The Hazing of New Employees – A Lost Tradition

Up until the 1980’s, the “hazing” of new employees was a time-honored tradition. Here, the new employees would be given the crappiest jobs, told to do the hardest things, and treated horribly. This all seemed to disappear in the middle 1980’s. This article is dedicated to all those older workers who had to endure the “hazing” period and what it was like…

Introduction

Today, little remains of the old days of Hazing. You can see it on College campuses and universities when people “rush” to join a sorority or a fraternity. That’s about it. The hazing during High School has pretty much been eliminated. With the only vestiges of it being the movie “Dazed and Confused“.

People have forgotten that “hazing” was an important part of life. You went through it numerous times in your life, and one of the most harrowing was when you started work at a new job. Here, we look at this aspect of life. In it, I describe the hazing rituals that I experienced in Western Pennsylvania in the 1970’s.

Hazing in the Coal Mines

One of the first jobs that I had was in the coal mines when I was 14 years old. My father believed that the role of a man was to work, and to earn enough to provide for a family. That was what “being a man” was. Now, the law put limits on the hours and the conditions that I would work under. Never the less, I was introduced to work on the rock crusher at 14.

The job itself was pretty darn straight forward. I would stand above the rock crusher on metal slats. These were steel flat bars that formed a grid over the crusher. The goal was to stand on top of them, and not slip between them. They were spaced about a yard apart to left the huge chunks of coal to fall down below. I was given a large pole to help push the coal into place, and a hand sledge to break up the rocks.

Many a time I would slip on the slippery mud covered slats. I would fall down between the slats and have to climb my way back up to the top again as the coal would be moving towards the crushing death below. I would often lose my helmet as it was ultimately ground up into tiny busted up flakes of plastic.

That was my normal job. Now, let’s talk about the hazing aspect of it…

Sure, I took a lot of gruff from the older workers. Most people that I worked with were in their 20’s and 30’s. The real older men were over their 40’s and tended to work at other roles in the company. I was doing the “grunt work” that pretty much didn’t pay well, and that no one wanted to do.

There were “independent” haulers that would drive their dump trucks to the mine and dump the ore into the hopper. These tended to be grizzly old truck drivers, and they all wanted to give me a hard time while I weighed out their load (they were paid by weight). They would love to call me names like “fucking-dumb pollack” and “pecker dick-boy” all the time berating me for “cheating” them out of a few pounds of ore. All nonsense. It was just a bunch of harassment that I would have to endure as they would pull in and I would need to weigh their loads. Other than that it was harmless.

However, nothing was like the shit storm that I dealt with by the older kids, only slightly senior to me. There, they would steal my helmet and throw it into the hopper and I would have to dive in and retrieve it. You know, if I lost the helmet it would be deducted out of my salary.

They would, for instance, take my lunch and hide it in the tipple somewhere. Or, lock me in the outhouse, or out of it and put ex-lax in my coffee cup.

My supervisor would make me crawl into the trash cans and scrub them out with a hose and a brush. He would also try to cheat me out of my salary. In those days we were paid in cash. Sometimes, instead of the $45 that I was due, I would find a $5 and some change inside the envelope.

Other tricks of the trade included flattening my tires so that I would have to drive real slow to the nearest gas station, rolling down my windows (in the car) so that the inside would be soaked in an afternoon rain, and putting grease on the handle of the hand sludge so that it would slip out of my hand when I used it. The worst was putting an empty can of oil on the hood. After a 16 hour day in full sunlight, the ring impression it made could never be buffed out.

Hazing in the Steel Mills

The steel mills were a little bit different than the mines. Once I turned 16 years old, I was able to work full time. This meant that I could get a “starter job” at one of the local steel mills. I was fortunate. Edgewater Steel needed someone to stand under the ladle and hold the ingot molds in place while the hot steel poured into it.

The work was necessary. You had to use these long poles to hold the ingot molds in place. If you didn’t do a good job, one of the sides of the ingot mold could come loose and the liquid could flow out, covering you and killing you instantly. We would work two people per ingot. Typically, we might be able to come up with ten ingots of steel from each poured ladle.

The work was hot, tiring and very dangerous. Never the less, it didn’t stop the older folk from “hazing” us newbies.

