Clayborn Benson: My name is Clayborn Benson and I am doing the interview with
Mr. Raymond Levy today at Wisconsin Black Historical Society. It is Tuesday, the 28th of 2015 at Wisconsin Black Historical Society. Fantastic, one, two, three. Well good, let us start Mr. Raymond. Your name is?Raymond Levy: Raymond Levy
Clayborn Benson: And where do you live at Mr. Levy?
Raymond Levy: I live at 1400 West Custer Avenue, Glendale, Wisconsin.
Clayborn Benson: How long have you live in Milwaukee?
Raymond Levy: I was born here.
Clayborn Benson: You were born in Milwaukee, oh fantastic. Your parents name?
Raymond Levy: My father's name was Thomas and my mother's name was Fanny.
Clayborn Benson: Fantastic. And what kind of work did you do Mr. Levy?
Raymond Levy: I worked at Pabst Brewery for 30 years.
Clayborn Benson: Thirty years? Okay, did you go to high school in Milwaukee?
Raymond Levy: I graduated high school. I had one year of college at UWM.
00:01:00Clayborn Benson: What high school did you go to?
Raymond Levy: Lincoln High School.
Clayborn Benson: Lincoln High School. What did you want to be? What were your
goals and aspirations?Raymond Levy: Actually when I was in high school I wanted to be a secondary teacher.
Clayborn Benson: Secondary teacher, okay.
Raymond Levy: I wanted to teach high school.
Clayborn Benson: Okay. And you went to work for Pabst Brewery. When I think of
Pabst Brewery I think about the cartoons that they used to have advertising. Do you remember those?Raymond Levy: Oh sure.
Clayborn Benson: They were quite famous.
Raymond Levy: They were indeed, they were indeed.
Clayborn Benson: And beer signs at almost every corner where people would have
the. How long did you work at Pabst please?Raymond Levy:I worked there for 30 years.
Clayborn Benson: Thirty years. And what did you do for them?
Raymond Levy: I had multiple tasks.
Clayborn Benson: Share some of them with me would you?
Raymond Levy: Well I drove the semis. I drove the tanker trucks. I worked in
bottling. I worked in the cellars where we got the beer from the brew house and 00:02:00processed it for the public. Those are the main things that I did.Clayborn Benson: So then any one of those that you liked more than the other?
Raymond Levy: I liked to drive the trucks more because it put me outside the
plant a lot.Clayborn Benson: Okay.
Raymond Levy: We had supply to bring into the plant like malt and grains. And I
drove the trucks to bring those into the plant.Clayborn Benson: Where did that take you in terms of outside of the –?
Raymond Levy: To the south side, South 43rd Street, south of National Avenue.
Took me out into Butler, just all over the city.Clayborn Benson: Okay. And what years did you, did you work for Pabst?
Raymond Levy: I was hired at Pabst in 1966 and I worked there until the plant
00:03:00closed in 1997.Clayborn Benson: Ninety seven. I understand that they're even coming back from
a smaller version then they.Raymond Levy: They are indeed. The microbreweries. And I had said to a friend
of mine I would not drink a can or bottle of Pabst until I find out what the connection is with the new generation to the old generation. I do not, I don't have fond memories of the way management treated us in the process of closing that plant.Clayborn Benson: Okay.
Raymond Levy: During contract negotiations they asked concession from us
supposedly to keep the business viable. Now they knocked our wages back three years. In terms of wages, they knocked our wages back three years. And that was a depressing time for most of us that I talked to in the plant, see. And of 00:04:00course they ultimately closed the plant anyway. But that was the story they told us.Clayborn Benson: Were you part of the union negotiating team or were you?
Raymond Levy: I was not. I was active on the various committees but none of the
negotiating teams.Clayborn Benson: Okay. How did that impact you when they asked that you reduce
your salaries back three years?Raymond Levy: Well it was depressing. It was really, really depressing because
when you're living at a point where your, where you do your lifestyle around the money that you're making and then all of a sudden they knock two dollars plus some cents off of your wages, you have to, you have to rethink everything, you 00:05:00know. Things that were easy to pay became difficult to pay. So that was not an easy time. And I think that feeling lasted for most of us or a lot of us rather until the plant closed.Clayborn Benson: How long after that big, well I wouldn't call it a strike, the
negotiation of your contract, how long did that take for them to close the factory thereafter?Raymond Levy: Well let's see I'm trying to remember our last contract. I don't
exactly remember when our last contract was. But it was maybe three or four years I imagine before they closed the plant.Clayborn Benson: So you guys really made that sacrifice hoping that the factory
would stay alive.Raymond Levy: Yeah.
