Page 50 - Gary's Book - Final Copy 7.9.2017_Active

its toll. The electric company and telephone company eventually agreed to share
ownership of the poles. The telephone company, however, would be responsible
for service and maintenance of the poles they purchased.

The problem was Union Electric had on their accounting books several hundred
thousand poles of which the owners were unknown. This amounted to multi-
millions of dollars. Darn! Half of a million poles, and they couldn’t even identify

the ownership. It was an excellent, enjoyable and financially beneficial summer.
We only covered about one third of the geography that summer. I would have
applied the next summer if it were not for being accepted to work full time at
Western Electric, the supply arm of Bell Telephone.

After graduating, I sought employment at Budweiser, Purina Feeds, Commerce

Bank and Western Electric – all in St. Louis. I was hired by Western Electric,
which supplied everything from toilet paper to telephone poles to all the Bell
Telephone Companies. As a staff management trainee, I got actual on-the-job
training and genuine job duties as opposed to mere book learning that I got in
coursework and on other job assignments. The training program was to monitor all

key functional units by sitting with the department managers (purchasing, human
resources, safety, accounting, shipping and billing) for several weeks and then
performing the daily duties thereafter. A follow-up report was then sent to the
regional manager as to duplication, procedural changes, processing methodology
recommendations, possible related costs and time savings projected for such
changes. All of this was preparation for the assignment of a regional manager

within two to three years.

After 18 months, in February 1965, I resigned. I found that it was too political for
me even though I was a salaried employee exempt from overtime duty and pay. It
was who you knew, where you went to school, what religion you were, or if you
were related to someone in management within the company. I wasn’t going to
play that game. I was rewarded on a tenure basis and not on performance,

contribution or savings realized. Excelling did not matter; I was boxed in and very
uncomfortable. Mr. Charles Miller, our regional manager, asked me to reconsider;
he said that if I changed my mind, I was welcome to stay.

During the summer of 1964, I visited my brother-in-law, Dr. Edward Schwan in
Midland, Michigan. He was, at that time, the chief accountant for Dow Corning’s

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