Latest / The Elevator Careers Podcast / Tom Slattery: Retired Mechanic with 41 Years in the Elevator Trade

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Tom Slattery: Retired Mechanic with 41 Years in the Elevator Trade · The Elevator Careers Podcast

• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome to the Elevator Careers Podcast, sponsored by the Allred Group.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: I am your host, Matt Allred.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: In this podcast, we talk to the people whose lives and careers are dedicated to the vertical transportation industry to inform and share lessons learned, building upon the foundation of those who have gone before to inspire the next generation of elevator careers.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: Today we are talking with Tom Splattery, who retired as an elevator mechanic after working with both the IBEW and IUEC in New York for over 41 years.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: Tom has been a helper, mechanic, supervisor, and an inspector, and was able to experience the change from relay logic controls to solid state systems.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: Tom has learned a lot and seen a lot of change over the years, and still to this day, he loves to meet up with his friends from the industry.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Tom, welcome to the show.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: How are you doing?
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'm doing great.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for being with me today.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um I'm excited to get to talk to you a little bit more.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: I've heard a little bit about some of your stories of the elevator trade.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm curious, how did you get started?
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: What was it that got you into the trade in the first place?
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_01: Well, luck, actually.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um, at the time I was going to college for computers after I got out of high school, and um my sister was dating a guy that was a salesman in the elevator business.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: And he told me, you know, hey, you want to work in the out in the elevator business?
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't know I was scared as anything.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: I was 19, 20 years old, and I was like, okay, let me check it out.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: And uh for the last 40 years I've been working in the elevator business.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: It was just uh one of those things most of the time, you know, you need that one person to get you somewhere, and it's up to you if you can make it or not.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_01: And it just became me because I I wasn't an office person per se.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I like being outside, I love being in different places every day, and that this job just fit my habits.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: It was always nice to go somewhere different, see something new.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and I worked in Manhattan, so it was always fun.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: Always different.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: Well, did have you ever looked back and said, Man, I wish I'd have finished up my computer degree, or did you did you go ahead and finish and then jump into the trade, or did you go straight into elevator trade?
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: Well, at the time it was the uh late 80s.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: Um, computers weren't as big as they were uh now, obviously.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: And I was actually took some computer classes in uh high school in Manhattan.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: I went to LaSalle Academy, uh Catholic High School in Manhattan.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_01: And then when I went to Kingsboro Community College in Brooklyn, I was going in to start learning how to write programs and everything when that all happened.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but then once I got into the business, I just never extended.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_01: And the computers became to the elevators now.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_01: So if you knew anything about computers, which everybody does now, obviously, but back in the 90s, you know, this was all uh all brand new to everybody, especially the old timers, right?
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: You know, because all these relay logic controllers were you know being taken over, and they didn't like that idea, you know, because they they were growing up learning all that, and uh now it became a little computed, and nobody really was like, oh my god, what's this?
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_01: You know.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: So you went straight from the community college into an apprenticeship.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: Is that correct?
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, it was actually in IBEW in New York.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I was with the electrical union, it was their local trade.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: They had the EE division, which was electric elevators.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: Also in New York was local one, which was the International Union of Elevator Constructors, which was also maintenance and uh others.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_01: But for 20 years, I worked with local tree because I worked for a company called Flint Hill Elevator.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_01: It was a private company, and they had a lot of big contracts in Manhattan, and they were very large.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so we really never had no problems.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_01: And later on in life, um it was like, okay, the best union to be in is local one because they only worry about the elevator guys.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_01: It's an only an elevator union, right?
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_01: And IBEW was everybody, you know, the electricians were God to them, you know.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: We were just a bunch of stepchilds.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: But as, you know, as now that I retired and realized I never touched any of those additional annuity funds and this and that from local three, you know, I found out I had, you know, a whole bunch, almost$100,000 saved up because I never took any of that money out.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: It always came out of your check, went into an account.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: And still had your name on it after all those years.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_01: And even though I I would always get the stuff in the mail, I just throw it to the side.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, but at the time, you know, it was invest in this, invest in that.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I was trying and I was seeing the money going up and down.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_01: And then I was like, oh, you know what?
