this criticism, which she augments with a discussion of union action, but also goes beyond it. She looks within rural midwestern culture itself to examine the class, gender, and ethnic contradictions that allowed--indeed welcomed--the meatpacking industry's development.

1 WHAT IS YOUR PROBLEM, RUTH?

AN ANTHROPOLOGIST GETS A JOB

The culture of the Perry IBP porkpacking plant is unlike that of rural Iowa outside the plant, although working in the plant radically reshapes peoples' outside lives. In January 1992, in order to study the experience of wage labor in rural Iowa, I went to work at the Perry plant, an ordeal that revealed a small part of the disjuncture between the world of IBP and orderly social life.

My fieldwork began with the application process. After driving forty miles over snowy Iowa roads from my home in Ames to Perry, I stopped first at the Iowa Job Service office in Perry, which does initial screening of IBP applicants. Once the inevitable wait and screening were done, I took the directions given by the Job Service woman, drove west of town, and turned off the highway onto the IBP road. The plant itself is set off from the rural Iowa landscape, first by an oversized parking lot that leaves a liminal space on the outer edge, and then by a fence and guardhouse. Reaching the IBP complex, I parked on the outer rim of cars, uncomfortably aware that my two-year-old Nissan did not blend into the crowd of large, sixties-era Fords and Chryslers parked close to the plant.

The people at the University of Iowa Labor Center had advised me that my hair, glasses, teeth, and clothes were all wrong for getting hired at IBP, saying that I needed a permanent in my hair and working-class glasses and clothes. Unwilling to face a permanent, I had bought two packages of tiny pink sponge rollers to curl my short straight hair, but it was a disaster. Rather than trying for a feminine look, I had moussed my hair into an Elvis Presley style and wore tight jeans and old glasses. My sister Kate told me to chew gum. Hoping that I looked normal rather than ridiculous, I walked to the guardhouse. The guard called inside to verify that Job Service had sent me and then instructed me to walk about twenty yards across the bare, paved inner yard to a side stairway, go up the stairs and through a door, and wait.

In the small waiting room were broken plastic chairs, a table, a lot of dirt, and an inside window. I waited in this room for almost two hours: my time cost IBP nothing at this point. Finally a man came out of a side door to ask what I wanted. Learning that Job Service had sent me for an interview, he went to look for the interviewer.

The interviewer—"Ricardo," he told me to call him—motioned for me to take a chair when I was finally admitted into his office. Knowing IBP's reputation as a secretive company, I had guessed that whatever else I could offer as a worker, it would not hire an anthropological researcher, so I left that part off the application form. Afraid that my residence in Ames, a university town, would flag my application, I had listed my address and telephone number as those of a Des Moines friend. I had crafted a life history that I hoped would make me seem to be a disturbed, recently divorced farm woman who had been out of the formal workforce for most of her life. Accordingly, I submitted the names of three friends who worked in the public mental health system as references. As it happened, none of this mattered. Ricardo began the interview by informing me that everyone at IBP worked sixty hours a week. As my stomach sank, I asked if I could work part-time.

"No," he stated firmly. “We all work Saturdays. That's how IBP operates. You got things to do on weekends?”

"No," I answered, looking down at my lap. “I'll do it.”

"You sure?"

"I'm sure."

At least I wanted to come back and see if I could actually learn something. Ricardo informed me that the starting pay would be $6.50 an hour, gave me a medical form to fill out, and told me to come back the next day for a physical examination. The interview could not have lasted more than ten minutes, and it would have been shorter if it had not been interrupted by telephone calls.

