Bomb Girls
Page 23
Your products have always been of the highest quality and have gained the proper respect of both friend and foe. Truly, this is a record of which we may all be proud.
During the course of our associations these last five years we have made friendships both in the production lines and throughout the staff that will remain with us always. We will never forget such scenes as a production shop at 2:00 in the morning with dozens of workers busily engaged at their respective jobs, or the cheerful greeting of a guard just off patrol on a cold and blustery night, or the enthusiasm of thousands greeting a concert artist during a war bond rally.
In closing, may we express the wish that your future endeavours will bring to you continued happiness and well being. For doing such a grand job at Scarboro, we thank you sincerely.
R.M.P. Hamilton and P.D.P. Hamilton18
From Ammunition-Filling Jobs They Proudly Can Retire
Wrapping up and winding down came quickly. GECO Fusilier, in its June 11, 1945 edition, acknowledged the sudden and frenetic pace at which the plant was closing.
Everywhere the Fusilier has heard regrets openly expressed at the threatened dissolution of that “all for one and one for all!” spirit which was built up during the months of stress when calls came to “pass the ammunition” in ever increasing quantities.
At the time we were too busy to realize how strong the bonds were that were being forged. Realization has come since. Out of this realization has come, as we said before, a strong desire in many quarters to carry on the tradition that seems to have been a uniquely Scarboro thing.19
To help with their transition back to “civilian” life, employees established an “Old Boys’ and Old Girls’ Association” to foster the friendships and associations formed during their time at Scarboro.20
In early June, management formed a committee to determine the best method for desensitizing the plant and equipment.21 By the fifteenth of June, GECO had terminated its lease at their employment office at 1350 Danforth Avenue.22 The Medical Department closed its blood donor clinic the same day.23 Management held their last staff meeting four days later.24
Carol LeCappelain completed her dedicated service at GECO on June 23, 1945.25 In retrospect, she wondered aloud what happened to the thousands of pairs of shoes when the plant closed down.26 She recalled fondly that the shoes were “the most comfortable shoes I’d ever had.”27
The Hamiltons reduced production to one shift with another massive layoff of workers on the third day of July.28 The plant published the last issue of GECO Fusilier on July 31, 1945.29 The front cover depicted Mrs. Eva Needham enjoying the distinction of filling the last, or the 8,604,742nd, 119 fuse at GECO.30
Production at GECO ended.
The last layoff of GECO’s operators occurred in early August 1945.31 Because of the continuing need for her skills as tele-typist, and regardless of military conflict, Molly Danniels stayed on at GECO until August, after most employees had already moved on.32
Regardless of how women felt about the war ending, losing their jobs, and heading back to their domestic duties, a huge indicator of their “Thank God, it’s over” attitude would become evident quickly, about nine months later actually, with the commencement of the “Baby Boom.” Many women were happy to be back in the home doing “women’s work,” and caring for their children. Young women were eager to marry a returning vet and start families.
Rationing stopped, the economy picked up, and Canada’s future looked bright, with the winds of change alive across the nation. Women had proven they could perform jobs that had been solely in their male counterparts’ realm before the war. Many women were not ready to be just homemakers again. As peacetime lengthened, increasing numbers of women sought work outside the home.
Men who worked at GECO, for the most part, returned to their peacetime occupations, found new jobs within their trades, or retired.
Canada experienced a time of economic growth and prosperity after the war. Industry returned to manufacturing, and consumer goods were readily purchased and enjoyed by ration-weary Canadians more than ready to spend their Victory Bonds. Quickly expanding families of the “baby boomer” generation moved out of the city to affordable new housing in rapidly growing suburbs.
