Interview with Peggy Gardner
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0:00:00 Robert Franklin: I have a little bit of boilerplate to begin with. My name is Robert Franklin. I am conducting an oral history interview with Peggy Gardner on May 2, 2017. The interview is being conducted on the campus of Washington State University Tri-Cities. I will be talking with Peggy about her experiences working at the Hanford Site. And for the record, can you state and spell your full name for us?
Peggy Gardner: Peggy Gardner. P-E-G-G-Y. G-A-R-D-N-E-R.
Franklin: Great, thanks, Peggy. Tell me, how and why did you come to the area to work at the Hanford Site?
0:00:36 Gardner: My father was a real estate agent in the state of Indiana where we were born and raised. And his cousin lived here in Richland, Washington. And he said their real estate market’s doing wonderful. So my father took a leap of faith. And he was not a man of adventure. So he left my mother for a year and came out here, got his real estate license, and that’s the rest of the story, basically. They moved here, and I followed three years later.
0:01:07 Franklin: And how old were you when you moved here?
Gardner: 23.
Franklin: 23, oh, okay. So you were in Indiana while your parents relocated here, and then you moved to be closer to them?
Gardner: Yes, I did.
Franklin: Oh, okay.
0:01:22 Gardner: My father took me on a statewide vacation with my mom and showed me the area, trying to convince me to live here.
Franklin: And it seems like he was successful.
Gardner: Oh, yes. And I never regretted it.
Franklin: Really? What kind of attractions did the Hanford area have over Indiana?
0:01:42 Gardner: Well, not in particular the Hanford area at the time, because I wasn’t that familiar with it. But the state offered a lot more mountains and lakes and fishing and boating and just a lot of things I enjoyed doing. Plus the fact that where we live, the humidity’s so low. And where I’m from in Indiana, there’s very high humidity. So it was a big difference in the weather.
Franklin: Yeah, yeah. It’s the hardest part about going east, back east, for me in the summer is the humidity. So how did you begin—well, so you moved when you were 23. Did you go to college?
Gardner: I did, and I quit.
Franklin: Okay.
0:02:23 Gardner: And when I quit, I got a job as a gas station attendant for Marathon Oil, and became a minor tune-up mechanic and drove the wrecker for three years. So that was where I got my mechanical aptitude, was within that job. But I guess I’ve had it all my life, because I’ve always—
Franklin: So you were doing that in your teens and 20s then?
Gardner: 19.
Franklin: Okay. Driving a wreck—like a tow truck and--?
0:02:51 Gardner: Yes! A brand-new 1976 Chevy. And it had dollies on it. So, yeah, that was kind of fun.
Franklin: Did you work with mostly men in that industry, I gather?
Gardner: Mm-hmm.
0:03:02 Franklin: Did you find kind of ready acceptance by your male colleagues, or did you—you know, how was it being a woman in a what I think people still today think of as a predominantly male job?
Gardner: Yeah. I don’t remember any challenges. I grew up with brothers and grew up as an athlete, so I spent a lot of time around a lot of men, and was very comfortable and confident in that environment.
Franklin: So did you find—you said you had this aptitude all your life. Did you find a real kind of calling in mechanics?
Gardner: Mm-hmm.
0:03:36 Franklin: And so how did you—you were working for Marathon Oil. How did you—when you moved here, did you go to work right away for Hanford, or how did you get involved out on the Site?
Gardner: I wanted to have a career with a job that had paid for me to be able to enjoy life. And I applied at an apprenticeship program. That program then got me into Westinghouse. Because I was accepted in September of 1978, and it was a machinist program that I went into. So that’s when I began. And they accepted me, because they saw the aptitude that I had for that field.
0:04:23 Franklin: Okay. And was that kind of like a technical school kind of apprenticeship, or like on-the-job training? Were you immediately in the job, or was there like classroom training and things that went along with that?
Gardner: It was both. It was a state-approved apprenticeship program. Instructed by a couple of supervisors and an estimator. They taught the classes right onsite, and we would go work eight hours and then go to class right there at the building. So that was real convenient.
0:04:59 Franklin: How long would the class be each day?
Gardner: Probably two to three hours; I don’t quite recall. But there were three different subjects, ongoing that we were—
Franklin: So you were pulling some pretty long days then.