The next day when I returned, I waited in the same room. This time I talked with a Mexican man who came in after I had been there for some time. In broken English he told me that he was thirty-two and had been with IBP for three months. Before this he had worked somewhere in Texas, at a seed nursery in Iowa, and in a tobacco plant in North Carolina. He had also worked on farms, but that wasn't “good money”; IBP was good money. He sent most of his paycheck home to his family in Mexico, he explained; between jobs he would return there for visits. On the IBP production floor, he ran a whizard and seemed to think I would know what that was; I didn't think I would understand if he explained it. Now, he had “tired fingers.” He got that often and usually would just rest for several days. Staying home was lonely, because all the people he lived with would be working at IBP. He was waiting for a nurse to come and take him to the hospital. During our shared wait he talked about the impossibility of finding housing in Perry and his daily ride in the IBP bus from Des Moines, which he would miss if he didn't make it back from the hospital. He was still waiting when I finally got called for the physical.

Somehow, I had expected to walk into a clean and orderly medical office and to have a nurse's attention. This place was grimy and cluttered—more like a service station than a medical dispensary. As the nurse took my form, she warned me that any lying would be grounds for immediate dismissal. As if reciting her piece for the thousandth time, she said that this medical exam was not to determine whether or not I would work at IBP. No one failed the physical. The company wanted only to place me in the most appropriate job. All I had to do was tell the truth.

I had completed the form, which had standard medical history questions, including date of birth, illnesses, surgery, existing conditions, and childbirths. I did not think they would knowingly hire a fortyseven-year-old woman and hoped I did not look it, but I saw little point in lying about my date of birth. Maybe they couldn't subtract. Anyway, I had to provide the name of my doctor and sign a general release of all my medical records to IBP, and these would also convict me. Because I had had surgery several years before at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, where the state of Iowa sends many of its welfare patients, I wrote down the University of Iowa as my doctor. One way or another, I feared, my IBP adventure would soon be over.

Requesting a urine sample for a drug test, the nurse pointed me to a bathroom with a torn-out place where a sink might once have been. After I returned the urine sample, the main part of the medical exam, that pertaining to my back and my hands, followed. I had to bend over and try to touch my toes while the nurse probed the vertebra at the base of my spine. Then I was ordered to lie face down on a rank-smelling cot, lift my legs, hold them in the air and tell the nurse if my back hurt. It didn't. Next I was to press my palms together, bring them up to my chest, and move my fingers individually. The nurse asked if my fingers were going to sleep. They weren't. She carefully inspected my hands and wrists, pressing the insides of my wrists, my palms, and the backs of my hands with her fingers.

Then it was over. She said the drug test would take a week to ten days to process and I would be called at that time.

But the wheels of IBP turned faster than she indicated. The next evening my Des Moines friend telephoned to offer congratulations. Earlier that day Ricardo had called and left a message for me to report to work the following Tuesday at 7:30 A.M. with two pieces of identification.

That Tuesday I left my house at six-thirty to get there in plenty of time. Again I gave my name at the guardhouse and walked to the little room. This time there was standing room only. Twenty-one people in my orientation class crowded together for over two hours as we were taken two at a time for hearing tests. In the meantime, we got acquainted.

"Rosa," a Mexican, was the only other woman. I got a chance to try my bad Spanish with her, because she had just arrived from Mexico and didn't know a word of English. In spite of my distressing Spanish she smiled warmly and immediately attached herself to me. She didn't look as though she could be older than thirty-five, but she said that her children were in Mexico and were grown. Now she came to Iowa to be with her amigo, an IBP worker. She herself had never held a waged job before.

Two other Mexicans began orientation with us but were dismissed before the week was over for having trouble with their immigration papers. Four black men, all having come on the IBP bus from Des Moines, waited in the room. The rest were white men. One of them was telling about having been released from prison on December 15 with only $100 and surviving the holidays alone and broke. Three of the other white men had just returned from the Gulf War.

I found myself talking to “Guy,” a smiling, sandy-haired man of about forty who had retired from a railroad job. He had been making $56,000 a year, and when he was offered $100,000 in early retirement, he took it. Guy had a wife and two daughters and had missed seeing them when he was doing his railroad runs. After taking some time off with his family, he had begun to look for a job in the area of his home in Boone, twenty-five miles northeast of Perry. His search for employment that would bring a decent income and leave him time for his family had been futile. He assured me that after job hunting in central Iowa for several months, the IBP starting pay of $6.50 an hour seemed good. Like me, Guy had worried about his appearance and his record and had shaved off his full beard and downplayed his work experience and union membership when applying at IBP. Friendly and thoughtful, he was easy to like. I was soon discussing my research with him.

