Lost Voices
During the time of Jan Smith’s employment at the Owens plant, West Virginia was among the states having the highest percentage of industrial workers and unions in the United States. Historically, West Virginia workers fought hard to bring unions to the area and have placed strong value on collective bargaining.
Initially,
the Owens Factory had a fair amount of consideration for
the workers . This was because the early management
included Huntington natives who had worked their way up
to the administrative level. During those early times,
Owens sponsored picnics, buffalo roasts and other social
activities, which encouraged a sense of community within
the plant. The communal attitude of the plant changed
considerably, when the ownership of the plant was taken
over by Silvis and became managed by those not closely
linked with the region. When the plant closed down in
1993, many of the nearly 3,000 workers were at a
disadvantage. According to Jan Smith, Some of us had been down
there forty or forty-five years. They don’t know
what is going on out here today. Computer skills…
very few of us had that. Most of the crew leaders, we did
have computer, but it always pertained to what was in the
plant and that glass. It is not something we could take
and use somewhere else.