|
Personal
View of Mary Evelyn Ross Lucke
|
I began working for the Weather Bureau in January, 1944, at Havre,
Montana. At the time, I used my maiden name, Mary Evelyn Ross. I had
learned by word-of-mouth that the Bureau needed new employees. I went
to work there to do my bit for the war effort - and to earn money
for college.
My experience
included one quarter of college, and I had worked in a department
store and a bank. I left the Weather Bureau in January 1946 to return
to college. The Weather Bureau provided on-the-job training in reading
instruments, typing and measuring clouds, measuring winds aloft, and
plotting maps. The boss and our four female co-workers were the other
personnel at the duty station. The morale on station was good among
the "girls." The boss was an old "fuddy-dud" and quite "macho," even
though he was effeminate. As near as I can remember, I started at
$130 a month after leaving a bank job that paid $70.
My duties
consisted of hourly reports, PIBAL runs, and weather maps (my favorite
job). I worked eight-hour shifts - day (8:30 a.m. -4:30 p.m.), evening
(swing), midnight (12:30-8:30). We normally worked eight hours a day,
40 hours a week. The last few months I worked, we had an 8 a.m. to
6 p.m. shifts with a two hour lunch. I worked night shift with no
days off because the two new girls weren't experienced enough to work
alone.
I don't
really know what would be the high or low points of my Weather Bureau
Career. My first impression of the Bureau was - I liked it! I really
liked the work. Would I do it again? Yes, because I learned so much
and it was fascinating. I feel that my major contributions included
being efficient and doing excellent daily maps.
Interesting
experiences included the time I stayed on the roof tracking a PIBAL
for 50 minutes when the temperature was -30. I couldn't move my fingers
for quite a while. Another time, I recorded a rather fierce thunderstorm
which "hit" at 3 a.m. The boss, on arriving at 8 a.m. chewed me out
for making such a mistake because Great Falls hadn't had a storm first.
According to him, all weather came from Great Falls. After I showed
him the map and the frontal system, he calmed down.
