chapter 24. feed the rounder.
i was dying everyday on the machines.
i prayed.
'Stuefloten's Sweat Shop' Yes that was another story I remember.
I say the press room "animals" with all due respect. They were the cream of the crop. I'm glad I ended my time on a press.
I was one of the first guys in the "Towers" room T 211 first then T 240.
chapter 24. feed the rounder.
i was dying everyday on the machines.
i prayed.
Chapter 24
Feed the Rounder
I was dying everyday on the machines. I prayed. “Please god get me out of here.” There was no way I could do another two years. I was losing my mind.
I found a picture old guy with grey hair. His hands were folded as he praying. There was a Bible (not one of ours) and a loaf of bread on a table next to him. I hung it up on top my locker for all to see. I had no idea why I did.
One day my floor overseer Phill Gouckinbil saw it and said. "What is this brother Casarona? This guy is not a witness! Because that is not a new world translation bible on his table."
I said. "I thought he was. That he was one of the anointed ones, celebrating the pass over behind the iron curtain and that was the only bible he could get."
"Mmmmm." He said as he walked away.
I had nothing to lose. I was already at one of the worst jobs in the factory.
It must have worked. I got a job change two weeks later to the east freight elevator in building one. I thought I died and went to haven. I could walk around and even go to the bathroom anytime I wanted, without having to get permission. I was my own boss. Maybe there is a god after all.
My job was to move people and freight from the different floors in the oldest building in the factory complex.
That is where I meet the sixth floor press room animals, Great guys.
Just below the press room is the 5th floor ink room. These guys were "The Mash unit" of the factory. These guys got away with murder. They even had a place they could hide and one of them could take a nap, as the others were on look out. Their overseer was Norm Brecky. I really cool guy I thought, until Jimmy Olsen killed himself. Anyway he would go to bat, for his boys “The Inkies” which he did so more than once. These guys even took coffee breaks, unheard of.
A few months had passed. I was getting comfortable again, maybe a little too comfortable. I was starting to lose some of my “fear of man.” However, the bindery was just a building away over a sky bridge.
One day, I was down by glue room which is on the other end of the ink room. I was standing there with Mike Stillman and two other guys. Mike had this big wooden paddle about six feet long. He was beating the harden glue with this paddle it. It made a sound like a whip hitting bare flesh.
He would yell out. "Feed the rounder.” This was the machine from hell, I worked on in the bindery.
Slap..........”Feed the rounder.”..........SLAP! ”Please don't beat me, brother overseer!
“Feed the rounder.”...........Slap!"
We were all laughing. Just then walking up from behind us was none other than "Liver lips Linderman." The overseer of the whole bindery! He stood there for a minute quaking and finally said.
"Just what do think, would have happened if it was a tour group that had come over that bridge instead of me?"
Mike just stood there, with his paddle over his shoulder and said. "Well, I guess they would think we were normal, like everyone else!" Oh my god, I can’t believe what Mike just said!
Remember rule number one, never defend yourself.
Linderman stood there with smoke coming out of his ears and with a hateful look. He didn’t know what to say. How dare we stand up to him? He finally said. "You, you .......have done a very bad thing.” He turned and walked off. We are totally screwed, I thought.
That was it, I thought, bindery here we come…. back to hell!
But no, Norm came through again. He saved us.
That is, what is so nice about Bethel, it’s the love!
There is an old Bethel story that goes like this.
Phone rings in 5th floor bindery, new boy picks it up and says.
"This is Jack's mule barn, which Jack ass do you want?"
On the other end of the phone. "Do you know who this is?”
New boy. “No”
On the other end of the phone. "This is Max Larson factory overseer!”
New boy says. "Well, do you know this is?"
Max Larson says. "No!"
New boy says, "Good" and then hangs up. True Story.
chapter 23.
in 1970 i saw a move that changed my life forever.
which looking back, would have been a total blessing from god.
