Camozzi Transcript

Interview with Terry Camozzi, Yard Office worker

Date of Interview: October 31st, 2001 in Prince George, BC

Interviewer: Shiloh Durkee
Transcriber: Shiloh Durkee & Corina Schlak

BEGIN SIDE ONE, TAPE ONE

S.Durkee: This is Shiloh Durkee and I’m sitting today with Terry Camozzi and we’re going to be talking to him a bit about his time working for the CN and as well, changes that he’s noticed in the community of Prince George. So we’ll start out and just ask you a bit about your background, if you don’t mind telling your birth date and…

T.Camozzi: Oh, age, age, right off the bat. Get the age going, typical woman eh? And I can’t know how old you are! (Laughing) No, actually okay. I’m born in 1947 right? In the Okanagen. And anyway, a long story short, my father and grandfather decided this was where it was going to be at so they decided in ’51 I think it was or whatever - they all moved up here. As it turned out, the early 50’s, as you probably already know, lots of immigration. You know, not just from outside of the country; I’m talking about within BC; all the southerners, Lower Mainlanders, they all flocked up here. Okay, cause you know, lumber da da da and again, the railroads eh? All linking up in here. So the first time I worked for them would be delivering telegrams in 1963; did that for a couple of months and realized that that wasn’t…but being young and not knowing about unions, I just – and there was a million jobs – I quit. Whatever. And then in ’64, I went and worked as a timekeeper for a couple months. I put on forty pounds…you go work as a timekeeper, you don’t work, you just keep time; there’s a bull cook (helper) that feeds forty immigrants and none of them speak the same language so she has to cook all the ethnic foods. Well! A good ol’ BC boy like me, I mean, I took some off of every table. (Whispering) My god, it was bad. I had to quit eh? You got to know about unions cause I transferred to end up doing what I did. In ’67, when I hired on the last time, and I could’ve had my seniority from ’63, again, I mean you know, it’s the old saying, “If you don’t ask, you don’t get told”; nobody volunteers stuff eh? But no. From up… during that time, like back then again, schooling was different. I worked with guys that had Grade 3/Grade 4 - was pretty common. I myself went to Grade 9 twice and did a little fake job just cause I didn’t want to work to try Grade 10 once but that had nothing to do with school; I just didn’t want to work right? See, you can stay home if you go to school right? (Laughing) But there was hundreds of jobs. There really was. They were importing people… like it was easy to get, as an example, the ball teams and different things. They could bring in people to play at certain level cause they could give them jobs. Cause there was lots! They were short people. In fact, I think they, if I recall, they even had to advertise and such looking for not just tradesmen; just people that will work eh? I know one year, I think I worked eight different jobs one year. I worked in a garage for a month, didn’t like that getting greasy every night.

S.Durkee: All for the CN?

T.Camozzi: No, no, no! Just different jobs! Yeah, different jobs. That’s why I quit in ’63, ’64. Who cared about unions? I mean, you just didn’t like that job, you walked around the corner and did something else. But I stayed away from the bush for the simple reason that I was lucky. Very early, when I was about fourteen, fifteen and friends of mine were going in the bush - back then you had to set your own chokers and what they called it - which means that the logs were pulling out behind, they wrap the chains for a simple of way of explaining it. Well, it was done by hand. Well, if didn’t pay attention, you could get hurt really bad eh? And my friend, right off the bat, first week, chain hook came around, slapped him on the inside of his knee, took his cartilage, everything gone, gonzo knee-time. This is in the hospital at fifteen, “Look at my paycheque man!” “Yeah, right! Look at your knee!”

So, back then it was, like I said, lots of jobs. So in ’67, I ended up hired on the CN; I was twenty. And did all the sports, played hockey, you know, just like everyone else did cause it’s an active town; more so than here now ‘cause you gotta remember T.V. only showed up ’58, ’60, somewhere in there, so it was already established as an outdoor people’s place. Well, cabin fever – you know what it’s like. You’ve lived here sometime, some of the winters when you were younger…god! You had to get out. Speaking of cold, that’s when I found out how cold cold is being the macho like everybody else right? So, here I am, early twenties playing hockey commercially; this wasn’t just rec-stuff, this was real hockey. The Caribou hockey league was here back then and that was all that wanna-be-ers plus we played real hockey with kid referees. Well, you can imagine the kind of control that had! Lots of rhubarb and fights there but anyway! (Laughing)

But okay so… Back then, the system of keeping track of rolling stock on the CN…

S.Durkee: So this was ’67 when you got hired?