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_01: I'm just gonna put in what they called capital preservation.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_01: So they use your money and you would get more interest out of it over the years.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_01: And then I uh 20 years later, I got into local one, which was everything.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_01: It was a higher rate, it was uh different, um, different, a whole bunch of different ways that they did things with money.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_01: The union dues wasn't as bad, but when something happened and somebody had to cover your back, you know, the union was there for you.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_01: So it was always good because they could just couldn't fire you per se.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: You know, they had to come up with a reason or they didn't like the clothes you were wearing, couldn't wouldn't cut it, you know.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: Sure, like you said, they they're taking care of their people, making sure that you were you were, you know, that that you weren't just fired arbitrarily.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: If if somebody's gonna get rid of you, there was a a good rate.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_01: It was an elevator union, though.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: That that was what more was more a concern.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: And the rate of pay was much better.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, in either one of them, you can always get whatever rate you want, depends on who you work for and how much you know.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, they're always looking for talent.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: Whatever they're willing to pay you, in other words, depending on what experience and knowledge you bring.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: Is that what you mean by that?
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: Well, yeah, but basically, like also, you know, if you're looking for at the time when you're looking for a job in local three, you you know, you get right in and stuff.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: But local one was more uh how would you say uh more like um elevator controlled where you know most of the guys they looked out for each other in local three?
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: It was like we were just EE division, you know, we can only vote, you know, on certain things, but if we had a vote for our contract, we were on strike with local three, we're on strike with local one.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: So it really didn't matter, but to be in just an elevator union was so much more interesting and more career related to it, you know.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_00: Gotcha.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_00: How did you come to that decision that hey, I'm gonna I'm gonna change from local three?
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: Was it a from local three to local one?
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: Was that a company decision or was it just hey, I want to I again I I lucked out.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I wanted to get out of Brooklyn.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_01: I had a wife and two uh little girls, and I didn't want them to grow up in uh where I was living.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I went upstate and I just said, okay, I'm gonna leave local three and uh I'm gonna go work for an elevator company, which is a private elevator company, and be their supervisor of the mod and maintenance stuff.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_01: So I wound up doing that, and then I met a friend of mine up there, and uh he was worked for local one company, which was Tyson Krupp Elevator.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: And he was like, Hey, what are you doing?
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, Hey, he says, Why don't you come over to local one?
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_01: You were in local three, and at that time, local three and local one were a little bit of fighting over everybody, you know.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: Local one wanted the elevator guys, and they were trying to get them in and over.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_01: And just again, you know, God bless, I lucked out and he said to me, He says, Hey, I can get you into the union uh up here.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: Doesn't matter whether you're in New York, it's uh local one is New York, New Jersey, as well as all over the country.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: It's local one, and they're the largest, they got more people on local one than the rest of the country has anywhere else.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_01: And next thing you know, I was working for them and uh the rest is history too, you know, because I just kept on going wherever wherever the times went.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_01: And I still well had to go back to Manhattan after a while because that's where all the work was in the five boroughs.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_01: So I wound up moving all the way up there an hour and a half to come all the way back down every morning, you know, with the company vehicle or this, they would always give you something, you know.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um, yeah, so it was it worked out really well.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: So you actually left the union to go into a supervisory role.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: Is that what happened?
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: And then you you came back.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but it I was leaving the union.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_01: I was, yeah, I was just getting out because I actually found a house.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted to live, and I was just saying, listen, I know what I'm doing, I know I can get a job anywhere.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I went up there and I wound up finding somebody at the D D elevator was called.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I knew the owner of D D through his father years ago, and another gentleman.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: And he was like, Hey, you want to come and work for me?
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I was like, Okay, sure.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not doing anything right now.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: I was looking for a job.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: And um, no, I was looking for a job.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: There was actually, I was a company up there that I was looking to get into before that.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: And then when that uh that opportunity came, I jumped on it, wound up working for him for about I think it was six or eight months before I had the opportunity to go into local one.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: Gotcha, gotcha.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, and then from there, like you said, you came back, you started working again in Manhattan at some point.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_00: How how long before you came back?