Finally the long and cramped wait was over, and our orientation leader—"Archie," as he told us to call him—led us into the building and upstairs to our orientation classroom, where we would spend two days being initiated into IBP. First we filled out various forms, had our pictures taken, and got our green plastic identification cards and lockers. Orientation involved a series of lessons on IBP procedures. As we completed each lesson, we signed a form confirming our having been instructed on the given topics.

The safety director came to the classroom to review the plant's safety rules: no horsing around, no running, be sure to use the stair rails. She warned us that we could be written up or fired for violating safety rules. For the purposes of safety, she explained, IBP would make certain that each person's worksite was the proper height and had the proper space. A short worker would have a special platform to stand on as he worked; a tall worker might need a higher worktable. All equipment must be in good repair for maximum safety. Whatever could be done to ensure a safe workplace was done. Safety was imperative and was everyone's responsibility. No one should ever overlook an unsafe situation. To reinforce the safety message we saw a video called “The Convincer,” with gory pictures of injuries caused by industrial accidents.

The safety director also showed a diagram of the plant with the various emergency exit paths, although this was hard to process. We had yet to see the actual workfloor, we didn't know where we would be working, we couldn't make out the writing on the map, and we weren't given maps to study. In fact, as one accustomed to a lot of paper, I was struck by the absence of lists of rules and procedures that we could keep for reference. The company collected the forms for our files as we signed them, and even those of us quick enough to read them before signing and returning them would have been hard-pressed to remember precisely what they said.

Throughout orientation we repeatedly heard about IBP's commitment to safety. The other watchword was attendance. When asked what two words we had to know to keep our IBP jobs, we would dutifully answer in unison, “Safety and Attendance.”

Our fellow workers would be annoyed, Archie said, if we missed work. If we called in sick, however, we were to call by 6 :oo A.M. On the days when we called in sick, a supervisor might phone us or materialize at our homes at any time. Anyone who had called in sick and was not home would be summarily fired. Anyone sick for three or more days had to have a physician's signature to return. It would have been impudent to ask how I was going to get a physician to come to my home to certify my illness.

So central was the issue of attendance that our only orientation handout was called “Probationary Employee Attendance Policy.” It was hopelessly complicated and contradictory. Two unexcused absences in our ninety-day probationary period and we were fired; four absences in our probationary period would result in termination, only unexcused absences being considered for disciplinary purposes. Three days sick and we needed a doctor's signature to return; four days and we were fired. What did they mean by two absences and we were fired, four absences and we were terminated?

Being confused and generally afraid of not reaching the plant on winter roads, I asked Archie to explain. He shook his head and said, "Look, we're not trying to fire anyone. It costs us money to hire you people." That was my answer.

The list of additional rules was lengthy but not hard to retain, because a rule existed for almost everything. Anyone caught leaving the plant with stolen equipment would be fired. Anyone bringing a camera or tape recorder into the plant would be fired. Anyone criticizing IBP or any of its employees would be fired. Anyone caught with liquor or drugs in the plant would be fired. Anyone caught stealing someone's lunch would be fired. Anyone caught fighting would be fired. No swearing or obscenity was allowed. We were responsible for all equipment checked out to us; having it stolen was no excuse for losing it. No food or drink was allowed in the locker rooms or on the production floor. We were to wash our hands before and after going to the bathroom and to remove all equipment from our persons before going to the bathroom. Our employer could request breath or urine tests at any time. In fact, IBP had the right to search our bodies, clothing, possessions, or lockers at any time. We initialed the separate categories of rules and signed each form affirming that we had been told.