T.Camozzi: …’67. This is the last time. This is when I got into the office part we’ll say, or office work, just for the sake of…’cause I mean there’s lots of different departments. What about yard office? That’s the proper terminology cause there was office work in all these other departments. So we were yard office, which was the controlling centre, you could say, for all the rolling stock which controlled the switchmen, you know, and the engineers moving it all. We kinda did the paperwork you might say. This is pre-computer, okay? So everything was done with pencil and paper. So we had checklists and I just missed what they called the round table. Just before I got there, I guess they had the system, it was a big round table and then they had cards, little slots, you see that they moved around in, and to keep track. So…but you’d have to man it and go out there and right ‘em all down and keep track. So anyway, just as I got there they were just actually… I think it was more than just started; I think it was kinda being fairly well implemented. They went to cards, IBM cards I think they were called.

S. Durkee: IBM cards?

T. Camozzi: Yeah, yeah but they weren’t always, everybody always says IBM and it’s just like, you know, they come out with Nintendo and everything was Nintendo - it might not be Nintendo but they called it that anyways. Okay. So anyways, everything was cards, so they’re implementing a system to try to recognize and code all the rolling stock. Where rolling stock, tank cars, boxcars, freight cars, you know any kind of rolling stock, anything that moves on the wheels. So you have to keep track of all this. I mean how else do you charge people if you don’t? Like grain, lumber, you know the type of rolling stock required to order, ‘cause there’s all different types. You might have certain places that need the big wide doors in to get the big forklifts in to load ‘em. Some might have smaller doors I mean it all depends, eh? So they incorporated a way with these cards and they had a big board on the wall with slots in it where these IBM computer cards, this is the first era of computer, and this is hand computer style. Not hand but you had to have a big clunky machine to do each little part eh, ‘cause it punched holes in the cards is what you did eh? You had keyboards to punch on and it’s hilarious. So anyway, you’d punch the information in the card, and they came up with each rolling stock had initials so when you hired on there, you were starting at the bottom of the food chain. Them were called checkers, so you were given a code card, and it had all the listings all the types of rolling stock and then they’d have initials to identify. So you wouldn’t tell them it was a tank car, that would be a ‘T’. Like, you read the number of the rolling stock, car number and then a code. So anybody looking at would be able to tell both by the number, ‘cause each number ran in series of the type of rolling stock it was. You know, an example of like, most of them were six digits, but anything less than a six digit we knew would more than likely be work equipment, like CN owned, as an example, to identify. And they had all of these things. So we’d have colour coded cards, plus we’d have to write these letter codes on it so the yardmaster, he was the guy that designated how all this got put together and he would give his switchmen the lists to move all the, martial all the cars to go to their designated area. So you had all year round you had people, at the bottom of the food chain as I call it, that had to do the walking out there. So after all the switchmen went out there and moved everything around you had to go back out there and write everything down again, so they’d come back - you can organize anything. ‘Cause the dumb switchmen, I mean, they couldn’t be bothered to remember where they put things all the time and in what order. So okay that was a hoot. And then, that was that computer system. And that when on actually for quite a number of years. You know there was little developments through it but that was the basic, and we had to have… Oh, I remember we used to have to call it a machine room. We had up to, oh I don’t know, six to ten clunking machines in this room, because as the more progress they got in the computers, just like now, and they can do more things, like sorting and reports, you see at the very beginning reports were (motion of writing). Well now you got printers. So now we could take these cards and run lists you see, so as they begin running lists they realize now, the big cheese could all get more up to date reports on what’s happening here, there and everywhere. So that’s how the computer, so consequently they, slowly this all…Oh, what year? I’m not sure what year. So probably in the, when did we get rid of cards? That’s a good question. I can’t really remember right now, it’s probably late seventies, eighties? No it was probably would be eighties. When did we move, see ‘cause CN moved around quite a bit within the CN down there. Well there was the lumber mills moved out and everything and expanded offices got moved to one end of the yard and then they would think the other end of the yard, then they’d go to the middle. So anyways somewhere, I believe it was, could’ve been in the eighties, you better not quote me on that, ‘cause that, I’m not sure about that. But anyway from that computer system we eventually got rid of the cards. ‘Cause cards were a deal. Like, you have to have, to do anything you had to have set up, you have anywhere from two to five cards just to recognize the cards that were coming behind what they were. You had to have the right information in these cards because everything had to be put into charge. Like as you know, I don’t know if you’re aware about it, anytime you have foreign cars on the railroad there’s per diem charge. Somebody gets charged for that, like if you own cars, rolling stock, and its on others, well somebody has to pay for using your car on their line. So it hurries up the deal ‘cause what happens…there was time involved there where the States were short of steel. So all of a sudden they had these big flat cars and they built these big fancy flat cars to haul logs and everything, they had these great big steel spikes, like wood but there was long steel and everything in there and they put the logs in. And they were detachable; you could take them off, load ‘em all up, load them in there these big steel. So down they’d go to the States but they’d come back and they wouldn’t have these steels on ‘em. Well, they were stealing the steel. Steel was so valuable down in the States. They wanted steel. There was Vietnam going on and they needed as much steel as they could get. So they had to stop that. So only certain types of rolling stock would go down to the States. So you had domestic and international type cars. So when you are supplying the lumber companies there was another thing they had to be aware of. There was hundred of different things like this. And again because of the raw nature of the computer system, I mean there was a lot of people involved. So they are hiring more and more people. Everything, there was lots of people working. Not just there but everywhere. Okay, then all of a sudden everybody is like “Oh work jobs, yeah right.” So down the road, which guys like me and others knew, yeah right, the computer age changed to where now they are replacing people. Take cards out, you don’t punch cards anymore do you? So you don’t have to have the people, simple things like ordering the cards from the company and having coming up on the truck and having someone unload ‘em. A very simple thing like that you don’t need that job anymore. So escalate that to where now you’ve got screens, you go to screens.

