A NEW YEAR... new beginnings? (Part 103i)

OK... I’m actually going to backtrack here. The situation with Stasia wasn’t the only activity going on over the last two weeks of February but I didn’t want to be jumping back and forth. I wanted to take the Stasia situation to a conclusion, such as it was.

Getting back to the things that involved me, Rich returned from his week long training on the new equipment that was due to be delivered sometime before the end of the month. Talk about cocky... he strutted around his area like a bandy rooster and made a point of “zinging” me about it. I really had to rein my feelings in and not give him the satisfaction of knowing that it did affect me. Real excitement came mid week when the new equipment arrived without warning. Space for it had been identified but nothing had been done to prepare for the installation. It caused quite a stir and most of the employees watched as the riggers wheeled the machine into the lobby. When I saw it I wondered where the rest of it was.

Background... When I called Jay, the Data Processing manager at the County Center that I had worked with, to tell him I was hired to run the bank’s new computer he asked what kind of equipment they were buying. When I told him it was made by Burroughs he said he knew nothing about their equipment and wished me luck. Because I knew that I’d be spending a week being trained on it I didn’t spend any time doing research on the specifics of it. When John, the bank president, had been trying to lure me to come to work I heard the word “computer” and had “assumed” that it would be at least somewhat similar in nature to the one I’d operated when I worked at the County.

When the riggers left just that one piece of equipment and then drove off I was truly puzzled. It looked to be the size of a small dining room table, about 2 1/2’ by 4’ by 2 1/2’ high. It was still on the wooden palate and covered with a tarpaulin. The one person who could answer questions about it was Rich but there was no way I was going to ask him. Surprisingly, Alvin, my immediate supervisor, took some interest in it. He told me he wanted to know the basics of its operation so he would be able to do a proper audit of the product that it would produce. Not wanting to appear overly interested, knowing it would trigger more “guff” from Rich, I made a point of subtly paying attention to what Alvin did to satisfy his curiosity. The day after the delivery I noticed that he had some material on his desk that prominently featured the name Burroughs on it. As soon as he left for lunch I was all over it. I had almost an hour to peruse it and long before I was finished actually felt a rush of both excitement and relief.

What I was able to glean from the material was that the equipment was NOT a computer at all but actually a relatively new type bookkeeping machine. It was not capable of doing calculations more than addition and subtraction. The new concept was that it would use ledger cards with magnetic stripes that would hold the most recent information of each account. The machine operator would now be relieved of having to enter the old balance as it would be read from the ledger card by the machine. The actual transaction, either a deposit or a withdrawal, would be entered by the operator and the new balance would be encoded on the ledger’s magnetic stripe for future use. Armed with that information I was truly relieved that Rich had butted in and had me removed as the operator. I was excited in that it was an “escape” from what was, in my mind, sure to be a dead end job. I certainly had no idea what was in store for me other that the Chairman’s promise of “We’ll find something for you to do...” but by the time Alvin returned I was fairly happy.

In retail it’s “location... location... location”. In life it’s “timing... timing... timing”. In most cases it’s out of our individual control. It certainly was in my case when Monte, the Chairman of the Board, came up to the table I was working at near the end of the day and tapped me on the shoulder, motioning me to follow him into his office. My first thought was that in actually seeing the equipment on the premises he had some solution in mind for what to do with me. However, I wasn’t so sure when he closed the door behind me... again.

There was one difference this time, though. He had a bit of a smile on his face when he said that he’d just gotten off the phone with the president of a bank located in the town where I lived. I knew of it because I had to go past the building both going to and coming from work. He told me that one of their key employees had just died of a massive heart attack and they were looking for people to interview for the job. Monte said he immediately thought of me and asked if I’d be interested. As soon as he mentioned the heart attack my butt moved forward on the chair I was sitting in. I know my reaction was just that... a reaction... a very positive reaction! Of course I said "yes" and he immediately picked up the phone. After just a few words he told me to be on my way, that the president would be waiting for me at the back door. I will tell you this... that was the fastest trip I had made heading West since I’d started at the bank.

To be continued...