Loose Laces

Part Ten...
Blogger has a new setup where I can write ahead of time and it will publish when I want. Not edited, so excuse the mistakes.

Upon my return to Maryland, I ran into one of my buddies from apprentice school. Sam (not his real name) had been on the job for a week, but we hadn't crossed paths. By now, I had a roomie, a guy from Knoxville whom was a magnificent bullshiter. Sam was staying at the next motel up the road from the White House. He was rooming with a guy from the Charleston, WV local, and it and all the rest of the Ohio Valley locals were still on strike. But negotiations were finally going well, and the situation looked to soon be settled.

Meanwhile, we had a little strike of our own. I don't know what it was over, but it was the boilermakers whom went out at 10:00 one morning. So naturally, the rest of the trades walked. Sam, his roomie, and I spent the rest of the day on the banks of the Potomac talking about things to do in Charleston when we got there. American Electric Power was building a two unit powerhouse just outside of St. Albans on the Kanawha river, and would be requiring over 3,000 tradesmen and laborers. We made great plans for when we got there. Our strike was a short lived affair, and we were back to work the next day.

This Morgantown powerhouse was owned by Potomac Electric Power Company, and was a two unit facility with oil-fired boilers. This was 1970 and just before the mid-east oil situation went all to hell. Not long after the first unit was finished with construction, the oil system was replaced by coal. Needless to say, there was overtime and I went back there for the big bucks.
----

Time out... The White House motel was owned by people who lived in New York City, and was managed by a couple from Florida. The managers went on vacation for a couple weeks, so the owners came in to take over. These were die-cast city folk, very wealthy and used to being surrounded by high class society. They were nice enough, but obviously out of place amongst construction workers. One day after work, I went in to pay another week's rent. The lady was behind the desk and sunlight was coming in the windows in such a way that it was lighting my head and shining through my eyeglasses, and of course they were covered with a day's load of construction dust. She gave me a stern look and said "How do you see through those filthy glasses? It is obvious to me that you haven't bothered to clean them in a very long time". She actually didn't understand or have a clue as to what construction work was about, and she figured all of us were third rate people whom hardly bathed and were completely uncivilized. To her, second rate people were her servants and those whom worked for her, and we were way beneath them. By the time she returned to NYC, she had alienated all of us and we were glad to see her go.
----

June rolled around, the strike in the valley was settled, so Sam and I drug up (jargon for "quiting a job"), met at our union hall on Monday morning, and got our referral to Charleston. Two more electricians from the local were making the trip up and knew the best way to get there, so on Tuesday morning we were on our way to the valley in a black 1968 Torino following our buddies whom were in a Ford-blue 1965 Mustang. Charleston was close enough to home that we would be able to drive back and forth each weekend without wearing completely out.

We had our first of many encounters with the West Virginia Turnpike, that million-dollar-a-mile two lane toll road that the people of that state were so proud of. At the time it was constructed, it was the most expensive highway per mile to have ever been built in the US.

We finally reached the Kanawha valley. We kept smelling something with the scent of rotten potatoes. Come to find out, it was the Kanawha river itself. Man, was that sucker polluted!

Next... Amos powerhouse