S. Durkee: Screens?

T. Camozzi: Yeah, and now you’ve got modules or whatever the hell they are. And now you’re all into screens you can see what you are doing. Well, consequently, after you get into that it’s just a matter of time before the system developed, and I went through a couple of changes while I worked, computer changes all different, slowly getting rid of jobs all over the place. Even office work and actually look at… you don’t have the typewriter of old do you? I mean, you don’t even know what a typewriter is probably. You think this is archaic. Right? But take, you get rid off all that stuff and office work now down to three people keeping the time-cards and you know, if ‘cause if they are mailed in you can’t, you know, ‘cause then they had telex machines (makes typing noise on table), remember the telex machines? No you don’t. Back then I was delivering telegrams they had telegrams you know, telex. You’d have a ticker tape it’s like a stock market, yeah so that’s how they could send messages. They’d have a little, they’d have a wide view, like then I’d go over to the dispatcher’s office and watch it. Somebody in wherever, Gekee Pit (Terry and I were unsure of this spelling), would want to send a message up here and he’d (telex-typing noise)… and this little ticker tape would come out the other end, just like a ribbon, and you’d read it. Then you take it off and stick it on a message pad, (whistle), ‘way she’d go to whoever wants it. [Indecipherable]. So I took a rest from that and went over for five years and worked in the… basically it was storage department it was attached to the car department.

S. Durkee: Sorry, when was this?

T. Camozzi: Oh, this would be 19…? Oh, good question. ’87 maybe. Somewhere in there. Somewhere late eighties. Yeah, I got tired of the crapola of computers and stress levels. I mean, there were too many Chiefs and not enough Indians; too many and they were all horrible. So any way, I went over there for five years and I ended up working in the storage which supplies all materials. Purchasing materials they called it, which worked right in the same buildings as the shops and the car department - which the shops is the one that look after the diesel engines etc., and then the car department is strictly rolling stock. So it got to five years and then it just so happened that there were buyouts coming because again the computer system and everything else, downsizing, centralization, and you could go on forever of all the reasons. There were buyouts, and the was one where my seniority level allowed me to do whatever it was, get over there and stuff like this, ‘cause there was guy retiring. So anyway I went back over there on the day shift with weekends off because it was more money. It was quite a bit and I knew retirement was getting closer ‘cause working in, believe it or not, it seems the less you do the more they pay you over there. Just typical all over the place, you know? I’m serious. No, I’m serious. The poor guy out there in the section who swings the axe, the pick, the 60000 below zero and everything else, ‘cause I know I was a checker, like the machoism came back, cowboy boots, the leather jacket, forty below and you’re out walking up snow up to your butt. Yeah, really smart eh? But those guys worked hard and they got nothing compared to guys that got to do less and warmer. Like running trade, engineers, and big bucks for those people.

S. Durkee: Do you recall how much you were paid when you started and progressed?

T. Camozzi: Oh yeah. Okay, just a sec. here. In ’60, hmm that’s interesting. What was it? Oh yeah, it was $300 hundred and, yeah I think it was $360 bucks, I think. Around $350-$360 dollars a month. That’d be about ’67. And anyway I went from, ’87, late eighties I went back over to the yard office again. ‘Cause the money was, well there was quite a bit of difference from the stores. See, the stores I’d make $30,… yeah I went from $31, $32000 a year in the stores.