Yes "corn" I think he was James Kennedy assistant for awhile in the press room. Even he was SR when he first got there too. I have another story about him in the press room. I'll tell it later in the book.
chapter 23.
in 1970 i saw a move that changed my life forever.
which looking back, would have been a total blessing from god.
Chapter 23
“Catch 22”
In 1970 I saw a move that changed my life forever. I could have been kicked out of Bethel for seeing it. Which looking back, would have been a total blessing from god. We were so brain washed we were afraid of being kicked out of hell.
Or at least I could have got a good “service talk” for seeing it. Why? Because it was rated “R” and all rated “R” movies have been condemned by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society for over forty years. It was such a great movie, I went out and book bought the book.
The story was about a bunch of guys living together in an institution and the institution was the army air force. The movie was called “Catch 22” and it was Bethel incarnate.
It started off with two officers talking as they are walking down a runway. As they are walking a plane crashes lands killing everyone on board they don’t even look to see what has happened. Officers and overseers who didn’t give a damn.
People like,“Major, Major, Major” who were promoted not because he was a spiritual person or his qualifications but because he was oldest guy in the department. Who had no idea how to handle people and hated the fact people wanted to talk to him. If you ever had a meeting with him “He would be out, unless he was in and then he would be really out.”
Then of course the insane amount of “Catch 22s” Where they say things they really don’t mean. You know if you find out about any wrong doing please come and “talk to us.” Or we are all equal here, just that some of us are more equal than others.
But the best part was at the end when they were finally going to let Yossarian go home. After they did everything they could to destroy him.
“You can leave here but there’s a catch.” They said.
“There’s a catch?” Yossarian was afraid to ask.
“Yes its catch 22. You can leave here but you have to go back home and tell all the people there how much you like this place.”
Yes, the movie was Bethel with all its insanity.
Then in September 1970, about 6 months after me. Roy my old pioneer partner showed up at Bethel. When he got there he was so self-righteous, he made me sick, he reminded me of me, when I first got there. I told him "I can’t say anything to you right know, come back and we'll talk again in six months" Of course he looked at me like I was crazy.
Poor Roy would fine out soon enough too. He got off to a bad start, they put him in a room in the 124 with Eugene Alcorn, a black "brother" from Detroit, with a real attitude. Roy hadn't even been there a couple of weeks and got a taste of "Bethel Justice." It seems he and his roommate Eugene got into a fight over the radio one night. Eugene had the radio on one night. Roy wanted if off at 11:00 p.m. so he got out of bed and turn it off. Eugene got up and turn it back on. Roy got up and turn it off. Eugene turned it on, you get the idea. Words were said and in the brawl, that followed, the sink in the room got busted. Now most guys would cover for each other. Instead, Eugene went to the Bethel office the next morning and told the brothers that, his white roommate didn’t like black people, He said Roy wouldn't let him listen to his radio, so Roy beat him up and that is why the sink was busted. I never did like Eugene.
They hauled Roy into the Bethel office. How it works at bethel is whoever gets there first with the story, usually wins. Pretty much just like in the in the kingdom halls. The reasoning is this, only the righteous one would naturally report the behavior of the unrighteous one. So by the time Roy got there, the decision was already made. Welcome to the bindery Roy.
Besides the about 48 hours you worked there a week, you would have other duties too.
There was dish duties. Since the waiters worked from about 6 am in the morning to about 4 pm in the afternoon, they needed someone to do the supper dishes. About once a month the Bethel family got that privilege. Funny thing is you never saw any of the Bethel “heavies" do any dish duties.
They we fun especially in the summer time. The worst job was working the dish washing machine on the "Hot end" there was 2 brothers loading the front end and 2 guys taking the 140 degree dishes off the back end. Your hands were on fire. You couldn’t wear gloves or the dishes would slip out of them and break on the floor.