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_01: 9-11.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: 9-11, I had to come back down because I had an elevator inspector license.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: And uh they tissue needed an elevator inspector down in New York City because the one guy that was at the World Trade Center actually uh wasn't going back to work.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_01: He was he was done.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_01: He was, you know, he uh he was around the area at the time.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: So it was um then next thing you know, here I am back in Manhattan.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_01: After working, it was Westchester County, which was everything was hydro's.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_01: So after coming out of Manhattan where everything's traction, and you got machines and this and that.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, okay, everything's a three, four-story building and office buildings.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_01: It was like just hydro cars.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, this is really retirement time right here.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know, no more slinging cables and changing cables.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so I pretty much was all I stayed on the electrical end of it because I worked in repair, you know, when I was in New York, and that was all just brute work, you know.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: And then I noticed they started coming out with the IP8300s and different selector types, which becoming more, as we said, computerized.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: And you would take old veins out of the shafts, put up this new magnetic tape, put on magnets, which were doing the same thing as the switches in the shaft.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I started wiring those things up, and next thing you know, I was in here, and then they made me a supervisor at Tyson.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I was for a while, we were doing really well and with uh them.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: And uh well, then something happened with Tyson, if I remember correctly.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_01: And uh then I got a job with Otis.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, and then so I was working with Otis for a long time, also.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: Is is Otis the one you retired from then?
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: So tell me about some of the mentors.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: You've told me about some of the friends, and you've even even mentioned just a minute ago about you know, I knew this guy and he got me into this company.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I hear what I hear you saying is there's a lot of deep-rooted connections in this industry, and that uh you've you've obviously been fortunate to have some of those play in your favor.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: Tell me some about some of the people who made the biggest impact on your career, or maybe taught you some things that really made a big difference for you.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, there's pretty much a lot of them, but I could tell you there's uh Bill Casey who um was was just a genius.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: He was an Irish genius.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: Bill Casey, who owned that company called Carter Electronics, he was a genius, and he was uh electrical, and then there was a man, Ronnie Paciano, still alive this day.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_01: He was uh from Brooklyn, and he was just a repair man.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: He to this day, he's still kicking.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_01: He's like 80 something, and he still remembers Jones.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_01: Remember that time when we were doing this?
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_01: He would do one time, he put my skinny little ass on the back of a beam in the projects in Brooklyn, because we didn't have rigging, the correct rigging to pull a machine out of the motor room.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_01: And he says, Listen to me, he goes, You go up there, and I want you to sit on this beam and you don't get up until I get off, until I tell you.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, You're gonna do what?
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_01: Rig a machine out of the motor room with me sitting, my I I weighed 130 pounds maybe at the time.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: And believe it or not, you know, uh, I sat there scared, scared, scared.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_01: And uh he just knew how to do everything the correct way and got that machine out, and then he was like, Okay, come on down now, you could get off.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I see that machine down on the street level, you know.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, oh my god, I didn't get to see what they were doing because I was praying to God, I didn't get catapulted over the thing from the weight.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_00: So, were you the counterbalance?
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's what I'm trying to understand.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_01: That's exactly what I was.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm glad Ocean didn't see that one, right?
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, I know they got the truth, they got the truth.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_01: But I mean, the guy's a genius.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: He you can talk to him over the phone and he'll tell you how to do something.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_01: And then basically, you know, people like that, uh, a lot of them.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: Then like over the years, uh, there was another gentleman, uh Ben Ciano, who I worked with at Tisson, and he was just another, just a great everybody had great, great attitudes, and they were always willing to help.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: And go, you know, it's up to you if you wanted to learn.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: They didn't care if you didn't learn.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: You needed to learn, and but then became more friends with them when they seen, you know, hey, you got an interest in this and you want to learn more.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: And then over the years, we still to this day meet every year up at Hunt the Mountain.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, a whole bunch of them and uh have fun.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_01: We just hang out with my old friends and then still hang out with the old timers, and it's real fun.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: No, that sounds great.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_00: And and obviously those those men had a huge impact on your ability to to turn around and and do the same for somebody else.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so I'm sure you had plenty of opportunities to to teach somebody who's who's coming into the trade.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_01: I got a lot of you know, you see a lot of people and they're you know, a lot of helpers.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: And what do you think?