S. Durkee: In the stores?

T. Camozzi: Yeah in the store department, having to work, to back in the yard office for $40. So it was about $6-$7000 dollars a year more to do less.

S. Durkee: Benefits all the same?

T. Camozzi: Oh yeah. No, no, once you’re in the comp… [indcipherable], yeah you can change in the department not changing companies. No, no, not at all. So anyway the, so I went back in there. And then again, this is where systems work. You know, people they always whine and cry and stuff about different things, but I… okay, I will say there was lots of problems going on. The new computer systems that was coming just before I left, I seen it, I knew what it could do. I thought “We’re history. We’re done.” “Oh no, no, no, you always say that.” I says, “No, no, no, I agree now. Just look at this, one guy can report all of Canada. You only need one human being to do that in the new system.” And sure enough that’s pretty well where it’s gone now. You got right down to where one person can easily run all the movements for that one town, or maybe even half of B.C. or all of B.C. That’s how bad it is…(incomprehensible)… But anyway! I seen what was coming. The change came and within six months after that last computer change, you know after it was completed cause it took six months to complete, cause again, they all like to do things the hard way - they were already realizing that the majority of all that type of work was history. So out they came and anybody with twenty-eight years seniority, no, twenty-six years seniority, and was forty-eight years old could be eligible. For what right? So anyway, we don’t know until you call so what I was at the time – sixth on the seniority list for the BC Mountain region right? Well, that’s not just Prince George, that’s the whole works okay? And anyway, there was three of them – they were starting off with three of these what they called “bridge-to-pension” – that’s the proper term … “bridge-to-pension” kay? I can’t retire until I’m fifty-five. With thirty-five years seniority, I mean that’s the earliest I can go. But they want to get rid of you so they says to me, after all these guys refuse, me and this other guy went in there – I was going to say yes no matter what they said cause the idea was I knew they were going to pay me to stay home. So I was forty-thousand dollars a year in 19…what’s the year now? 2001? Fifty-four...and I went in ’48 – six years ago so it was 1995 like I say. So 1995, they walked up to me and said, “We’ll pay you twenty-five thousand dollars a year gross right? Instead of forty and it’s like I’m still working for the CN, I get all the benefits and everything else just “Go away”. Seriously! “Just go away. Your cheques will come”. I get my paycheque, still get it, been getting them for six years. Every two weeks, my paycheque shows up in the bank. Reduced, it’s all proportioned unfortunately. Just like that. And this is low. Now remember the running trade people got way more when their time started coming. Okay, so believe it or not, there’s people who turned it down and then regretted it later actually. What a bunch of idiots! I said, “You’re not listening to what they’re telling you.” I say, “They’re telling us to go away”. This means you can do anything you want which I did. I took that and I let them wait a day cause I didn’t want to seem to eager; I almost climbed over the desk signing the form heh? (Laughing) You know, like I mean duh! Give me a break! And at that time, Crystal, my daughter, she was already finished school working so she was gone. I mean, once your responsibilities are gone, your income…I mean kids are the worst. They suck money faster than anything. Right? I mean god! As soon as you’re born, you start. We all do it – it’s just the way life is right?

S.Durkee: Yup!

T.Camozzi: Oh yeah. Your parents did it to their parents. I mean that’s what the job’s about. So anyway, I took that and I was so happy I couldn’t believe it. But the bad part was is it caused…because railroader’s are a different breed. A lot of them were really hung up; their whole lives were involved around it. I was always lucky that way. I had sports - I was lucky enough to play at a high-level of sports, a good level of sports competition. That changes your whole outlook with people and your socialization skills. I didn’t have education; I didn’t need it. And as far as the part that people yap about, is you get that through activities, just get your ass going. Whatever you’re good at right? You can always find something whether it’s tiddly-winks or shooting hoops or whatever! So a lot of those people didn’t. They socialized around that. I mean everything revolved…around…work. Families…where I say you get into these families. And a lot of people suffered a lot over that, you know, because when these downsizings started, too many people were hiring family. They got a little out of hand. That’s how people quit working too because it’s all families. Like, you’re going to fire me? That’s my uncle! (Laughing) You know, like I’m not saying all of them again but you get that when you’ve got thousands of a workforce.