That is where I first meet Dave Borga. He was Jim Pipkorn’s best friend and roommate from Wisconsin. He was the waiter that was in charge that night. He put me on the “Hot end" by myself because we were shorthanded, He could have helped me but he just set up on a counter just laughing. It was like that "I Love Lucy” show where she is in the factory with a conveyor belt, any way that was the last dish duty for me.
Then you had the night watchmen duties. Once every 2-3 years in the home, you pulled an all night watchman duty. It started about 9 p.m. The Watchman would get a day off and you would fill in. It was very creepy. It was dark and you had to walk through all three buildings 119, 117 and 124 (not the 129 no buddy cared about the 129) and their basements too. You did this loop three times in all the buildings and punched the time clock at different locations.
At about 3:00 a.m. in this dark basement of the 124 all of a sudden this guy jumps in front of me and screams! I could have died. I thought I saw ghost of Charles Russel himself. Guess who it was? It was Scott, the night watchmen, he said "he couldn't sleep and wanted to have some fun with me." What a jerk. About 2 years later, he was asked to leave (get kicked out) Bethel. It seemed he liked to sneak into the sisters bathrooms in the 117 in the middle of the night. They only at had one bathroom per floor, Knorr’s Idea on how to save money, I guess. He would lock the toilet door and wait until some sisters came in to take showers. He got quite a free peep show. I guess all those long nights working by himself finally got to him.
Good news, he is an Elder in Salem Oregon now. He was my overseer,e I was assigned to, at a district convention in Corvallis.
There was another guy, while I was there at the Watchtower farm, who was just as weird as Scott. He would sneak into a married couples rooms, in the middle of the night and lay on the floor next to a brother’s wife and copped a feel. Now, you know why Knorr hated Bethelites so much.
chapter 22. the machines conquer all.
after doweling’s committee meeting many of us got job changes out of the laundry.
i guess they wanted to bust the trouble makers up.
I don't where I was at in the sewing department but I was the 5th floor building 3 when I was on the lines
chapter 22. the machines conquer all.
after doweling’s committee meeting many of us got job changes out of the laundry.
i guess they wanted to bust the trouble makers up.
Chapter 22
The Machines conquer all
After Doweling’s committee meeting many of us got job changes out of the laundry. I guess they wanted to bust the trouble makers up. They asked for volunteers for a night shift in the factory and even though they don’t usually sent “home boys” to the factory they sent us. I had no idea what was wanting for us over there.
If the laundry was the penal institution of the home than the bindery was the penal institution of the factory.
Welcome to hell. Abandoned all hope who enter here.
I was sent to work nights in the sewing department. The smyth sewing machine was a machine that was designed by the devil himself. You would sit on this chair and throw thousands and thousands of these sheets over a saddle where they were sewn together. The good thing about the machine is you could always stop it. On the bindery lines there was no stopping the machines. You were like Charleston Hesston the galley slave in Ben Hur everyone rowed together. They had everything but the drum there and it was always ramming speed.
It was the bottom for me that winter 71-72.
After that I was sent to the bindery 5th floor, Building 3, bindery line 5. It made the laundry look like heaven.
Welcome to hell. Abandoned all hope who enter here.
Standing in the same spot, 8 hours and 40 mins a day. Your job was to take a book out of one machine, the “rounder” and shoved it into another machine called the “back liner.” Your job was to take a book out of one machine and shoved it into another machine. Your job was to take a book out of one machine and shoved it into another machine. You get the Idea. Yes, you would do this same motion 15,000 to 17,000 times in one day.
If you begged your line overseer, he might give you a 5 minute break to go to the bathroom every four hours. That means he would take over your position. Since he didn’t want to be standing between two machines either, you needed to get back to your spot as soon as possible. Of course, they could have bought a machine that did same job for $5,000 but it only cost them $22 a month for a warm body to do the same thing. Do the math.
One time an army general come through on a tour of the factory. He was shaking his head. The tour guide said "I'm sure you could get your troops to do the same thing" He said "Are you kidding? No way."