The president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1149 was given ten minutes to speak, and he came in quickly and distributed union cards. He reported that union representation in the plant was 82 percent, but the biggest problem was the twenty to thirty new workers that came in each week. The union was waiving its $30 initiation fee, and we would pay only $5.30 weekly, which would be subtracted from our check. I was one of the few to fill out a card, and he smiled at me, read my name, and said, “Thanks, Deb.”

"Ruth," I corrected. I went by my middle name in the plant as a minor effort to thwart identification.

When Archie returned, he concluded with a video and a talk on IBP as an innovative and public-spirited corporation and on the benefits that its plants had brought to various communities. As Archie was elaborating on how eager we all were to work for a company as great as IBP, “Dean,” one of the black men, got restive and started to interrupt.

"Our bus is gonna go."

Then, “Are you watching the time?”

"We gotta go."

The rest of us were trying our best to pay attention and work our way into the system. Dean's interruptions of Archie's performance spoke my mind better than I was willing to do, and I was thankful for his spirit.

I was thankful for all of my cohorts, even though they smoked so much that my throat burned raw and my eyelids felt as if they were sandpapered on the inside. Rosa ate with me at breaks during those days. Because the plant's Spanish interpreter came in only sporadically, I was left to help her with her locker combination and her food. Much of the orientation must have been a blur for her, and I could be important for knowing slightly more than she did about what was going on. Except for Guy, who was an instant comrade, the men were earthy and outrageous.

At seven-thirty on Thursday morning we gathered in the classroom again, this time to begin lessons on knives and meat. Three trainers came and showed a video on sharpening knives. With enlarged drawings of the sharpening steel, the video included microscopic detail on how to prepare steels to produce the minute lengthwise striations that would give the knives a razor-sharp edge. The procedure involved roughing the steel surface with varying textures of sandpaper, carefully working it in only one direction, keeping the strokes straight, and not using too much pressure. The knife edge then fit into the striations as the knife was drawn over the steel—if we did it right. We also saw drawings of how our knives would be dulled if we grated the sandpaper across the steel rather than drawing it lengthwise or if we tilted our knives at the wrong angle as we sharpened them.

After we had studied the drawings and listened to the video explanation, the trainers passed out steels and sandpaper. Each of us got to try working a steel. I attempted to follow the procedure carefully. The trainers then brought knives around to each person and spent time with each individually, demonstrating how to handle the steels and knives. Although I had been working my steel for about fifteen minutes by the time a trainer reached me, he found nothing to praise. After examining my steel, he took the sandpaper and spent a couple of minutes on it. Although he did not use the exact technique shown on the video, he prepared the steel sufficiently so that I could try to sharpen a knife with it. I did not do this well either, but after some coaching I was able to draw the knife over the steel somewhat correctly a couple of times.

Notwithstanding this knife sharpening introduction, none of the new hires was prepared to move forward independently to practice the skills. I was clumsy and inept. The rest were not much better. The process was sufficiently complicated and demanding that we would each need much more time and instruction before we could work on our own. Later, maybe.

Then Archie brought in our work clothes. Although we could have supplied our own work clothing, provided it met safety and sanitation standards, all of us bought our work clothes from IBP. For most of us, this included rubber boots with steel toes and white jackets called “frocks,” which by federal regulation we were to wear when on the cut and converting floors. Kill floor workers would get white trousers and shirts. The costs of these items were to be deducted from our paychecks. In addition to what we purchased for ourselves, IBP issued a hairnet, earplugs, and hard hat to each of us.

Wearing these new uniforms, we took our first walk through the three main production areas—kill, cut, and converting (also called boning). Moving from the smoky, overheated classroom on the second floor of the office wing to the production area plunged us into the chaotic interior of the plant. Machines of all sizes clanked and churned, huge metal tubs groaned as they were shoved and dropped, and the air control system roared at us from above. The noise surrounded and engulfed us. The production area was a labyrinth of large windowless rooms, and I immediately lost all sense of orientation. Starting on the cut floor, Archie shouted explanations as we walked through the production areas, but mostly it was a lost cause. We heard little a...