THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, August 6, 1995 TAG: 9508040181
SECTION: SUFFOLK SUN PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Faces and Places
SOURCE: Susie Stoughton
LENGTH: Medium: 92 lines
A man expects to get dirty in the machine shop at Suffolk Iron Works. It's just part of the job - working with drills, lathes, welding equipment and gears that need to be greased.
And the employees plan to put in a full day's labor, knowing in return they'll earn a good wage at the family-owned business that's been around for four generations.
The 30-some men and women who keep the equipment operating and the office running also know that each morning when they arrive, one of their co-workers will have beat them to the plant on East Washington Street.
James R. ``Mickey'' Underwood, a machinist who has worked there 43 years, arrives each morning before newspapers hit the doorsteps of his co-workers' homes. In the winter, by the time the others get there, he'll have a fire blazing in the wood stove he built in the break area. And he'll be there checking the early morning news on the color TV his bosses gave him a couple of Christmases ago.
Underwood, 63, says he shows up at 5 a.m. each day, three hours before his shift begins. Some who work with him, however, claim he's often there as early as 3:30 a.m.
``It's just a habit that's hard to get out of,'' said Underwood, who had to get up at 3 a.m. when he was in the service. Now he feels like he sleeps ``late.''
And five days a week, he works until 5 p.m. On weekends, he rarely stays all day though he stops by each morning - 365 days a year - to make sure everything is running smoothly at the plant that operates seven days a week, when needed.
``On weekends, if nothing is going on, I go back home,'' he said.
Underwood ``lives'' at the plant, said company president John C. Harrell, who started working part-time as a teenager the same year Underwood was hired. ``He just loves to work.''
Underwood learned his trade from Harrell's father - the late Robert R. Harrell Jr., who hired him as an apprentice in 1952. Underwood had just gotten out of the service, having won a Purple Heart in Korea, where he was hit by a mortar shell.
``He taught me my trade,'' Underwood said of his first boss, whose father had started the company sometime in the 19th century. ``He was a wonderful man. He was just like a father to me.''
Underwood started out in October 1952, making 52 cents an hour, or $32.50 a week for 5 1/2 days work. He went to school at night in an apprentice program and worked during the day in the shop that to day is known as ``Mickey's Shop.''
Underwood had finished four grades at the former Thomas Jefferson Elementary School in Suffolk, dropping out to work at a furniture company to help support his family. But he had achieved the equivalent of 10 grades with his training in the service.
He is mostly self-taught, he said, and encourages others to get all the education they can.
``You can get acquainted with a lot of things, if you just put forth the effort,'' he said.
Underwood rarely misses work because of vacation or illness, said John Harrell, whose son, Clifton, has also joined the firm.
Five or six years ago, Underwood took a few days' vacation in the fall. ``John Harrell told me it was going to snow because I took off,'' Underwood said.
When his first child was born, he took off a week, he said. ``That was about the biggest time I missed.''
He and his wife, Peggy, have two daughters - Deborah and Kay - and ``two puppy dog girls, Sugar and Molly,'' he said.
``I have a wonderful family,'' he said. ``I wouldn't have nothing to live for, if it wasn't for them.''
He and his wife ``got married 'til death do us part,'' he said. They had met ``through the mail'' while he was in the service.
``I had gone in the Army with her brother,'' he said. ``She called me while I was in the hospital in Tokyo and promised me my first date when I was stateside.''
They were married a month after he started working at Suffolk Iron Works. Things have changed drastically since then, he said. The company has grown considerably.
He's enjoyed working at the plant, he said.
``I enjoy the people I worked for,'' he said. ``I like them all, and I think they like me. We all get along.''
He still takes care of the machinery and equipment in the shop, lubricating the lines every 30 days.
``I enjoy what I do,'' he said. ``I try to do the best I can. A person can't do any more than that.'' ILLUSTRATION: Photo
James R. ``Mickey'' Underwood
by CNB