Of course there is no racial prejudice in the Lords house. Yet about 20% of the Bethelites were black but about 60% of the guys in the bindery were black. It seemed odd to me. So I asked Calvin Cylik why that was the case? He was assistant factory overseer at the time.
He told me. “The black brothers had a natural rhythm that fits well with the machines.”
I guess this is one time you didn’t want natural rhythm.
Ronnie Klineman from Ruston Louisiana. Told me my favorite story about Brother Swingle who was on the governing body. Ronnie set on Lyman’s table. This new black kid was sitting there feeling pretty good about himself as most new boys do.
Lyman said to him. "Boy would you pass me the potatoes?"
The black brother looked at Lyman in the eye and said. "I'm not your boy!”
To which Lyman said, not batting an eye. "Nigger pass the potatoes."
Hard to believe isn’t? Yes, Bethel was not the place to try and be uppity.
This was the early seventies and the “black power” thing was happening. A lot of black brothers went there had a little bit of an attitude. If they didn’t, some pick it up after they got there. I can’t say I blame them.
Anyway back on the bindery line. Many guys there would get the "1000 yard stare." The same one you would see in the war movies, the same stare that guys would get after they have seen too much.
To fight off the boredom you would play mental games with yourself. The first week there, I thought about everyone I had ever meet. The next week you would think about every movie you ever saw. The next week, about every place you would like to travel to. The next week you would think about every mistake you ever made. And then there was the girls, lots of thinking about girls. Then it all stopped after that. Someone would walk up to you and ask you. "What are you thinking about?"
"Nothing." You would say and you weren’t thinking about anything, you were brain dead.
There was just the groaning sound of the machines. Days drifted into weeks, weeks into years.
There is eternality! Some hours in that factory feel like it an eternity. There were days you looked at the clock and it would say 2:13. You would look again and it would say 2:26! So yes there is a hell, the fifth floor bindery.
Jim Pipkorn, ended up in the factory too. He got shafted to the bindery also, to the "End Sheet Gluier." In the bindery he got so depressed that for months, he would come back to his room at night and make himself some dinner and then go to bed, at about 7:00 p.m.
I asked him why he was doing that, he said "It makes the days go by quicker."
We were counting our time. It was just like Viet Nam. You would ask a guy how long he had left. He would say "3 years 2 months to go" We would say "You Poor bastard......that is after 1975, so you will never have any sex." You should have seen the look on his face.
chapter 21.
“black thursday” the day the music died.
knorr gathered all the bethel overseers and governing body to the kingdom hall in the 119 building.
Did he ever get married? He was every single sisters heart throb in the 1970's
chapter 21.
“black thursday” the day the music died.
knorr gathered all the bethel overseers and governing body to the kingdom hall in the 119 building.
Dean Songer did seem like a real person.
However I feel concerning all Bethel overseers unless you stood up like the three Freds and called bull shit. "You are as much responsible for the evil you commit as the evil you permit."
Other wise like the Nazis war trails its the old "We were just obeying orders.
P.S. I don't care if he was straight, NPG or active gay. There is no judgement here.
P.S.S What ever happened to him anyway?
chapter 21.
“black thursday” the day the music died.
knorr gathered all the bethel overseers and governing body to the kingdom hall in the 119 building.
Dean Songer was NPG and they knew it.
chapter 21.
“black thursday” the day the music died.
knorr gathered all the bethel overseers and governing body to the kingdom hall in the 119 building.
Chapter 21
“Black Thursday” the day the music died
Knorr gathered all the Bethel overseers and Governing Body to the Kingdom Hall in the 119 building. The Three Freds (ex-circuit overseers) and about fifty brothers showed up. That’s right only fifty showed up. The other guys chickened out, they knew it was going to be a blood bath. I was there with 5 others from the Laundry. No turning back now. I was sure god’s organization and his holy spirit would deal with these matters.