Gardner: Well, when you’re young, you don’t see it that way. [LAUGHTER]
0:05:15 Franklin: Right, right. Were there any other women in the program with you?
Gardner: Not in the program, but prior to me, there was two other women. They both had quit and moved on to different positions. Then another lady was hired on when I was there and there were probably 35 men and then the two of us. So, yeah.
Franklin: So still in a predominantly male workforce.
Gardner: Yes.
0:05:44 Franklin: Did you find ready acceptance by your male colleagues there? Were there any struggles or issues that you had to deal with, being one of the only women in this field?
Gardner: Yes, there were. It was kind of during the time when equal rights and the women’s movement and “I Am Woman, Hear Me Roar” was out. And there was a lot of resistancy by some of the older craftsmen. But on the other hand, I feel like I assimilated pretty well. And you learn to know who feels that way about you and just be thoughtful about that.
Franklin: Sure. Are there any incidences that kind of ring out in your mind? Any experiences that you care to elaborate on?
0:06:35 Gardner: I’ll say two I have, just right off the top of my head. The first week I hired in, the lunchroom, we had union breaks. I went in and sat down, not thinking each chair was sacred, like in church when you go to church, you know people sit in their own pew or whatever. I sat down in a chair, and a gentleman came in and took me by the scruff of my coveralls and literally raised me up out of my chair and moved me over. And I thought, well, I guess I shouldn’t sit here! [LAUGHTER] But he was a real crotchety old fart, but I loved him to pieces. So we gained a really close friendship. But that was my first week.
0:07:19 Another interesting part of my career was, I was working on a project that another fellow machinist had been working on. And the setup was rather slow. So I was given an overtime job to continue on with his job. And I changed the setup and actually was able to complete the parts a lot quicker. And I got written up for it. For not going to my manager and asking to do that. So that was kind of hard. It hurt. And I didn’t make a stand for myself back then. I probably would now that I’m older. So that was an interesting situation.
0:08:07 Franklin: Yeah. I know in the early days of desegregating some of these jobs that bathroom access was often an issue for women. Were there fully functional women’s bathrooms at the time that you started, or were they still kind of figuring that out in the buildings?
Gardner: Well, they did have restrooms. I mean, it had office space in the front of the machine shop, so there were restrooms for women. But they didn’t have the shower facilities. So for the first couple years, I’d shower in the men’s shower. The guys would just, one guy would stand outside the door and I would go in and shower. That’s sort of how we did it. But then the company built me my own shower, so that was nice to have, and not have to be in the men’s restroom.
Franklin: With a guard. Yeah, I imagine, that must’ve been quite an interesting experience. So you said there was kind of the offices in the front of the house. Were the offices mostly staffed by stereotypical secretary positions—is that where most of the women were, was in the front offices of the buildings?
0:09:20 Gardner: The building itself housed different occupations, unrelated to the machine shop, but yet related to safety and the estimators and the purchasers. Yeah, so it was a combination of men and women; it wasn’t just administrative.
Franklin: Did you hang out or kind of form friendships with the men you worked with that carried on after—like, did you hang out primarily with machinists, or were your friends not working at Hanford?
Gardner: Not working at Hanford. I had a few friends that I would do things with. And coworkers also. But when you talk about my core group of friends, it would probably be I had maybe a couple, three that I was very close to throughout my career. And others that I was close to but wouldn’t see on a regular basis outside of the job.
0:10:20 Franklin: Okay. I guess, describe for me the day, a day in a machinist—what types of things would you be machining, what kind of tasks would you be asked to do, and what kinds of operations would you be supporting?
Gardner: When I first hired in, the FFTF was being built. So we did a lot of support for that. Really interesting work. We worked a lot with stainless steel. The machine shop itself had full heat treat capabilities and also a grinding room, which was rather unique, from the standpoint, a lot of machine shops may just have machining of the parts. This machine shop had the full spectrum. Which, also the apprenticeship was—I was very blessed to be a part of that, to have such a large amount of knowledge within the trade that some people don’t get. But working for the FFTF and that project and the completion of that was very unique for me, being the only breeder reactor in the United States and being a part of that.
0:11:27 Franklin: Oh, wow. And you brought something that you made on your first day, correct?
