Description
At age sixteen, Mary Newson married and left her home in rural Texas. She moved to the Bay Area where she worked a variety of jobs before she was hired at the Ford Assembly Plant in Richmond. Ms. Newson remained employed at Ford for thirty-two years, relocating to San Jose when the plant moved to Milpitas. Discusses: rural upbringing in Texas, journey to the Bay Area and the range of jobs held as a young African-American woman, work life at Ford--as a janitor, an assembly-line worker and an inspector, networking/cohesion among coworkers, role of religion in her life, housing, transportation and social climate in Bay Area during the war years.