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: But if they can't listen, just keep your head down, show up to work every day.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you're gonna learn and you're gonna enjoy this.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: If if you're uh, you know, an outgoing person, you know, you can you're gonna like this because you're gonna be outside, you're gonna be somewhere different every day.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_01: You might be in some place, maybe a week, you know, someplace you've been there four hours, right?
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_01: You know, changing governor ropes or you know, doing different things.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_01: And every day was something different, which made us so and you learn so much more that when you do become a mechanic, you know, you you feel empowered to say, Wow, now I gotta teach this guy.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_01: And I had plenty of helpers that didn't want to do anything.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's like, all right, no problem, you know.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: If I had to work harder, then it just made their day work a lot worse.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_00: So the ones, I mean, it sounds like some of those that didn't want to do anything probably didn't work out long term because they just weren't there to work.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_01: Some people just don't, yeah, just don't like it.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: You know, first you get very dirty.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: Your hands are like constantly, you know, now everybody's got to wear gloves, but you know, the the uh grease between your fingernails and everything like that, you know, you always had to uh you know, wash up at the end of the day with the scrubs and this and that to get it out, you know, only back to it the next day.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_01: You know, they didn't make you wear gloves like they do nowadays, right?
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_01: But I got all my digits 40 years is is a big thing, you know.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you you've been working in a high-risk job and environment for for a long time, and so yeah, to to walk out unscathed like that is is awesome.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: That's a uh don't get me wrong.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, a lot of days you went home hurting from rape, you know, you're pulling weights, putting them on the elevator.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_01: That and they didn't really have weight cards, they only had they were uh 50-pound things you had to bring into the elevator, put them down, go get more, you know, your back is definitely gonna be hurting.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but at the end of the day, you you know you worked.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_00: That's amazing.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, if you were to to give some advice to somebody coming into the trade, maybe they're maybe they're new, what what would you tell them?
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: And what what are some of the things that have contributed to your overall success?
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I would tell them to just keep their head down and learn.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_01: Listen, shut up.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_01: You know, don't try to think you know it all.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_01: Uh shut up, listen, learn.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_01: And you you know, sometimes you have mechanics that really don't know what they're doing.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: So you got to decipher what's right and what's wrong.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_01: And you can in any way, because if that elevator's not running and this guy thinks he knows what he's doing, he obviously doesn't.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: He might know more than the helper, but he doesn't know more than somebody that has a little more experience.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: So everybody's gonna fix everything, you know.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_01: I'm the best thing ever, you know.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_01: But you you learn and you sometimes just shut up and just listen.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: And that's basically it.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_01: And show up.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_01: Show up, always be there on time.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_01: Be there before the mechanic, you know.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_01: If you start at eight, be there at 7:30.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_01: And you you realize that you know, you see things that might not, you know, again, oh, so you got something that just got delivered and you were there early.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_01: And that guy now that a mechanic might appreciate it.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe he uh had a fight with his wife and got in a little late, right?
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_01: You know, but now he can trust you.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_01: When you got somebody next to you on top of an elevator, and they're pretty much looking out for everybody's got to look out because one bad move can cut your head off.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I lost a couple of friends.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we had, you know, one of them was it was exact platinate.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_01: He was uh doing a hydro job on 43rd and uh Lex, I think it was, in this place called A1 Security.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: And then if you went into this place, it was locks and everything all over the place.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_01: The place was like, it was like a library of just locks.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_01: And uh they were doing a uh thing that ran the car all the way up, and they were gonna lower the piston down after they hung the car, not realizing they never took off the platin plate, which the piston runs on the platen plate, which is supposed to be secured to the steady and plates underneath the the cross beams underneath the car.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: And um, what happens was they started to release the pressure and he went into the pit and the platin plate came down and hit him, and he was he was in pretty bad shape uh for about five, six years before he passed.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um, he's a good friend of mine, and stuff like that.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you just gotta be really, really, really cautious.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, you want to go home at the end of the day, that's the main thing.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_01: No, you nobody wants to get hurt.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_01: Nobody goes out to work and say, I'm gonna get hurt today, you know.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but just be conscientious of your surroundings at all times, you know, stay within the perimeter.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_01: Nowadays it's a big difference.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_01: Again, I keep saying that because it was different.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we weren't a safe, we were safe per se, but now with all the you know, the big companies, it's God forbid you do the wrong thing.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_01: But then again, they want you to do the wrong thing when they don't have the correct equipment, but that don't mean anything.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_01: You don't, they don't get fired, you will get fired.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: So you feel it sounds like there's a lot more rules today.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_00: Do you feel like the do you feel like it's safer overall, or um has that changed as well?