Gardner: Yeah, I did. My boss said, let’s take you to a machine—which I’d never been on any—and this was on a lathe. And he just gave me a blueprint, and was able to give me the tooling and tell me how to operate the machine. He walked away, and I did this little part. It’s just a practice piece; it doesn’t have any application to it.
Franklin: Oh, okay. And how long would it take to construct something like that?
Gardner: Oh, maybe an hour.
Franklin: And would you start from a solid piece and then machine it down?
Gardner: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Franklin: Oh, okay.
Gardner: Yeah.
0:12:13 Franklin: So what kind of parts were you making for the FFTF, what kinds of things did the machine shop create for the FFTF?
Gardner: They have fuel pins within the FFTF and they would be bundled in these great big stainless tubes. So we would machine these stainless tubes. I don’t know how long they were, but maybe over six feet. Maybe less than that. And then inside would be small quarter-inch pins that would run the length of these inside. They would have several bundles inside this but also several parts inside the reactor. Yeah, that was just one piece, though. I mean, one part of it. We machined other things. I don’t have a good recall for all that. But it was very exciting to be a part of that.
0:13:06 Franklin: Did you need a special clearance to work in the machine shop or to be kind of manufacturing these reactor components?
Gardner: Depended upon what we were machining. Some of the machinists had what’s called a Q clearance. That allowed them to be exposed to different information that we weren’t allowed to as just the regular clearance. So there were some that were able to machine more confidential things.
But in general, on a day, we had a lot of certifications to the metal that went into the nuclear reactors for the fact that it had to have provisions, knowing that the metal needed to be a certain quality. So that was something that we would keep record of when we were given a job. We would document things and make sure it had the proper certifications from the manufacturer of the metal.
0:14:05 Franklin: Did that require you to test the metals at all for strength and for the amounts of various—if it was a composite, the amounts of its components?
Gardner: Well, there was metal testing onsite. There were places that we could take metal for its tensile strength. And to make sure, if it didn’t have any stamped certification on it, we could use some chemicals to find out exactly what’s in it, and to know that the material is what we wanted.
0:14:38 Franklin: Interesting. And so eventually, the FFTF kind of was sidelined, right, as—and so I assume that you weren’t then working on fuel pins or the bundles anymore. So what did you do after the FFTF had ceased operations?
Gardner: Well, when we moved from the nuclear to the cleanup mission, we supported that in different ways. But they actually closed our machine shop down and moved the machine shop out to the 200 Area.
Franklin: Sorry, so where was the machine shop before that?
0:15:18 Gardner: In the 300 Area.
Franklin: 300 Area, okay.
Gardner: 328 Building. So, I’m going to guess, for 14 years I was there. And then the company—that was during the time when there were many contractors bidding for the job, so instead of it just being Westinghouse, there were three main contractors. UNC was another one; Rockwell. Then they started having more people come in and the contracting work out became a popular thing, the transition in our way of doing business. Not just with Hanford, but throughout the United States.
So we moved to the 200 Area and Kaiser took over part of that. I was only out there for two years supporting the cleanup mission, but this is when the tanks were being discovered that some weren’t even marked where they were on the ground. I really don’t have a lot of knowledge about what all went on, other than they were digging up a lot of things, finding ways to pay for the area.
0:16:28 Franklin: Right, yeah, finding some history. Nice. I’m wondering if you could share your opinion on what that was like, to go from a single contractor to multi-contractor, and if you saw that as a beneficial change for Hanford operations, or—basically, how that affected you and how that affected worker morale and the scope of work that you were being asked to do.
0:16:55 Gardner: I just really have one thought on that when you asked me, and that is, because the history and the value of the employees that were there, some, not from conception, but there for a very long time that had a lot more knowledge—once they were bringing several contractors in, people would come in without any history or background knowledge. I felt that was a real critical part or piece that needed to stay consistent for the continuity of understanding the dangers or the concerns. It was taken more serious, from my standpoint, of those that had been there for a long time or had more history with the Area. So contracting work out and bringing new contractors or several contractors in, I felt, was a safety issue.
0:17:45 Franklin: Oh, interesting. Okay. That’s a really interesting point. Did you find that each contractor had its own kind of culture or corporate culture? And was it easy for employees of different contractors to work together?
Gardner: There was some competition, I think, when I initially hired in between the contractors. But there were only three at that time. I guess not. I didn’t pay that close attention.
