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“I had thought the industry standard for foundry workerswas to have hair pinned up, wear closed-toed boots, and avoid trailing sleeves.” Louise crooked her elbows with a flourish. “Which, you can see, I have done.”
Mr. Hanover’s eyes drifted downward to confirm her appropriate choice of footwear, then lifted his head with a look of resignation.
“In that case, I suppose a quick look wouldn’t overly disrupt the workers.”
Once they crossed the street and passed through the foundry’s doors, it became apparent why Mr. Hanover hadn’t suggested a tour. Though it was hardly a sweatshop like the ones Louise had fought against in her younger years, the foundry was hot, loud, and ugly. Exposed brick walls, the masonry grimy in patches, were lined with metal shelves, haphazard crates with metal bars poking out leaning against them.
Louise could feel the grit of sand under her feet. They must sweep between shifts, but for the moment, the foundry floor resembled nearby Pemaquid Point—though stripped of the peaceful ocean, lighthouse, and any natural beauty and charm.
The center of the core room was a maze of rough workstations on either side of a conveyor belt. Each station was divided in half with a bin, with tools and what she recognized as metal molds stacked within reach. Two workers manned each station—or perhapswomannedwould be the term, given the gender of most of the bustling forms. They reached into the boxes, drawing out handfuls of dark sand and packing it into the molds, every motion precise and practiced.
“That, you see, is sand,” Mr. Hanover singsonged, as if she might not recognize the substance due to the discoloration.
“Yes, mixed with oil and cereal flour to make it moldable and inflexible.”
Another sputter. “Uh, yes.” He cleared his throat. “These cores will be inserted into molds to create cavities and interior recesses before molten metal is poured inside.” This last linewas delivered with less certainty, as if Mr. Hanover was waiting to be told she already knew that too.
Which she did. But since he’d abandoned his condescending tone, she let the lecture pass without comment. “What are they making now?”
“Aluminum castings for bombers.”
Lieutenant Frederick Keats, her new gardener, would be pleased to hear that. He’d only been in her employ for ten days now, and already most conversations had some mark of his past as an army pilot, every task made analogous to some aircraft process or tool.
“We’ve been nothing but pleased with even our new female employees.” Mr. Hanover began walking toward the door. “The outlook was quite grim when we lost a third of our work force immediately following Pearl Harbor. But we’ve found that women’s delicate fingers are well suited for many tasks....”
While he went on, clearly hoping his monologue would create a leash to yank her away, Louise lingered, mesmerized by the pattern of metal clanks as workers rapped on the molds, opening them to reveal cores of various sizes, made of solid sand, setting them on metal trays on the conveyors behind them to be baked. Here the overwhelming grinding of machinery from elsewhere in the cavernous building was muted, like the sounds of a distant battle.
And in a way, it was. The battle to produce, to harness American industry and make up for lost time.
Finally, she turned away, through the shovel-scraped room where sand was mixed and carted away, through the thick metal doors, and out into daylight again. Mr. Hanover babbled all the way to his office, ushering her inside. She was sure she detected a sigh as the door clicked closed.
Louise sat back in the leather chair, a deep breath picking up traces of wood polish and cigar smoke instead of oil andmolten pig iron. Across from her, Mr. Hanover dabbed at his temples with a handkerchief.
She reached into her purse and withdrew her checkbook. “I’m glad to hear all is going well with production, government contracts, et cetera. But I am not one of your board members. I’m here to contribute a charitable donation to your factory. Don’t tell me what you’ve accomplished. Tell me what youneed.”
It was impolite, she knew. People never liked to be seen as needy, but no number of subtle hints or decorously phrased inquiries could get to the heart of the matter.
Sure enough, Mr. Hanover squirmed uncomfortably, as if anything he said might be relayed to his competitors the moment Louise returned to Windward Hall. “As I mentioned, most of our open positions have been filled. The cafeteria is fully stocked. And we’re in the midst of solving the housing and transportation shortage for our workers.”
She sighed and closed her checkbook, the leather cover slapping quietly over the scripted paper inside.
Mr. Hanover tensed, as she’d known he would. “Actually, there is one thing. The children.”
She arched a brow. “I’m not particularly fond of children, Mr. Hanover.”
“And yet you spent a good part of your younger years campaigning for more stringent child-labor laws.”
Of course he would remember. She’d probably bored him to tears about that campaign decades ago when her father had invited him to call at their summer home. Activism, she had discovered, was an excellent method for chasing off potential suitors, for it reeked of independence, determination, and other less demure qualities. “That’s quite different. Charity is a duty, while fondness is an emotion.”
“I’m not sure you understand how true that is.”
She frowned at the change in tone, but whatever the meaningof that cryptic phrase, he hurried past it, explaining his idea. Many of the foundry’s female employees had children too young to be left alone, and some had no extended family to take on the burden. “Widows, you see, or women whose husbands are fighting in the war,” he added quickly, as if to reassure her of their respectability. No divorced or unwed mothers laboring in the core room—that wouldn’t do.
Nursery schools and daycare centers, he went on, were provided by the larger factories, like Bath Iron Works, but Bristol-Banks hadn’t the finances for it.
“Shouldn’t the government be providing childcare, then?” she asked.
“Oh, I’m sure they intend to eventually. After they work out proper sewage, fire prevention, law enforcement, and a thousand other problems for every surging factory town.” Mr. Hanover steepled his fingers over a stack of documents, smiling once more now that he was cozily ensconced in another monologue. “It will be years before government agencies have time to consider working mothers. And how many of their young children will be neglected in the meantime?”