Clayborn Benson: And continue to exist.
Raymond Levy: Well, you know, by way of contract negotiations we had, we had
00:06:00some pretty good things going on. We had health coverage. We had insurance which the company, which the company pay, I'll give them that. They paid all of that. We had all of that until the plant closed. And then from the year 1997 to 1998 we had taken the, they took, they dropped our life insurance 50%. And we went to court to try to battle that but of course the court ruled in favor of the company. And the biggest lesson I learned from that is that they, they depend a lot on the language that's in the contracts. And that was how Pabst was able to convince the judge in their, persuade the judge in their favor, see. 00:07:00And sitting there through all of that it was kind of, we could kind of see the air going out of the balloon.Clayborn Benson: Goodness.
Raymond Levy: Yeah. And so they ruled, the judge ruled in favor of the company.
And we lost our life insurance. We lost our health insurance. We lost our life insurance. And then from 1998 on we had to scramble to get our own health insurance. I was fortunate that I found something that was affordable but I did look around.Clayborn Benson: So when you said two dollars and some cents you're talking
about per hour taken off the per hour of your salary?Raymond Levy: Yes, yes.
Clayborn Benson: My goodness.
Raymond Levy: It's a big job. You know, you plan, you plan your family
00:08:00vacations based on what you're making at the time and a lot of other things that impact your family. And all of a sudden it becomes a problem. So that was not a good time.Clayborn Benson: So, so would you say that they cut off 5% of your salary or
10%? What would you think that they, what percentage did you lose?Raymond Levy: Well it's hard for me to figure percentage wise. But I can just
tell you dollar wise because we were making $18 plus at that time. And they just knocked us back two years.Clayborn Benson: Okay, wow. So the plant closes two to three years thereafter.
What did you do?Raymond Levy: Well I was used to being busy so I just found part time work just
to keep myself busy.Clayborn Benson: Okay.
Raymond Levy: I had a part time job for maybe three years after I retired.
Clayborn Benson: Okay.
Raymond Levy: You know, I just used to being busy.
00:09:00Clayborn Benson: So did, the money wasn't there and did you suffer any other
hardships as a result of not having?Raymond Levy: Not really because the part time work that I took on made up the difference.
Clayborn Benson: Okay, all right, okay. Did your family experience any
difficulties that, because of you not bringing the same amount of money in?Raymond Levy: Nineteen ninety seven, not really. With my wife at the time she
had a job.Clayborn Benson: Okay.
Raymond Levy: But my main concern there was my youngest daughter. I didn't want
her to suffer anything because of that situation.Clayborn Benson: Was she in school or something?
Raymond Levy: Yes she was.
Clayborn Benson: Where was she at in school?
00:10:00Raymond Levy: She was the Washington High School.
Clayborn Benson: Washington High School. Were you able to send her to college
or did you?Raymond Levy: Yes. We sent her to Johnson C. Smith College in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Clayborn Benson: That's good, fantastic.
Raymond Levy: She graduated.
Clayborn Benson: But having less money did impact whether or not you could do that?
Raymond Levy: Well sure. But then my wife and I at the time we always had to
talk about how we were going to get this done. How we were going to get that done. And we cut back on some vacation time, things like that. I don't see it drastically but it was there.Clayborn Benson: Okay. There were people who suffered all kinds of dilemmas. I
mean, some drunk excessively and took drugs, neighborhoods collapsed, small business fell to the wayside. Any of those kind of experiences that you feel that you encountered in that kind?Raymond Levy: Not really.
Clayborn Benson: Not really.
Raymond Levy: Not really, no.