0:18:16 Franklin: Okay. And so when you got moved out to the 200 Area, what kinds of—you’re obviously not going to be manufacturing fuel pellets—or fuel rods and things. So what kind of work were you doing out there to support cleanup? Like, what kinds of things were you machining out there?
Gardner: There would be tools that needed to be made, specific tools, that were unique to cleanup. So we would be manufacturing those.
Franklin: Can you give me an example of a tool that’s unique to cleanup?
Gardner: I can’t. [LAUGHTER] I can’t even remember those things.
0: 18:50 Franklin: Oh, okay. And how long did you stay out in the 200 Area?
Gardner: Probably a year-and-a-half.
Franklin: Okay. And was it the same kind of atmosphere in the 200 Area that you’d had in the 300 Area? Or was it changed?
0:19:08 Gardner: Well, the R&D world that we were in with the nuclear industry—it was just a lot different in the culture and the different things we fabricated. So when we changed out to the 200 Area, it was a big shock of having to do different types of work. Probably less R&D than it was when I worked in the 300 Area. R&D is research and development, where sometimes we do one or two things, or sometimes we just manufacture something or fabricate something to see if it’s going to work, just as a test piece.
Franklin: A little more experimental.
Gardner: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Franklin: Like, intuitive than—
0:19:59 Gardner: But the culture was very different out in the 200 Area. The buildings were old. The building I moved into was not insulated. I had to wear—they gave us all Carhartts to wear in the wintertime. Pipes froze in the restroom. And snakes—I had a snake pass me in the building. Mice were in my coverall bag. So it just really wasn’t an environment I wanted to continue my work in. So I ended up quitting and moving over to Battelle. That was one of the best moves. I absolutely loved Westinghouse, but when they moved us out in the 200 Area, I felt like I could make a better change. So I quit and went to Battelle and worked in the environmental industry there.
Franklin: Okay, and what kinds of work did you—were you still a machinist then in the environmental—
Gardner: Mm-hmm, yes.
Franklin: And how would you support—that seems like kind of a different mission change from what you’d be machining. So how did you support the environmental research group?
0:21:04 Gardner: I’ll just give you one example of some parts that I was working on. Battelle is worldwide in how they work with the business. There was a job that I was working on that was going to go on an airplane, filtering the air in the atmosphere in Mexico. Because the pollution was so bad there. So that was interesting to know, you know, that this job I was working on was going to be attached to an airplane that was going to be flying around Mexico. I think Mexico City, actually.
We also did animal research. One example of that is when the checks that we write, everyday checks from our checkbook that has the carbon copy, when we would utilize those carbon copies—when they first were manufactured, the workers that were making these pieces of paper, or making the paper to go in our checkbooks were getting ill. So they exposed laboratory animals to this paper until they were healthy; they were not having any side effects from being around any of the particulates caused from the manufacturing. So that was one of the first projects that I worked on. I literally made, they’re called plethysmographs. They were Plexiglas tubes where they housed the mice to expose them to these things. It was hard for me, because I’m an animal lover. So that was a hard job, but it was interesting to see the application of it for the health of the people in the industry.
0:22:51 Franklin: Mm. Do you know what kinds of data was gathered from that research? Did there end up being a link between the illness and the carbon paper?
Gardner: Yes, well, they already knew there was an illness just from the people that were manufacturing it originally. So all I know is they decided to change whatever went into the paper, and that did have a good impact.
0:23:15 Franklin: Oh, that’s good. So how long did you work for Battelle in the environmental research group?
Gardner: For 16 years.
Franklin: Oh, for 16 years. And so from—you said you went out there in ’95, and then 16 years, so 2011, or about 2010? And did you retire then—
Gardner: Mm-hmm, I did.
0:23:40 Franklin: Okay. And what have you been doing—have you still been involved in the machinist industry since retirement, or how have you been keeping busy?
Gardner: Well, I pretty much put my tools away. But I’m still a handywoman; I like to do projects around the house and help people with projects that need some repairs. My first year, I just enjoyed. I took a job out at Canyon Lakes golf course and worked as just a helper at a catering business there. A few times, drove the beverage cart which was lots of fun. I was raised as a golfer. That was fun for me. So just enjoying my life and making it a choice every day to explore something that I haven’t done and wasn’t able to do since I had a full-time job.