I suppose it was all in good fun, but at the time I thought that it was mean and cruel. Some of the tricks included shitting into the boots that we had to wear on the shop floor, taking carbon dust and spraying it on to our lunch (sandwiches),  turning off the lights (at the breaker) when we were getting set up under the ladle. Dangerous stuff this. Though, on the other hand, no one ever got really hurt. That I know of.

Other tricks included stealing our time (punch) card, dropping pallets (off of a fork lift) from three feet up, making a terrible racket and startling everyone. I’ve had my car keys dipped in paint, my motorcycle helmet (outside) filled with urine, and my locker door removed.

This kind of hazing would continue for months until the guys “felt” that you had “earned your place” in the “pecking order” and could be left alone. There were modifiers of course. Say you had an older relative working there, or you were close friends with some of your buddies.  All of this would modify how long the hazing treatment would last. Though, in my case, they always called me the “token pollack” at the company. That never ended.

Hazing in the Grocery Stores

For a while, I worked as a stock boy for a local grocery store. The kind of work was quite different. I wore a short sleeved white shirt, with a bow tie and a large apron that I tied around my waist. As different as it was, the hazing continued unabated. In fact, each time you started to work at a new place, you would have to go through the hazing procedure all over again.

The hazing depended on the person who did it. The other “bag boys” would play tricks and “jokes” on the new-comer. The department managers would give you a hard time, often assigning the most terrible and awful jobs for you to do. The female cashiers would pester you mercilessly and do little things that would make your life harder than it should have been.

Hazing tricks included hand delivery of groceries to the wrong house. Having you do the hardest clean up jobs in the store; like honey, or olive oil. It would include such things as constant call-ups to bag groceries, and not being able to get your core tasks assigned, which always resulted in a bitch-out session with the floor manager.

Some of the tricks seemingly got out of hand. Like fire extinguisher soak downs as you started a long day of work. Or, scrub downs of the inside of a freezer, while it was still running. We would have to do things like move the two ton safe, scrub the floor under it and then move it back. Other tasks included parking lot cleanup in the pouring rain or snowing blizzard. It was all harmless and innocent hazing for the most part.

Of course, everything would eventually die down. This was especially true when there were new employees to bear the brunt of all the hazing. Thank goodness.

Hazing on the Drag Lines

A drag line is a huge machine that eats into the earth, and processes it into rubble from which ore is then extracted. They are common all over Pennsylvania. They tear into the hills and extract the precious coal and ores from the land.

For a while, I worked on a dragline. Being the new kid on the block, I of course, became the “go-fer”. Which means “hey, kid! go fer that…”.

My first “go-fer” task was to get a hook brace located at the top end of the dragline boom. So, yeah you guessed it, I had to climb all the way up to the end of the boom and retrieve the part. Only to find that I got the wrong part, and had to go back up a second time and get it again. Being the “new kid on the block” really did suck.

Conclusion

Many times I lament “the good old days”, but not with this. I am happy to say “good riddance”.

I really do not know why humans require any type of “hazing” activities. I am sure that there must be scientist or two who can explain the phenomenon. I, for one, would like to hear why we all seem to utilize hazing as a passage into adulthood. I know that it is used in Zambia, China and Japan. What’s the point?

"In my research I've found that group benefits that could quickly accrue for newcomers –– automatic benefits –– predict people's desire to haze," he said.

"This isn't the only variable that matters –– there's some effect of age and sex, for example –– but the effect of automatic benefits suggests that potential vectors of group exploitation alter people's treatment of newcomers in predictable ways," 

-Cimino

Today, I think that most of this type of hazing is now absent in the work environment today. I haven’t seen it. However, it is possible that it has taken on new form, and has manifested in other ways, like at Google, for instance…

Take Aways

• Hazing was an important part of American culture up into the 1980’s.
• Schools hazed the new students.
• Workers in industry hazed the new employees.
• Since the 1980’s and into the 1990’s people stopped hazing the new employees at work.
• Younger workers today have no idea or concept that hazing was a rite of passage that they would need to deal with when they started a new job.

FAQ

Q: Why isn’t hazing permitted in American industry any longer?
A: I really do not know. I think it is partly due to the rise of HR standardization of policy, the merging of government laws, and HR enforcement, and a rapid swinging volatile labor force. I would guess that any hazing today would be grounds for dismissal of an employee.