But no, I have to admit I never went back. I run into people I know but to them it was just… the system worked. I walked out of there cause I could see that computer system and I talked to people since – that’s why it would be good to maybe talk to somebody right now that’s actually working in there to see how little people it takes to run all this stuff cause it’s so centralized. Even all the dispatching units, they don’t work out of here. They all work out of either Edmonton or Vancouver – I’m not even sure anymore. It might even be all the way to Winnipeg as far as I know cause that’s their idea is they want basically only one or two across Canada in main places. All the rest are real small satellite type people right? You know, so instead of a thirty-thousand total CN working force, you might be down to maybe five-thousand, three-thousand or whatever. I got a friend of mine who’s a carman; they moved him to Vancouver. Now they had to downsize in Vancouver so much – they paid him to move down there – within a year he had to be laid off. He’s even better than me, he’s getting ninety percent of his wages to stay home and do nothing. So, he’s living in Vancouver now, got moved and CN paid it, now he doesn’t have to work – gets ninety percent until retirement.

S.Durkee: How do they determine who gets what?

T.Camozzi: It’s based on seniority and age. Some people call it “points” but basically that’s the bottom line; it’s seniority and age combined. That’s why all these other jobs, like teachers, everything, they’re all based on points. Some are higher, some add up to eighty-five – ours is eighty-five. Some I’ve heard are ninety, you get a total of ninety so you might have to be fifty-seven and a half with thirty-seven (years) or I don’t know. You know what I mean? It’s a combination thereof. I’m sure if you checked with, I don’t know, University teachers? Probably not. They might not have that kind of a system. I don’t know what they’ve got. But in your deal, it’d be interesting to ask people like that kind of question cause that’s the benefits. That’s why the trades you’re looking into to – you kinda sometimes…like money’s good but you want to look at where there’s benefit packages, what’s down the road. It’s fine and dandy to say you want to come out of school being something. Okay, so…whoopee ding! But there’s certain trades, certain things that are going to get you far more down the road than the immediate right now. Like I got, what…a friend of my daughter’s ended up working in a video store for now because she couldn’t find…what the hell? Oh, she was a travel agent – a simple thing like a travel agent but they wouldn’t hire her cause she has no experience. So here she is managing a video store. You know, so there was an example – it was really good to be a travel agent but what good did it do you? Sure you have it and there’s nothing wrong with it but the bad part was that they didn’t tell you that you get the ticket now and you might be able to use it ten years down the road cause you’re going to have to make contact, get on part-time somewhere and you know, cause you have to work somewhere else while you’re doing that right? And it goes for a lot of stuff. A lot of the time you’re not told that until you finished that particular course or whatever and then find out it’s going to take another five years before you can really use it. You know?

So anyway, I got out of there and I did – I went and worked part-time jobs, different things to make up for a couple of years ‘til I realized I didn’t want to do that either. So they’re paying me not to go so actually I retire next year, next May.

S.Durkee: Officially retire.

T.Camozzi: Officially. Then I will no longer be a part of the CN system and then go on a pension plan. See, so right now I still get to vote in the union if I want – I could still go down to the union meetings but to me, why? I mean I’m done, finished.

S.Durkee: And it holds no ties…

T.Camozzi: Not really, no. The only thing is that I don’t put them down; I used to. They had a lot of faults; I’ll still say a lot of faults, but through, thank god, some foresight on some certain unions and that, they got the benefit packages. They created this. Cause without those benefit packages, none of these people, including myself and the rest of them would be able to…they’d be out of work. I mean, I’d be working but I’d have to be still be working and I might be on midnights cause somebody older than me might have to be working the day job. And when we spread out, I’d have to probably be in Edmonton. Well, no, I could still hold it here but within short period of time. But I would’ve retired now but even then, without the benefits I would’ve still had to see? So, benefits again – you go back to benefits. And they work! They do work! At first appearance, they might not seem like it to start with. I mean, look at pulp mills. They have the same thing. I mean they got great benefit packages. There’s another one – get into the chemical plants. I mean, this is where student’s who start looking at it, where are the benefit packages? I read in the paper well nobody wants to be a schoolteacher. Duh! Why not? Aren’t you telling them the facts? But benefits dear, that’s the question. And the CNR really did a good job that way. And BC Rail got the same thing. There again, they really understand what they got. I found it more since I went some of these manual, menial…what do you call them? Minimum wage jobs! Did that for ten months, god that was horrible. And they treat you like crap too eh? That’s another problem I got. Why are certain industries tipped and others not? What about the poor person in 40 below that’s pumpin’ your gas and some twirly-bird swings her hips over here at Moxie’s and she get’s a twenty-dollar tip! I got a friend of mine, her husband, he worked over here – in fact, he’s the town crier – Chris McNalty there? University? You know the town crier? Didn’t you hear about Chris McNalty? He goes to UNBC up there. Yeah, he’d get tips too. You know, well why does that industry get tips? You know, the others don’t. Okay, fast food – you can’t tip, they won’t let you tip in fast food but the poor person behind there is working just as hard. There’s lots of them; why are certain ones getting’ and not others? I don’t like that. But anyway! If you wanna know anything else, you’re going to have to ask.