Clayborn Benson: You didn't note a favorite tavern or nightclub or bar that you
00:11:00would go to as a result either near the plant that went under because the, because either the plant moved or because you guys were less likely to go in there because you had less money?Raymond Levy: Well there several taverns near the plant that closed but it
wasn't, but it wasn't because the plant closed. It was because of management. Management in a lot of these taverns had gotten old and they didn't want to continue the business.Clayborn Benson: Okay.
Raymond Levy: That's what that was all about.
Clayborn Benson: Okay, all right. And in the guys that or you don't know of any
that found themselves drinking excessively because of.Raymond Levy: Not to my knowledge. But I will tell you that at the time that
the company closed there were a lot of guys that were still in their mid-50s. And so one thing the plant did was to provide them with a supplement until they 00:12:00reached the age of retirement which was 62. As a matter of fact I left, I was 62 when the plant closed. I had planned to work until age 65, see.Clayborn Benson: Okay.
Raymond Levy: I was able to get my, my social security but I didn't want to draw
it until age 65.Clayborn Benson: Okay.
Raymond Levy: But because that I did I lost money. I forget what the number was
but it was enough to make a difference now. So I was fortunate and I was retirement age when they, when the plant closed.Clayborn Benson: So what kind of other jobs did you do? You had talked about
some part time jobs that you. Did you do more than one or just?Raymond Levy: No, actually I went to work for Laidlaw because I liked to drive.
00:13:00I went to work for Laidlaw to pick up handicapped people and things of that nature. I went to work for them for a while. I went to work, I worked in a hardware store for a while. [Inaudible] hardware store. Those are the two last meaningful jobs that I had. It provided me with a little, a little recreational money, I'll put it like that.Clayborn Benson: Well did your pension kick in at all? Did you have a 501 3c?
Raymond Levy: Well I had a pension from the union.
Clayborn Benson: From the union. You got a pension from the union. Not from
the company but from the union?Raymond Levy: We got it from the union, yeah. Well I take that back, from the company.
Clayborn Benson: From the company, right.
Raymond Levy: Yeah.
Clayborn Benson: So you did get a 30 year pension?
Raymond Levy: Yeah. But so now you have to understand that at Pabst it didn't
make, the years didn't make a difference whether you got a pension or not. The 00:14:0030 year thing was not, was not in effect. It was your age, how close to your age. So you could work in 30 [inaudible] in some places but not at Pabst. You worked until the age of retirement. That would qualify you for your pension.Clayborn Benson: Okay, all right. But so if a person was not 62 then they
wouldn't qualify for a pension?Raymond Levy: Not until they reached the age of retirement as far as I know, yeah.
Clayborn Benson: They wouldn't qualify for pension.
Raymond Levy: Yeah.
Clayborn Benson: So were there actual guys who left there not having a pension?
Raymond Levy: Not to my knowledge, not to my knowledge. Everybody, everybody
that was of retirement age received a pension.Clayborn Benson: Okay. So even the guys who were 50 years old?
Raymond Levy: Well when they reached retirement age they could get it.
Clayborn Benson: Okay, all right. But the guys that were 55 or so?
Raymond Levy: Yes.
Clayborn Benson: They couldn't touch their pension until age 62.
00:15:00Raymond Levy: Yes. So that's what, that's what the supplement that the company
provided between their loss of, between their loss of regular wages and perhaps what their pension would have been, the company provided that until they reached the age of retirement.Clayborn Benson: Okay. So in your encounters with your fellow employees did any
of them express to you unhappiness at, one, the company closing up to how they were making it as a result of the company closing?Raymond Levy: I would say in general the guys that I've talked to were not happy
that the plant closed in general.Clayborn Benson: Okay.
Raymond Levy: I still don't hear any of the guys talk about drinking Pabst. Some
00:16:00might, but they don't mention it, they don't mention it.Clayborn Benson: Okay. So what do you think when you drive past where Pabst
used to be at downtown there? I know you drive past there.Raymond Levy: I do. A lot of nostalgia because even though the plant treated us
the way they did toward the end, it was a nice place to work. Yeah, it was a nice place to work. We had good colleagues, so.Clayborn Benson: It was really in the heart of the black community wasn't it?
Raymond Levy: Yes it was, yes it was.