Scarboro’s Spoils of War
Production: Collateral Damage
While GECO originally intended to fill seven different “natures,” or types of fuses, the plant had been designed to be completely flexible and responsive to the needs of the Allied forces.33 Good thing, too. The plant eventually tooled up for and filled forty-one types of ammunition.34
GECO’s production accomplishments were remarkable in many aspects. Perhaps one of its biggest claims to fame was the fact that workers filled more than 256 million units of ammunitions without one fatal accident, a feat not only unique in Canada and North America, but globally.35 This statistic becomes more remarkable when one considers the number of operations that were required to unpack, fill, pack, and ship a single fuse at GECO.36 Each and every step in the fuse-filling process presented an opportunity for explosion. In particular, 8,604,742 No. 119 fuses were filled at GECO, with seventy-six different operations needed to load just this one type of fuse.37 Simple math suggests that more than 653 million manual operations were needed to prepare the more than eight million Fuse 119s for service. Fuse-filling workshops reached the height of production in July 1944, when the plant filled 11,466,878 .303 Flame Tracer bullets alone, giving an all-time high production in the plant of 14,753,003 units for that month.38
Example of a timer fuse filled at GECO. Courtesy of Barbara Dickson, from Scarborough Historical Society.
To add icing to GECO’s cake, the facility boasted an acceptance record by government inspectors of nearly 99 percent, unparalleled within the munitions industry.39
Total products shipped from GECO were valued at $112,692,316.40
GECO’s impressive munitions display. Over the course of the war, workers filled forty-one types of ammunition, including percussion and time fuses, nose and base fuses, tracer-igniters, and flame tracer bullets. GECO filled an impressive 13,426,587 Fuse 251s by June 30, 1945 — the largest production of any single fuse at Scarboro, or in Canada. Courtesy of Archives of Ontario.
Scarboro’s War Score: July 1941 to July 1945
Fuses, Primers, etc. filled: 129,066,629
.303 Tracers filled: 127,601,555
Total munitions filled: 256,668,18441
Final Headcount
GECO reached its employment peak in July 1943, with 5,324 operators plus an additional 980 Inspection Board personnel.42 In total, 17,104 operators worked at GECO over four years.43 Including support staff and Inspection Board personnel (of about four thousand), that number swells to more than twenty-one thousand employees.44 GECO paid out $27,165,212 in wages.45
It’s in You to Give
Above and beyond purchasing Victory Bonds, employees managed to raise $34,480 to support many charitable organizations, which included British War Victims’ Fund, Canadian Red Cross (including P.O.W. care packages), GECO Veteran’s Fund, Sunshine Club (a comfort service for disabled veterans), various local welfare agencies, and the Salvation Army with the purchase of a mobile canteen.46 More than 250 wallets were given as gifts to enlisting GECOites, four tons of books and magazines were sent to servicemen, and $3,000 was spent to host annual children’s Christmas parties.47 This bounty does not reflect the thousands of dollars donated to various philanthropic organizations for which records were not kept.48
Shrapnel
Other curious figures and totals, of no less importance, of a top-secret munitions plant include:
2,151 individual employees made 8,453 blood donations to the Red Cross;
GECO purchased 22,640 female uniforms and 5,266 uniforms for male employees;
a total of 36,344 purchase orders were placed from about 1,300 different firms for approximately 10,000 different items, not including combustible materials needed for component stores;
41,000 messages were transmitted or received by Scarboro;
buses transported 9,161,258 passengers and covered 3,095,040 miles;
GECO’s cafeteria served 6,854,287 meals;
the plant consumed 39,841 tons of coal and 357,520,600 gallons of water;
total Employee War Loan Subscriptions reached $3,873,643;
GECO’s Medical Department treated 173,456 patients — of which the vast majority were suffering from non-occupational injury or illness;
GECO spent nearly $7.2 million in capital and $102.2 million in operating expenditures.49
Before the first stick of TNT ripped up Scarboro’s countryside, T. Holmes Bartley, Toronto Industrial Commission, estimated the cost to design, construct, and equip the top-secret munitions plant in the east end of Toronto stood at between $5 million and $8 million.50 GECO’s management team felt they could build the plant for a modest $2.25 million.51 When all was said and done, the final cost of construction reached $7,181,124,52 almost three times GECO’s original estimate.