Q:  Why you think that hazing was an important part of industry?
A: The work environment consists of a tiny microcosm of society. They structure themselves in a tribal manner and creature written and unwritten rules of behavior. New members to that society must prove their value prior to them obtaining membership in the group.

Q: Are there any formal policies against hazing?
A: Yes.

• AR 600-20 Army Command Policy 4–20. Hazing
• Drury University: Hazing Policy
• Protect Your Employees: Have a Bullying Policy

Some Comments

Posted on Free Republic on 10SEP18. The post can be found HERE. Some highlights…

I recall reading about how when Mario Lemieux was a rookie with the Pittsburgh Penguins in 1984, even he did not escape that bit of hazing as when he fell asleep on an airplane in the midst of a road trip, a teammate snuck up and covered his head in shaving cream. And also the well known tale of Bobby Orr in about 1966 being dragged into the dressing room shower, covered in liniment oil, and shaved from head to toe.

- OttawaFreeper

The retired Naval aviation guys I work with tell stories about sending the noobies for a bucket of “prop wash”. lol

- V_TWIN

20+ years ago my daughter was in an award winning marching band that had a time honored "hell night" for new members. That was until one newbie went psycho and has stayed that way. The band director, school, and boosters are likely still paying off the seven figure judgement.

- buckalfa 

There's no hazing at all in the Navy these days. I remember making 3rd and then 2nd Class Petty Officer and getting my crows "tacked" on (getting punched in the arm). My arm was black and blue but I wasn't any worse for the wear. I was proud. Of course, there's always some asshole who takes it too far and someone winds up LLD with a broken arm after his arm was jumped on.

Around 2010 or so, about the same time as DADT was repealed, the Navy cracked down hard on hazing. It had long been officially banned but still tolerated. The Navy sent a message in the form of several publicized career ending NJPs that the days of hazing were over. When I made First Class, there were no punches to my arm. We got the message loud and clear.

-Drew68

Steam blanket. Prop wash. Key to the sea chest. Metric crescent wrench. Fetch a henway. And on and on and on......

- rktman 

There’s hazing, and then there’s hazing. When I stood my first messenger watch as a US Navy Seaman Apprentice, I was sent to a location on the ship to see a particular petty officer and obtain a container of red running light oil. That petty officer sent me to another location and another person, and so on for a number of contacts. Of course, there’s no such thing as running light oil...but the travels seeking it helped familiarize me with the ship’s layout and some of our senior petty officers.

Then there was the “Sea Bat” ploy. A number of sailors were gathered on the fantail around a cardboard box partly covered with a towel, and were peeking inside at it. A couple of others were doing some desultory sweeping nearby. One of my shipmates asked what was in the box and was told it was a Sea Bat. He bent over and lifted the towel to have a look, and one of the broom wielding swabbies swatted him on the rear as all the others yelled “SEA BAT”!

A new junior officer was the next victim; his swat was a bit less aggressive than the other received.

- JimRed 

One of my first summer jobs was at an amusement park. The tradition there was to be sent to hunt for a bucket of steam. Some of them are still looking.

Then there was my first “real” job at a huge factory complex. I was taken to the remotest part of the place and left to find my own way back. Took all afternoon.

- Some Fat Guy in L.A.

Regarding Life and Contentment

Here are some other similar posts on this venue. If you enjoyed this post, you might like these posts as well. These posts tend to discuss growing up in America. Often, I like to compare my life in America with the society within communist China. As there are some really stark differences between the two.

More Posts about Life

I have broken apart some other posts. They can best be classified about ones actions as they contribute to happiness and life. They are a little different, in subtle ways.

Articles & Links

• You can start reading the articles by going HERE.
• You can visit the Index Page HERE to explore by article subject.
• You can also ask the author some questions. You can go HERE to find out how to go about this.
• You can find out more about the author HERE.
• If you have concerns or complaints, you can go HERE.
• If you want to make a donation, you can go HERE.

Notes

1. First written 10SEP18.
2. Completed 10SEP18.
3. SEO Review 10SEP18.
4. Published 10SEP18.