S.Durkee: I was just about to (laughing). You were just talking about some of the problems you had but what would you say would be your best memories of working for the railway? Was there a camaraderie between you and…

T.Camozzi: I’d have to admit probably the best part of the railroad that I liked was the earlier years. There was…

S.Durkee: Meaning 60s, 70s?

T.Camozzi: I would say late 60s, early 70s cause there was quite a few people…there was a lot of involvement, there was a lot of sports involvement because there was so many guys. We had good hockey teams, like we travelled eh? With the CN.

S.Durkee: With the CN?

T.Camozzi: Yeah, oh yeah cause you have to remember that a lot of these ex-pros would go work from the railroad in the summer. I mean junior players, the railroad use to hire a lot of summer employees cause the holidays eh? You know, there was so many so you had to hire summer relief. Later on, there was no such thing because there was too many workers but back then there was. So then we had a lot of, what you say, athletes that worked for the railroad. And even today, well, there’s first-round draft choices in hockey that work for the railroad that never made it. We’ve got one right in Prince George. He’s, I don’t know, he’s forty-five, works for the railroad, played for the Philadelphia Flyers. He’s only one of many and different things. I mean we got lots of ex-pros and different things so the railroad had a lot of top deal. So, I would say that…cause there was ball teams but the hockey teams were good! A lot of them would go to Jasper, Edmonton, and Smithers.

END OF SIDE ONE, TAPE ONE, BEGIN SIDE TWO

T.Camozzi: Consequently, a lot of the good people just wouldn’t do it so again; consequently, you keep getting worse and worse managers. Then there would be too many and it got really bad. Morale was really down because you’d get really stupid managers like foremans as an example. And again, they’re the worst worker so, you know, you make the worst worker the boss, what happens? You get chaos right? And it was in all departments. You seen it; it was pretty obvious in a lot of places and at times, there was times, where certain bigger bosses came in and did make a difference, got rid of some of them, changed some, did make improvements at different times over the way. But with the combination of the computer system and the downsizing, it slowly even became a lost cause on their part because all the good they were trying to do, you know by getting rid of the garbage management and getting good ones in there, was being basically chopped off at the knees because they were downsizing so much. So there again, there was a period of time in there where morale was pretty bad in just about all departments. And there was, you know, the ones naturally, like myself, it didn’t bother me as much because I didn’t care. I had another life away from the CN. When the CN goes bad, I just drop that part of the life – except for the eight hours a day you had to be there – and I got involved with… Well, I was a single parent too so I had lots of ways to go stay active.

S.Durkee: Did you do nine to five or what were your hours?

T.Camozzi: Well again, most of the time I was lucky. I worked day-shift seven to three. I had either Saturday, Sunday or Sunday, Monday off. I liked either one; it didn’t matter to me. That was mostly what I worked. But other than that, there was the afternoons – if it was seven to three, it was three to eleven and then eleven to seven. And there was the swing shifts; I hated all them. But if I had to work shift, I worked midnights. Straight midnights is better or the only thing better than straight days. Afternoons, no life. At least midnights you had a choice. So no, I was really lucky. Again, the system worked for me. I fit in everything; I only had to work three months of shift-work basically, the rest were basically days. Well, let’s put it this way. How can you put a system down where at forty-eight years old, they pay you for the rest of your life? I get extended health until I’m sixty-five - my dental quits though at fifty-five. But still, all my prescription stuff still until old age so then I won’t pay nothing anyways so it won’t matter right?

S.Durkee: When you officially retire, you were saying you were going to the pension…

T.Camozzi: Yeah, that’s pension. I will no longer be a part of the CN. Because you gotta remember pensions, you are no longer employed. No matter what company your with, once you go on pension, you’re not part of that company anymore. Well, same difference here. That’s where the “bridge” comes in eh? Walking over the bridge, haven’t got there yet. Bridge-to pension! And that’s about it really. Well, I’d have to say in all fairness though most of the people I knew through the railroad were all pretty decent, okay people. But like in any large gathering of the clans, you get dingbats. And being mouthy like myself, I didn’t have too many cause you wanted to play with the dingbat, well, you’re on tape so I won’t use the words that we used to use but (laughing)…

S.Durkee: I have a pretty good idea!

