The Golden Rule
I had met Bill Mennen in Berlin-I had worked in Berlin for the German agents for The Mennen Company-and he told me I had a job at Mennen when I came to America. When I was ready to start work I called him, and he arranged for another employee living near Cranford to pick me up as part of a car pool.
It was Monday, June 21st, and I was to start working for The Mennen Company. I dressed for work so early in the morning that I was ready to leave way ahead of time. Though filled with anticipation and some fear, my spirit of adventure was taking over. This would be a day to remember, packed with new impressions and experiences.
Mr. Jim Ford stopped in front of the house punctually at eight o'clock. He introduced himself and asked me to call him “Jim” and not “Mr. Ford.” The custom of calling people by their first names upon meeting them for the first time was new to me. So far, I had called Aunt and Uncle's friends “Mr.” and “Mrs.” as was the custom in Germany, and because they were an older generation which demanded respect. Jim drove a station wagon, which I liked-I was getting quite interested in cars-and after a short trip on the Garden State Parkway we started driving through towns. A lady was waiting for us in the town of Springfield. She joined us for the ride to work. Her name was Alice. Next we picked up Beverly in Short Hills, and then another Alice in Summit.
So this was a car pool. Aunt and Uncle had approved of it when I told them about Bill Mennen having arranged for a man picking me up every day. This was perfectly normal to them. I just happened to be the first one on Jim's route. As I learned later on, there was no one else who came to work from that far away. Bill Mennen had done a super job in finding the only person in the company who traveled anywhere close to the area in which I lived. Only a year before, The Mennen Company had moved from the city of Newark out to rural Morristown, and most of the employees had either relocated or had been hired from the local area.
We arrived at The Mennen Company's plant at 8:50 a.m., and I was guided into the Personnel Department. After a phone call made by the personnel manager, a middle-aged man arrived who introduced himself as Mr. Henry Oldenburg. He was the plant manager, and the only German at Mennen, having immigrated when he was a young man. Mr. Oldenburg had been assigned to be my lifeline in case I absolutely needed an interpreter. Initially he helped me fill out my job application form and told me all the things I needed to know about working there. This was vastly different than working in a small company in Berlin.
After entering the building in the morning, and again before exiting, all non-management employees punched time cards. There were set times for having lunch in the cafeteria and for morning and afternoon coffee breaks. Work hours were from 9:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m., five days a week. My weekly salary would be $37.50, minus deductions. Mr. Oldenburg told me about holidays, vacation time, sick leave, etc, and that I needed to get a social security number. For this I had to go to the city of Newark, and he would arrange for The Mennen Company's driver to take me there on his next trip later in the week.
Before escorting me to my place of work in the Central Steno Pool, or the “Typing Pool” as it was referred to, Mr. Oldenburg gave me a piece of his wisdom which became a guideline for my new life in the United States. He told me: “The door of opportunity is open. We are not going to serve anything to you on a silver platter, but you can have whatever you want here, if you work for it.” Most meaningful of all was his advice: “You can learn a lot if you keep your eyes and ears open, and your mouth shut.” Those words became my Golden Rule.