Spitüres—British fighting planes which are ihe great ive of the Nazi bomber—are being made largely through the combined efforts of American machines and- British women workers, writes Mallory Browne in the "Christian Science Monitor" In a factory stretching for miles, thousands of men and women work at row after row of machines of all sorts, shapes and sizes—whirling metal lathes, giant jigs, turning out and assembling latest huge presses and monster metal stretching devices. More than one third of these many hundreds of machine tools, mechanical marvels which are the real story behind the story of aeroplanes which they make possible, are American.
In fact, the proportion of American equipment, including tools and jigs of all sorts, is more than 50 per cent. in certain blocs or units of this particular factory and the proportion is constantly increasing as shipments of more machines continue to arrive from the United States.
A surprisingly large number of these machi operated by women. Although some es and mechanical devices appear to be no more formidable than a small electric sewing machine, others are towering masses of steel which hiss and roar and thump alarmingly as they simmer out metal parts to be used ju the production of planes. The view of young girls in flowered print aprons operating such sizzling, thundering metal monsters struck the observer as the most significant sight in the entire factory—which the British claim is the biggest aeroplane factory in the world.
At present about 40 per cent. of the workers in this Spitfire factory are women, But within a few weeks or months at most it is expected the proportion of women will be nearer 80 per cent. to only about 20 per cent. of men. American methods of manufacture and American types of automatic or semi-automatic machine tools have made this possible. The British have adapted American mass-production methods fo this Spitfire production factory.
A great deal of the rivetting is done women. The plant manager told the writer tha women often make much better rivetters than men. Asked why, he said he didn't know, except that they often seemed to be able to use their hands more quickly und cleverly, and also pointed out that most metal used was a relatively light aluminium alloy and not heavy steel.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.