Bill Jack Vs. Adolf Hitler

Series

Series Name

The March of Time 9th Year

Issue

Issue No.

3

Date Released

1 Nov 1943

Length of issue (in feet)

1650

Stories in this Issue:

1. 1Bill Jack Vs. Adolf Hitler

Story

Story No. within this Issue

1 / 1

Summary

The March of Time synopsis: "Bill Jack vs. Adolf Hitler" is the title of the March of Time’s story of Jack & Heintz Co. an Ohio defence factory, where employees are working eighty hours a week and liking it.
How has a management contrived to keep 7,500 men and women working at a bench twelve hours a day for even days a week for over a year, and how can it expect to continue breaking its own astonishing production records by just these means for as many more months as the war is likely to last? The answer was given last year when Washington, distrubed by rumours of lavish salaries and bonuses being paid to Jack & Heintz employees, sent for the senior partner, William S. Jack, to explain the alleged "scandal".
Bill Jack returned to his factory, his name cleared and his Company front page news. The nation learned that Bill Jack’s "associates" as he calls his workpeople, do not receive any more per hour worked than is customary in the industry. They merely work more hours. They do this encouraged by a management who are brilliant mass psychologists, who have succeeded in convincing them by unmistakable, concrete signs taht they have their welfare at heart.

Jack & Heintz "associates" do not punch clocks. Discipline in timekeeping, as in other maers, is maintained by a rigid honour system imposed by the workers themselves. So long as the work is done, the workers are subject to few restrictions, and they are all made to feel that they are full participants in the business of the company. The monotony of the gruelling twelve-hour shifts is broken every day when free issues of doughnuts are brought to the benches apparently by professional cheer-makers. At every hour of the day and night coffee urns stand ready for all who need a mild bracer. One hot meal per shift is provided free; special shoes are provided for those who spend long stretches on their feet; and any man or woman can leave his work to relax in rest rooms, steam baths or massage departments. By these and other means, by paid holidays, dental and medical aid, free insurance and, particularly, by a wise regard for the psychological effect of sympathetic personal attention, the Jack & Heintz management has defeated war industry’s most formidable enemy - absenteeism. Of course, the Jack & Heintz Company’s policy towards its workers has provoked comment and some alarm among other industrialists. They feel that the workers are being spoilt. Whether such treatment can continue after the war is a question upon which Jack & Heintz has already made up its mind. Meanwhile, the Company, having broken a serious bottleneck in airplane manufacture, continues to break production records and demonstrates what remarkable results can be achieved by a little understanding and consideration.

Researcher Comments

This story was included in Vol.9 No.12 of the US edition.

Keywords

Industry and manufacture; War and conflict; Employment

Written sources

The March of Time Promotional Material   Lobby Card, Used for synopsis

Credits:

Production Co.

Time Inc.