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A Baby Bell utilities company lost a court case in the 60s which requires them to hire women in the field. Their argument was that women can't handle the heavy
by zappo2938 9y ago
A Baby Bell utilities company lost a court case in the 60s which requires them to hire women in the field. Their argument was that women can't handle the heavy tools. After losing they purchased aluminum ladders to replace the heavy wooden ladders and wrenches with longer handles so they had more leverage being easier to use. A reporter interviewed some of the men about the changes and asked what they thought. One man replied, "Everything is so much easier now. I wish we did this a long time ago."
Edit: I heard this story in the 80s when I was a kid. It may be real or not, but the point is the same. I'm still looking for the FWD: FWD: FWD: but I've never heard it again since the mid 80s.
- dragonwriter 9y ago> A Baby Bell utilities company lost a court case in the 60s No it didn't; the Baby Bells were created by the 1984 breakup of AT&T. EDIT: As a sibling post provides details, the error was calling it a "Baby Bell"; the essence of the story, at least the lawsuit itself, is true, but Southern Bell was a pre-breakup Bell Operating Company (an AT&T subsidiary), not a post-breakup Baby Bell. [Errors like pointing to a Baby Bell 20ish years before they existed are often, but as this incident shows not always, signs of folk mythology.]
- Gargoyle 9y agoThe case was real, dunno about the new tools part. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorena_Weeks https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorena_Weeks