They’ll Hear … “They Kept ’Em Firing”
The war decree, “They Kept ’Em Firing,” from Canada’s fighting sons honouring the faithful back on the homefront, still echoes across the decades since the Allied forces laid down their arms. The story of GECO at Scarboro is an incredible tale, one of which legends are made.
“The record, we think, will stand,” wrote Ross Davis, proudly, in the GECO Fusilier, “as lasting proof of what can be achieved by a company of purposeful Canadian men and women drawn from all walks of life, when faced with grave necessity.”53
15
If You Build It, Scarborough Will Come
GECO’s story at Scarboro did not end with Germany’s surrender.
Decontamination and Desensitization
With GECO’s days of production numbered, Bob and Phil Hamilton had more to worry about than just wrapping up payroll and taking down posters. Management had to ensure workmen desensitized the buildings and surrounding land, ridding the compound of all toxic and explosive materials, as well as destroying all drawings, specifications, and sensitive employee data.1 Most buildings on the dirty side of the complex did not need special attention, except for change houses, where workers had carried explosive dust in on their hair, uniforms, and shoes. However, most everything on the clean side needed decontaminating, right down to scouring cracks between linoleum floor tiles and disinfecting or destroying sink traps.2
Workmen treated workshops with a special chemical formula depending on the explosive residue being removed. Water was sufficient for ridding a site of gunpowder, while workers needed a solution of sodium sulphite, water, and acetone to remove tetryl.3 Some buildings were razed; their lumber burned.4 Contaminated rock wool, as well as tainted earth and bricks from the Destroying Ground, Proof Yard, and magazines were transported to the “Don Valley Pit” and submerged in nearly ninety feet of water.5 More than 6,800 pounds of various excess explosives were destroyed by burning in the proofing yard.6
The War Assets Department of the Canadian government took over managing GECO’s buildings and re-zoned the area for light industry.7
Sheltering the Homeless
At the north end of the GECO plant, bordering Eglinton and Warden Avenues, several buildings were acquired by W.H. Bosely, emergency shelter administrator for Greater Toronto from the War Assets Corporation.8 In many ways, providing emergency housing in the now abandoned buildings of the Scarboro munitions plant made sense. Besides the influx of returning G.I.’s, many families, due to circumstances, some beyond their control, were suddenly without a place to live, or needed to find an affordable place until the economy picked up. In an article in the Toronto Telegram, a writer reported, “With the number of evictions increasing, the housing plight in Toronto is reaching a new crisis ...”9 With other emergency housing facilities cropping up, the city refitted GECO’s facility to accommodate some of the neediest. GECOite Helen Leslie and her fine family were the first residents to move into the new housing project, taking up residence in GECO’s administration building on July 15, 1946.10
“When the housing shortage became almost disastrous after the war’s end,” reporter Harvey Currell wrote, in an article in The Telegram, “Toronto leased some [GECO] buildings, threw up flimsy partitions, put in plumbing and rented apartments to city families who could find no other place to live.”11
Helen told a newspaper reporter the day they moved in, “We will be rather cramped in our four-room apartment but it is such a relief to know that we will be all together, under one roof until better housing accommodation comes along.”12
Living at GECO combined the pleasure of living out in the countryside with the convenience of the city within reach by bus. It was the best of both worlds. In the morning, a resident could go apple picking, or swim in a nearby creek; the afternoon could be spent in the city enjoying a movie and shopping along the Danforth followed by an evening sweet-smelling hayride offered by a local farmer.