Clayborn Benson: It was in the heart of the black community.
Raymond Levy: So I could see that, it would have been difficult for them not to
hire as many blacks as they did being located where they were.Clayborn Benson: They didn't hire that many did they?
Raymond Levy: They had a, they had a number. We had about, when I got hired at
Pabst it must have been close to 2,000 employees. 00:17:00Clayborn Benson: Two thousand African Americans?
Raymond Levy: Not no, employees.
Clayborn Benson: Employees. Employees. How many African Americans are they?
Raymond Levy: A goodly number where I don't think, I had never heard anybody
complain about there not being enough.Clayborn Benson: Okay, all right.
Raymond Levy: Yeah.
Clayborn Benson: Good.
Raymond Levy: It was hard, when I drive down through there I got a little
nostalgia going on.Clayborn Benson: Okay. You're thinking about the various buildings and what you
did in those buildings.Raymond Levy: Yeah. And the good times that we had there.
Clayborn Benson: Yeah. So did you see people just roaming, come into the
buildings or black people who lived in that area just make their way into the buildings?Raymond Levy: I never, never, I never experienced that. I never experienced that.
Clayborn Benson: You never experienced that.
Raymond Levy: But here's the thing about Pabst. We knew that something was up,
just didn't know what it was because they started changing the management.Clayborn Benson: Oh, okay.
Raymond Levy: Most of the supervisors that were there when I got there had come
up through the ranks. So even though they were supervisors they still had some 00:18:00empathy for the population in general.Clayborn Benson: Yes.
Raymond Levy: Okay, so what the company did was start eliminating these guys
through by like changing their shifts and moving them to other departments that they weren't familiar with.Clayborn Benson: Okay.
Raymond Levy: Where supervisors that at that time had 30 and 40 years with the
company, had been there for years. They put them on different shifts. A lot of them retired. And then they brought hard liners like you against us kind of mentality begin to come in, see. They got rid of the old brew master and brought in a little guy that reminded us a lot of a, he was German.Clayborn Benson: Okay.
Raymond Levy: You know. And he tried to be a hard liner. So we knew something
was up. Just didn't know what it was at the time.Clayborn Benson: So the brew master is one person?
Raymond Levy: Yeah.
Clayborn Benson: He's in charge of the flavor for each of the different beers
Raymond Levy: That he is.
00:19:00Clayborn Benson: That the company
Raymond Levy: Yes.
Clayborn Benson: Produces.
Raymond Levy: Yes. Now mind you we have a laboratory where they would process
all that. But the brew master has the final say. We had two labs there. And they were taste testing every day.Clayborn Benson: Okay, that's interesting. Did you do any taste testing?
Raymond Levy: I did not because ironically enough I worked at Pabst all those
years but I never became a big beer drinker.Clayborn Benson: Okay. So right after the factory's closing, right after the,
when you had, and I have to tell you I remember the strike, well not the strike but the negotiation. I remember people coming out of the plant and how people make that settlement that. I remember that.Raymond Levy: Okay.
Clayborn Benson: It wasn't that long ago for me. I'm still old enough. But
then, then the plant does close. When did you first hear about the plant closing? 00:20:00Raymond Levy: Oh my goodness gracious. Well it might have been 1996 or earlier,
you know, that it became definite. Because when Cal Manumits bought the plant from the family he had a reputation of being a hard liner and operated his business to the bare walls which is what he did promptly. The things that I heard Pabst was in possession at that time of some outstanding artwork which was not only in the plant but it was posted on the walls at the Milwaukee Athletic Club.Didn't find out all that until later on. But they tell me that Cal Manumits
packed up all of that stuff and took out to his estate in California. He didn't believe in computers. He just ran things to the bare walls. Fired people without notice in the front office. So that's why I said the union came in 00:21:00handy for us that he couldn't do that to us. But for office personnel he could get rid of whoever he wanted to.And I heard that happened on more than one occasion. So we just knew something
was up.Clayborn Benson: And when you guys, when you guys met with management, I
remember that negotiation and I remember where the union hall was. I remember when you all came out of there, when you all made that concession did you in your mind thing that the company was going to, was going to revive itself and stay competitive?Raymond Levy: I never had full confidence that they were, never had full
confidence. And I think we all work with that little monkey on our back, on our shoulders. I don't think any of us were convinced that the plant was going to 00:22:00continue. We just had that feeling. A lot of us just had that feeling. We were wondering that if they ask for one concession when were they going to ask for another one?But I think the second one, I think we refused to give them a concession. And
after all that negotiation, I think after all that long negotiation they wound up giving us a 50 cent raise which was like a slap in the face. A 50 cent raise. And even that didn't, that didn't keep the plant open. So the die was cast. We were out on strike for weeks.Clayborn Benson: You were.