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_01: You know what?
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_01: Safety is only as the people around you.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_01: So you know, it's uh if people are safe, they're gonna be safe.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_01: And back in the day, it was everything.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_01: Nobody and I don't think once, you know, that there were, you know, you always get that little bruise or something falling on you, or something like happen or trying to uh tighten down on something too much, and you know, with little scrapes and this, but nobody, you know, ever on a job that I was on really ever got hurt um where somebody did something wrong, you know.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: Now, like what you said about safety's only as as good as the people you got working around you.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_00: And and so you've gotta everybody's gotta be vigilant and diligent and paying attention and you know, following the protocols and just looking out for each other.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and then most of the time you're a maintenance guy.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_01: You're all by yourself.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: So, I mean, when I came to North Carolina, I got stuck in an elevator twice.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I never got stuck in an elevator at all.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_01: You know, a lot of years.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_01: I found a way of getting out.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_01: You know, now with the door restrictors and all these other you, you know, pieces that they put, like Otis put on these retractable edges and they put stuff on the doors.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_01: So you can't get out of the elevator.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_01: The door only opens two or three inches, you know.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_01: And if that happened in the day where we did it before cell phones and all these other things, you were stuck in there pressing the button and the phone never worked.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: So might be there a long time, in other words.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, until you know somebody or some you didn't get home that night, or somebody said, Well, where is he?
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_01: And there he is, you know.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: Where was he last?
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_01: Call work.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_01: What job was he on?
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_00: You know, gotta go find him.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, and there somebody's stuck in it, you know, falling asleep, and yeah, you never know.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_00: What would you say is your your favorite thing about the elevator industry?
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: You mentioned never really looking back at your your computer career and you just stuck with it for 40 years.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_00: What was it you love so much?
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: The friendships that you have with the guys you worked with and the learning of, you know, the learning of doing it and being, like I say, out in the open.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you weren't going to from your house to the train to an office, coming back home, right back in on the train.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_01: So you went to this building, and then you met this, or met this super at this building, or this building manager was really nice over here.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: And and you worked them in hand.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_01: So it was always like you just, you know, they let you go, do what you got to do.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, you're like um you're like the you know, when the elevator guy walks into the building and there's only two or three cars, you know, and one of them is down, you're their best friend.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's you probably started earlier and you're you were trying to get it all done before the the mad rush comes in.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_00: Is that right?
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_01: No, most of the time it's uh you got to take it out.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_01: It could be a four or eight-hour job, 12-hour job.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_01: So if the elevator was out, you always, you know, the barricades.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: We didn't even have barricades back in the day.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_01: We just closed the door, nobody knew we were inside until maybe something might have fallen down the shaft or something.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_01: They'll be like bing, bing, bing, bing, you know, what was that?
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, nothing.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: The guys are working in the shaft, you know.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_01: But uh, yeah, that's pretty cool.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_00: What what do you miss the most?
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: Is it is it those friendships?
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_00: Is there anything that you miss about being retired?
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_01: That that was it when I first retired got retired, because I retired in New York, and then I went, I got my license, and um I was doing inspections in Manhattan, and I was it was actually having it was even better.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: I was getting it to Manhattan at nine and being on the train going home at 12.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_01: Wow, because I would go there, and all I would have to do is go into the buildings and talk to the manager, tell them I gotta check the the inspection tags on the elevator, go up there, check the one, the three, and the five-year test, put the dates on a piece of paper, go down, go to the next car, or go to, you know, you can only do uh five cars in one building in a day, and eight total.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_00: Really?