GECO became a close-knit community brought together through their unique living arrangement. In many respects, it operated much like a beloved campground nestled away amongst the “wilds” of Scarboro, where neighbours knew one another, looked out for one another, brushed their teeth and showered in communal washrooms, and knew everyone’s business. Many moms and their small children rarely left the grounds, especially when the family couldn’t afford an automobile. Mothers would sit on wooden benches placed along concrete sidewalks to keep an eye on their children as they played. An apple orchard sat at the northeast corner of the property. Children would run across Eglinton Avenue to pick mushrooms where GECO employees had once planted their Victory Gardens. Hundreds of children could be seen running around the compound on any given Saturday. The thrill of (mis)adventure living in Scarboro’s farming “playground” only added to GECO’s exclusivity.
In addition to enjoying the bounty of nearby farms, GECO residents appreciated some original wartime amenities such as a baseball diamond and a hockey rink. Lawn bowling was available at the corner of Civic Drive and Warden Avenue before the municipality installed a new water tower.
Residents of the GECO housing complex, arguably a unique community within Scarboro Township, had to consider daily life, from performing ablutions to doing laundry, from grocery shopping to keeping children entertained and out of trouble.
Helen Leslie did her laundry in her apartment, using, as her daughter Jackie recalled, an “old clunker” washing machine. She hung out their clothes to dry, year round, on a line rigged up by her husband, Howard, accessed via their second-storey bedroom window. Each building had its own laundry mat complete with washing machines, large tubs, and indoor clotheslines.
Men and women shared separate but communal washrooms situated in the middle of each building and consisting of three toilets, showers, and sinks. Each sex was responsible for keeping their respective amenities clean. If the men didn’t bother, the facilities were neglected. The women’s bathrooms were better cared for.
Grocery shopping proved a challenge. Women had limited options. They could travel into the city, which took time and was a great inconvenience if they had no vehicle; they could seek out meat and produce in season from neighbouring farms with no guarantee as to selection; or they could walk to the nearest store, which was located at Eglinton Avenue and Kennedy Road. It wasn’t long before residents and business owners recognized the need for a store onsite.
A store was opened shortly after people moved in. Remarkably, a blind man ran the shop. When a young customer entered his store, they picked out their merchandise and put their payment in a dish. The children couldn’t figure out how the sightless man knew exactly what they had purchased; he would feel the coins with his fingers to ensure he was paid accurately.
Another shop was set up in an old silver-coloured bus, which housed a fruit and veggie stand. It would be six years before the first big grocery outlet, a Dominion store, would open as part of the new
Golden Mile.
The forty-five-minute trip to and from the city was too great a distance for young children to travel, so Building No. 86 — GECO’s former medical building — was renovated, and a school opened. At its peak, the housing complex had four school buildings — three public and one Catholic — all run by accredited, competent teaching staff. Classrooms could accommodate close to forty students. Kindergarten classrooms were attached to the recreation centre. Children identified the schools by colour; the “green school” housed the lower elementary grades, while the “brown school” accommodated grades four to eight.
Given GECO’s remote location, and with hundreds of children idle on Sundays, churches such as the Salvation Army set up parishes at GECO. Many children attended Sunday School. Scarboro’s city council provided the Salvation Army with a large hall rent-free on GECO’s premises in March 1952, in which they could hold their various weekly meetings.13 As of May 1954, the Salvation Army had christened almost fifty children at the housing outpost.14
The GECO housing complex operated from 1946 to 1954, with one to two thousand men, women, and children, conservatively, inhabiting more the than three hundred units.15 It has been suggested, though, that more than six thousand people — upwards of eight hundred families — lived at GECO over its postwar tenure. Toronto Telegram staff newspaper reporter Derm Dunwoody adds credence to the latter estimate. During the summer of 1950, Dunwoody wrote, “The shouts of what seems to be more children than anywhere else in the world” could be heard amid GECO’s housing units.16 He estimated 1,100 children lived at the complex.17 The first residents, Helen and Howard Leslie, added to their fine family while living at the complex, bringing their seventh child, Howard Wayne — “Harry” — into the fold on May 19, 1949.