T.Camozzi: Yeah, cause again, there was just so many ways eh? It got a little tiresome cause like I said, the morale used to be down cause you get these dingbat foremans and stuff come in; you could just set them up so easily, they were so stupid. And that was the bad part but I had fun with it so I didn’t mind. But a lot of people did cause they took their jobs really serious, far too serious. I mean, once you can’t control anything, there’s not much point in gettin’ too worried about it anymore. Why? A lot of people do. I used to, probably still do I guess sometimes but you know, everybody does and it goes through the period where you just take things far too serious. Especially I find…well, my daughter and some of her friends – I guess girls come across it more than boys or maybe it’s just the way it is but I don’t know if it’s the naïve part of you guys moreso or whatever, but you always seem so shocked sometimes and to me it’s just like, “What do you think we’ve been trying to tell ya?” You know, like life just ain’t like that! You’ve just been lucky up to a certain point and never had to come across dingbats, for want of a better way to describe it. Then when you do, you’re just, “Oh!” you know? No, no, no, no. But I hope to god you guys, or everybody, is lucky and don’t meet too many of them but you gotta be aware of them! It’s like telling people too many personal things after you’ve just met them. Like girlfriends are bad for that. I remember work, oh! The women admitted it! They admitted it! When there was too many women working together, it was terrible. Most of the women liked working with most of the guys.

S.Durkee: Were there a lot of women working there when…

T.Camozzi: Oh, lots! Specially as time went on. I mean the hiring policy had to change. I mean that was again-I’ve gotta be careful here - there was certain incidences where I mean if you were female and ethnic, guaranteed! Guaranteed. They had to have percentage eh? Remember all that, when you were really young, I mean everything was equal, equality, you know, hiring equality, da da da. Didn’t matter what you were; high, tall, short, fat, skinny, I mean you better have a reason not to hire the average person. You can’t hire the average person anymore right? No matter what you can’t hire them because no, no, you gotta go back and hire all around the circle now whether he’s Indian, East Indian, Black, Greek, orange, Japan, Japanese – I don’t care. But if you were female, you had to jump on everyone of them. Cause it was true but then again, in all fairness, the CN or the railroads, were a lot more manual work back then. And there was lots of jobs that very few females could do, yes, there always… I hate to use the term “butch” cause I don’t mean that in other term than you’re husky and can lift stuff. There ain’t too many of you around that can throw fifty to a hundred pound bundles around everyday or all day is there? Without dying after a day or two you know?

S.Durkee: What do you recall of women working on the line?

T.Camozzi: Oh yeah, there was always the odd one, you know, and then later again it became moreso you know and far more. In fact, at times, it got too much because women were working the wrong jobs. They couldn’t do them and I hate to say it but just like in every crowd, there was one or two that would like to use their womanly wiles to get the young guys to do stuff. And I wouldn’t do it. Oh, a couple of them hated me. “You do it”, no I don’t I says, “That’s your job”. “Well, it’s too heavy”. “Well, that’s not my problem dear!” “What do you mean? Johnny does for me!” “Then you better go get Johnny! cause I says, “I don’t work for your department. Go get a dolly. Go get a forklift. Go get whatever you need to pick it up but don’t come to me!” And oh god! One tried tears. I told her, “Get out of here, go away”. Well, you know, it gets ridiculous! You know, I mean gee! But then there was the others that didn’t do that, they did what they had to do. They’d drag the stupid five-gallon pail of salt they had to carry you know? Take ten steps, stop. Take ten…. So they did it! No complaining! That’s the way you do it, you do what you can do. You go get the tools to get the job done. You don’t bat your eyes and get somebody else to do it. Oh yeah. But fortunately again, I was lucky. I only came across a couple of them like that. Yeah, I didn’t really care whether they liked me or not anyway. I mean you’re working with hundreds and hundreds of people you know! You can’t like everybody and why do I want everybody to be my friend? I’m not your friend; I’m not everybody else’s friend. Not everybody can be friends. So why worry about it? You’re going to get lots before you die you know? Some you like, some you don’t. And I never had a problem.

That’s what I say; the CN was good that way too for the simple reason the departments, like I mentioned earlier, had changed. Well, because of the unions and stuff, you could probably, oh god, there was probably three or four different departments I could’ve got into and done different types of work within my union scope and done those jobs. So, again, instead of having to quit you could just bid off it, go bid another job, which again that’s benefit. Not too many people can, you get hooked into your job or your career right? You’re there. If you don’t like it, you quit.

S.Durkee: How many departments were there in the CN? About?

T.Camozzi: (Sigh) God, I don’t know dear. I really wouldn’t want to try to hazard a guess. I mean, double digits easy. I mean, main departments, by departments you can break that down into small and large. You had big departments, probably maybe only ten or twelve. But I mean if you get into the smaller ones, satellites and all the rest of it, you could get into hundreds. Literally. Just literally. Cause you gotta remember then you go up into the other end of it which I only had a very small touch of, had to deal with telephone communications – had to line a few of them up too.