They brought the brothers into the auditorium in small groups or one at a time. So we were not present for the testimony of the different brothers but we did heard about some of it later.
It started out with Dan Smoley who wasn’t even 30 years old and partaking. Meaning he thought he was part of the little flock or the anointed ones. As mentioned before these are chosen directly by god. He told all the overseers there about how Max Larson had told him in no uncertain terms, that there was no way was one of the anointed!
Max was the head of the whole factory complex. Max was very close Knorr. They would dress their wives up and go dancing together at the “rainbow room” in Manhattan. Max at the time was just a member of the “great crowd.” Which really pissed him off. I mean how could god pick this kid, over Max? Especially since Max had been at god’s house for over 40 years?
Sometimes I wonder how God picks those anointed guys anyway, God can be strange sometimes.
Guess what? Years later Max started partaking. What a surprise god changes his mind once again.
Back at the meeting, the stories of Bethel's Elders misconduct and abuse of power kept flowing. They were shaking the pillars of the organization! Knorr knew this and got madder and madder. With fire coming out of his eyes, he would have loved to have killed us all on the spot! Everyone knew these men were above the law. How dare we? Where the hell is Jehu, when you need him?
Then it was our turn to share our information about our dear brother Ken. Some of the brothers from the laundry started telling about some of Ken’s escapades. Knorr when off on all of us. Than something crazy happened as he was in the middle of his rant. All of a sudden Fred Franz stood up and said "These men are appointed to their positions of responsibility/power not because of their spiritual qualifications but because of their secular abilities!" The room was silent. What did this mean? No one really knew for sure. This statement did stop Knorr dead in his tracks however.
So Knorr said. "We will look into these matters later." End of meeting.
As Jim Pipkorn and Jack Sutton were walking back from the meeting, Jim looked over at Jack and asked him how he thought the meeting went?
“Well, I think this is the end of our Bethel careers.” Of course he was right.
What happened after Black Thursday? Basically nothing. There was only one committee meeting. Brother Lang presided. It was about my Laundry overseer, Ken Doweling, brother Couch wasn’t exactly a disinterested third party because he was the one who appointed Ken to his position of oversight in the first place. So if he was removed it would be a reflection on him.
They gave Ken a slap on the wrist. By the time I left Bethel two years later, he was promoted to where else? The Bethel office! Back to the most power office in the Bethel Home. Yep, he now had the chance to train new Bethel overseers and be an example to them.
He was "a company man" and "company men" always take care of their own. Just look at the elders in any local kingdom hall today.
Oh something else did happen to about a hundred and fifty brothers and sisters there. They lost heart.
Of course nothing happened to the other Bethel overseers. Funny how this was reminiscent of what happened to my parents back in 1961. Could there be a pattern here? If there was I couldn’t see it at the time. I just didn’t want to see it for sure. After years in the organizations, I have to say this was no coincidence. Just the voice of “Christmas future.”
They didn't kick the three Freds out for their transgressions. Looking back it would have been kinder if they had kicked then out.
Instead they would try to break them, and humiliate them in front of the whole Bethel family. They made their lives living hell.
They even put Fred Barnes, who was well into his fifties at the time on a machine called “The Gather." This was a machine that even 19 year olds had a hard time keeping up with.
Fred had a heart attack. What a surprise. They were kind enough to take him off that wicked machine after that. “By their love you will know them.”
They were really hoping all three brothers and their wives would just quit and leave. Really where could these guys go in their fifties. They had invested their whole life into the program. Leaving Bethel in disgrace wasn't an option so they stayed.
Of course the rest of us "Laundry boys" we were screwed also, as were the others that showed up at that meaning. We were all marked. We had done the unforgivable, by binging up the wrong doings of the bethel overseers. Our Bethel careers were over. Our files were noted.
There was only one thing left to do, serve our time and get out.