Raymond Levy: Yeah. I remember, I remember Tommy Thompson came down and, you
know, made his show. That was the first time that I experienced how sometimes untruthful a reporter can be. Because being present at the time of some of 00:23:00those interview and then reading it in the paper, didn't sound like the same place I was at. So I became very, very worried from that point on of talking to any reporter that showed up on the scene. Just didn't report it favorably. And all that grandstanding that Tommy Thompson didn't keep the plant open either. He came down there supposedly to support the workers. It didn't work, it didn't work. So.Clayborn Benson: So management was selling the company to this new investor?
Raymond Levy: Yeah.
Clayborn Benson: And but the negotiation took place with the company, with the
original company, your negotiation? And you could see the progression changes in the positions that they were taking a hiring outliners and different people. 00:24:00Raymond Levy: I think our last negotiation was with the new management, see. And
I understand they brought attorneys up from Texas, see. He came up to fight their legal battles in terms of us keeping our life insurance and things of that nature. He was not a Milwaukee attorney, from Texas. So they really created a hard line between management and labor.Clayborn Benson: Pabst was one of the national or international businesses.
Raymond Levy: Pabst at one time they were always Anheuser-Busch.
Clayborn Benson: Yeah.
Raymond Levy: And they was always Miller and then Pabst. Pabst could do, Pabst
moved up second place briefly I think for one time in their history. But they could never get passed Miller. We know they weren't gonna catch Anheuser-Busch. We didn't have the capacity, see. So we kind of revel in the 00:25:00fact that they did make it to number three.Clayborn Benson: So you had in Milwaukee we had Miller, we had Pabst, we had Schlitz.
Raymond Levy: We had Blatz.
Clayborn Benson: Blatz. But Blatz was owned by Schlitz weren't they?
Raymond Levy: No. Blatz was independent.
Clayborn Benson: It was independent.
Raymond Levy: Blatz, and matter of fact Blatz was independent and then what
happened was see Pabst bought Blatz. And they began to brew Blatz. Blatz was independent.Clayborn Benson: Pabst bought Blatz?
Raymond Levy: Yeah, they bought them up, Blatz out. So that's why we thought
after purchasing Blatz they were going to move up to maybe number two at least. But they could never catch Miller. Because at one time Pabst had plants in, they had plants in California and I think they had a plant in Texas. 00:26:00Clayborn Benson: Okay. Well it's such a land mess down there. Man and that
wasn't the only place. You had warehouses in the other parts of the city as well.Raymond Levy: We did indeed, we did indeed. And matter of fact when things were
going well, when Pabst bought Blatz out they took over that warehouse which at that time was located on Broadway.Clayborn Benson: Yeah.
Raymond Levy: I used to drive a truck down there to unload beer and pick up beer.
Clayborn Benson: You, any famous people working for Pabst?
Raymond Levy: There was some that were working there like for, for summer for
like when they were in college. But I don't remember exactly who they were.Clayborn Benson: Right, okay. Okay, well that concludes my comments. Anything
00:27:00else that you wanted to add to it at all?Raymond Levy: No, except that I remember, I choose to remember the good times at
Pabst. Not the way they treated us in the end. There's still a lot of us that remember the good times. It was a good place to work. It really was. I'll give them that.Clayborn Benson: Well good. You guys have Christmas parties and all those kinds
of things?Raymond Levy: The union still provides that for us, for retirees. They still
provide that for us in December and then in the summer they have a picnic which I hardly ever go to. The union still provides us with that.Clayborn Benson: Okay, well good.
Raymond Levy: Yeah.