Well, I said I did a job once that worked with customers, taking orders or the rolling stock. They had this one department called “freight-sales” which people will sell, you know, make the big deals with other big lumber companies to move thousands of lumber, da,da,da,da. Well, okay, they get carried away their own self-importance again eh? And they’re not railroaders! You don’t expect them to be. So, a couple of times, this one guy decided to play with me and I told him not to and he did anyway so I got. Very simple, used to customers. Just tell the truth! That’s all you got to do eh? (Laughing) Well, yeah they wanted to haul me up cause I told him he was an asshole and go to hell right in front the whole office eh? And you’re not supposed to talk like that, especially when you’ve got these Easterners coming over and they’re all politically correct. They right carried away with this. God! You’re in the North, I mean, don’t take it personally just cause I told you to go somewhere. So, anyway, after I left for work, he came in and change all my stuff which he shouldn’t have been doing anyway right? So, the next morning I come to work and a customer call me up and wanted to know what was wrong. I said, “What?” “Oh, we didn’t get this, this and this” and then nothing what he wanted that him and I had gotten arranged happened, it was totally different. And he didn’t know! He’s the customer. I said, “Well, I’ll check it out”. So, I checked it out and found out that the dingbat had come in after I had left for work and played with my stuff so I confronted him on why he did it. He goes, “Oh, you’re just a dumb clerk”. “Ha, ha, well you’re just a you know” so out the door and down he goes to the big chief who I had had a pretty good rapport with anyway; he was almost like a sergeant, major-type guy, really, really tough but I never had a problem with him. Well, we batted horns a few times but he was pretty good that way as long as you stood up to him and you had made sense – you lose control, you lose right? But anyway, he wanted to get me all hooked in, take a statement, you know, get disciplined and all that so I got called into my bosses’ office and I got told that this was going happen. I says, “I got no problem with that” and he was all set for me for me to (indecipherable) it. I says, “No, that’s great!” I says, “Cause we’re going to hang him!” “What do you mean?” he says. I says, “Haven’t you done your homework? You’re supposed to be my boss! Well, I’ve got no problem. Get the big guy up here right now; we’re going to handle this. All I need is one phone call. He says, “What?” I say, “Well, I’m going to phone the customer and have him come over here and we’ll see who the asshole is”. Whoa, stop. “Well, well, we’ll have to see about this.” I says, “No, there’s no seeing about it. Either we are or we aren’t” right? “We ain’t doing this this afternoon, we ain’t doing this tomorrow, we’re going to do it now cause I ain’t putting up with this crap from you guys”. I guess they did a phone call or two and realized what he’d done and I never heard another word about it. Waiting for him to be hanged, fired, all the rest of it. See, this is what I mean by bad management. He had nothing to do with the railway; he did not know how to railroad (Terry’s emphasis). He was hired by a company to do a job within his deal, which he was probably very good at. I don’t know, who cares? It wasn’t my problem? He might’ve been a great salesman but you know, because they get into that line they think they know that. Well, most people, they take it and they hold it in themselves and they’re the ones that have lots of problems later. I mean work…you should never allow work to get to you like that. But again, I was lucky. I could get away with that. I mean, not everybody can respond when the pressure’s on sometimes. Like retorts I suppose is the word we’re looking for. You know, because not everybody can stand up and make intelligent retorts. And the ones that can, you don’t really have a lot of the emotional baggage that’s been caught on from a boss giving you hell. You just look at him and you just agree with him if you’re wrong. You say, “Yeah, you’re right. I screwed up. Okay.” But if you’re not wrong, what do you think you’re doing? (Laughing) Anyway, if there’s not too much more, I gotta get out of here pretty quick.

S.Durkee: No problem. That’s pretty much it. I’ll just ask you, to sum up, how do you feel about your long career? Was it a good choice? Were you glad you were with it (the CN)?

T.Camozzi: Oh yeah. Again, I got lucky. I hired on and stayed there with a company that had, again we go back to benefits, I had advantages that were again…I mean, I could’ve been lucky enough to hire on with the pulp mills too. I won’t deny that the pulp mills has that so I had a couple of choices back then. But I think all in all, from what I’ve heard of pulp mills and BC rail, I think I prefer the way this went down then the way it would’ve gone down with the other ones so…yeah. CNR’s done good.

S.Durkee: Good.

T.Camozzi: There you go.

S.Durkee: Thank you.

END OF INTERVIEW