Steelworker by trudy pax farr

STEELWORKER BY TRUDY PAX FARR Trudy Pax Farr held variety of jobs in her lifetime. She worked as a teacher. She taught English as second language. Ohio is her native and currently she lives in Minnesota.
She worked in BOP (Basic Oxygen Process) shop, which is a six to seven store building. She was assigned to work as a burner in BOP. She was given stiff metallic like coat and leggings, strap leather gaiters over shoes, a welded type shield to protect her face and leather one-fingered mitts for her hands. All these were given to protect her from the sparks that might fall on her when these sparks shower down when oxygen, flame and air meet molten steel.
Accidents were part of everyday life in mills. The author was aware of these accidents. One such fatal accident happened to Slow Joe. Though he survived the accident but the worker say its better to die than to lead that sort of life. When the author visited the accident site she immediately decided become a ladle liner. She took this job because she thought it was much safer than the burner. As a ladle liner she has to help in building the floor and wall of firebrick inside the ladle. Since the risk involved in ladle liner’s job is very less she opted for this job.

Reference

Molly Martin. Hard Hatted Women: Life on The Job. Seattle: Seal, 1997.