0:24:32 Franklin: Sure. Now, your bio here that Jillian took says that you went to HAMMER and were a teacher for trainings on MSDS work conditions safety and health concerns?
Gardner: Yeah, for a short time, a couple years. So maybe two or three times a year, I would work at HAMMER for a week at a time.
Franklin: Was that after you retired?
Gardner: No, it was during the time.
Franklin: Oh, okay.
0:24:57 Gardner: I actually was working at Westinghouse, and I think I continued HAMMER once, maybe, when I was at Battelle; I can’t really recall if I did or not. But it was before the new facility was built, so we were over on George Washington Way.
Franklin: Oh, okay, okay. That makes sense. Well, that’s great. I just have a couple more questions. Are there any ways in which security or secrecy at Hanford impacted your work as a machinist?
Gardner: In what way?
0:25:37 Franklin: Oh, well, I don’t know. Is there any times in which, say, an element of security or secrecy stopped you from working on a project, or you could only work on specific pieces on it because of not enough clearance or something like that? Did you ever work on a project that was very secret or kind of a need-to-know basis?
Gardner: I didn’t, but there were machinists that did. You’re right, it is called a need-to-know. I remember one time they put big barriers up around the Project just so it was in compliance for the security of machining it. So, yeah, that has been a part of my career. But I wasn’t a person on the job.
0:26:27 Franklin: Okay. And was it challenging to—because you moved here during the Cold War and then—although it seems that most of your machine work was for peaceful reactors, you know, the majority of reactors at Hanford were producing plutonium which was being used for the US nuclear weapons stockpile. Did you ever feel unsure or unsafe about working at Hanford, either in a safety sense or in a larger, kind of geopolitical sense, especially as tensions were heating up in the 1980s?
0:27:10 Gardner: Not in the geopolitical sense, but as far as some of the chemicals and materials that I machined, a few years after becoming a machinist, they became classified as carcinogens. The PPE, the protective equipment that we wore, would be required or some of the chemicals were actually pulled off the shelf. So, yeah, that was a concern, because I think the invincible feeling of being young, you know. You think everything’s going to be safe working for large companies like that, and they wouldn’t expose us to things that are unsafe. But that’s not true. They did the best they could, and as things progressed and our health concerns were addressed, then, you know, they would see that some of those things needed to be looked at differently. So the government was able to classify things as carcinogens. And companies could no longer use those.
Franklin: Interesting. And did that impact your work in any way? Or did you feel pretty comfortable with the measures that were addressed?
0:28:21 Gardner: I think there was resistancy because some of the materials we could only machine well with certain chemicals. When they pulled those off, we had to really be creative to find something that was just as good or settle for something that wasn’t as good and try to make the parts as well as we could. But I knew that there were health effects, even throughout my career, in my own body that I had to address from being exposed to things. And I was able to, and got it taken care of.
Franklin: Oh, that’s good. So kind of a balance, then, between doing a job in the most effective way, but also making sure that it’s safe in terms of having your worker safety protected.
Gardner: Mm-hmm.
0:29:15 Franklin: Well, great, and my last question is, what would you like future generations to know about working at Hanford and living in Richland during the Cold War and afterwards during cleanup?
Gardner: I feel that our government was doing a wonderful job keeping our nation safe, and that was their priority in creating Hanford, protecting us. The residual, while being, it is very nasty and the ramifications of all the buried things is a very difficult piece, the reasons behind it were very genuine and ultimately for our country.
Franklin: Hmm. Okay, great. Did you want to show any of the things that you brought with you?
Gardner: I don’t.
Franklin: Okay, not a problem. Well, maybe if they’re—if you wouldn’t mind, maybe we could take them and digitize some of them and then we’ll put them with your interview when it goes online and post the pictures.
Gardner: Yes, I brought newspapers that would come out monthly. I’m not certain if it was monthly or weekly, from Westinghouse. And they’re fun to look back, probably more for me. But, on the other hand, yes, that’d be great if you could digitize it.
Franklin: Great, well, thank you so much, Peggy, I really appreciate it.
Gardner: Oh, it’s been my pleasure. Thank you.
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200 Area
Battelle
HAMMER
Years in Tri-Cities Area
Years on Hanford Site
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