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, yeah, and it was a great job.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, and then again I met uh such a nice dude that uh I still called Charlie Morone.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_01: I met him at the class over in uh I went up to New York for my class so I could see some more of my friends and uh Charlie from a guy from Long Island, a little older than me, he's like such a nice guy, such a sweetheart.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: And I mean him sat together and I met like five of my other friends at the thing.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's like you have friendships that last a long time.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: And when even though you don't see them for a long time, you know, everybody goes in their own direction.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_01: When you do see each other, it all comes back.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, remember that job we did here?
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: Remember when we did the cables over here?
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_01: Remember when we were over there, you know.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and that's what it sounds like that you've you've kept those friendships.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you talked about going up into the mountains every year and kind of a big family reunion.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, pretty much, pretty much.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_01: And it it, you know, to this day, it's still fun, you know.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: And it it's you you just bring back so many memories of you know growing up in this business.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_01: It's uh it's good, like you say.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_01: You're always gonna have bad bosses and you know, people that you know you might not like.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, to even then I might as a lot of guys I disliked, but as I got older, I realized, you know, it was more me, maybe than them.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_00: You even learn to like them, huh?
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's yeah, and then now we we're still great friends, you know, guys that that still go up to uh hunter.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_01: You know, now they're my you know, they're all great friends.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: When we sit, we have dinners and we have lunches together, and it's at ten at night, we're all having, you know, we're staying in the rooms and we're uh because they all own houses up there, and uh we just party and having fun, just remembering the old times.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_00: That sounds like a lot of fun.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_00: So it is I've got a question about uh you mentioned that things have changed.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_00: Is there is there anything if you could change one thing, maybe maybe wave your magic wand?
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_00: What what's one thing you might change now?
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_00: You know, maybe keep it the same as it used to be, or what would you do if you could just change one?
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_01: Change one, I don't know, tell you the truth.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe uh not get married the first time.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I mean, everything went good.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, over the years, now that I think about it, I mean, like I said, you know, a lot of times I was more angry than anything, but realizing that it doesn't matter, you know, the most important thing is coming home at the end of the day and not being hurt.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know, not hurting somebody else.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know, God forbid you drop something by accident.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you don't mean to hurt anybody, but I never hurt anybody, you know, by you know, kicking some, you don't even know.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_01: Inadvertently, you could kick something off the top of an elevator.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: And if somebody's in the pit, you know, you have to be cognizant of if anybody's below you, even when you're in the shaft alone.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_01: And uh other elevators, you know, some things fall, things fall all the time, you know.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: So hey, okay, you hit the other car.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_01: Now those poor people are thinking, oh my god, the building just came down.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_01: Because that's a scary thought for somebody that doesn't, you know, just hitting off happy, happy day, like watching the numbers go two, three, four, boom-boom.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_00: You know, they start hearing things falling.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you've got to really, I don't know, to maybe, you know, maybe be a little more smarter, you know.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um, that's about it.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's awesome.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_00: You've got a lot to to be thankful for, like you said, just coming home safe every day and build a lot of friendships.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: You learn that for granted sometimes, you know.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, it's easy, yep.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and then you see somebody that gets hurt on a site, and you're like, hmm, you know, yeah, and then you have, you know, at the time I was young, then I started having kids, and now you know you got something, you know, that that's uh very important to you.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you for for talking with me today.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_00: You've you've shared some some awesome memories, some some good things to keep in mind, and it's my hope that others can can hear you talk about a wonderful industry and build their career upon some of the things that you've learned.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, for sure.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you, Tom.
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate it.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_01: All right, thank you, Matt.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_01: I appreciate it too.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening to the Elevator Careers Podcast, sponsored by the All Red Group, a leader in elevator industry recruiting.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_00: You can check us out online at elevatorcareers.net.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_00: Please subscribe, and until next time, stay safe.