George Ott Changes Careers with the Times
George
Henry Ott: 1866-1977 (Maternal Grand-Aunt’s Husband)
Ethel Mary
Macbeth Ott: 1896-1951 (Maternal Grand-Aunt)
Articles
offering career advice often refer to the current job market as a “gig
economy”, where people shift from one employer to another, using their skill
sets to tackle various projects. The articles often assert that workers must be
nimble, adapting as employers’ needs change, and that this pattern of career
change is new. They claim that in the past, people worked for a single employer
for their entire working lifetimes, remaining in the same or similar jobs. But
is this view of the past true? A look at the work history of my grand-uncle by
marriage, George Ott, shows he was just as nimble as any gig worker today. He
cycled through three or four very different types of jobs in a twenty-year
period. His goal—and that of his wife Ethel-- was to provide for the family.
Geoge
Henry Ott was born December 17, 1886 in Mankato, Minnesota. He grew up on his
father Geoge’s farm, and his first jobs were as a farm laborer before he went
into farming for himself. He married Ethel Macbeth on May 22, 1914 when he was
27 and Ethel was 18.
By the
1920 census, George and Ethel were farming on rented property in LeRay Township
near Eagle Lake, Minnesota. They had two little girls, Nona and Phyllis. By
1930, George had bought a farm near Kasota in neighboring LeSeuer County,
Minnesota. He probably felt more assured of his ability to provide for his
little family, but of course the Great Depression had just begun, cratering
farm prices. George probably had a mortgage on his farm, and at some point he
must have had to sell up and move to nearby Mankato to seek employment.
By the
1940 census, he was working as a laborer on highway construction. He appears in
a Mankato city directory in 1941 as a worker for Guaranteed Gravel and Sand Co.
and he also lists the company on his 1941 draft card. I suspect this is the
same job—a gravel company would be involved in road construction.
The 1950 census
took me by surprise. George had changed jobs, to one I’d never heard mentioned
before. Under “Occupation”, the census taker wrote: “winds electric motors”.
The industry was listed as “Engineer Co.” I found a slightly different
description of George’s new job in the 1948 Mankato City Directory, which
listed George as an “armature winder” for Kato Engineering.
I did some
research, discovering on a website cited below that an armature winder is:
“an
artisan responsible for the repair, reconditioning, or construction of wire
armature coils for transformers, electric motors and generators. Although
strictly an electrical trade, armature winding is generally classified as
electrical fitting because it involves additional mechanical elements. Armature
winding typically involves two facets: construction and repair. The
construction or manufacturing armature winder engages in the winding of new
armatures while a repair winder concentrates on fault finding, repairing, or
refurbishing existing parts. Both disciplines can involve a lot of precise,
repetitive work….”
I further
discovered that Kato Engineering was founded in 1926, and manufactures generators,
so George was preparing armature coils for generators. George was in his
sixties when he worked for Kato Engineering. While the work may have been less
physically harsh than road construction, it obviously required extreme care and
control.
Interestingly,
my Great-Aunt Ethel was also employed in 1948. The city directory states she
was working as a maid at Immanuel Hospital in Mankato. She no longer held a job
by the date of the 1950 census, but I am sure she was proud to have contributed
to earning a living for her family.
Ethel
Macbeth Ott died November 2, 1951 at only 55 years of age. George Ott died June
18, 1977 at age ninety.
As a side
note, I returned to my entries on Ethel and George this winter after I was contacted
by a gentleman who was researching the Eagle Lake Cemetery where George and
Ethel are buried. He had discovered the graves of three additional children
that weren’t listed in any Ancestry trees, and thought I might like to know
about them and add them to my tree. The three little boys, George Ethelbert
(1917), Laren George (1920), and Daryl (1925), appear to have been stillborn or
died shortly after birth. I am so grateful for the efforts of volunteers like
that gentleman. The babies are now part of my family tree, and I have included
photos of their headstones on Ancestry. No one should be forgotten.
Sources:
What does
an Armature Winder do? Mastering the Craft of Electrical Motor Repair, by Paul
Scott. https://www.practicaladultinsights.com/what-does-an-armature-winder-do.htm
Findagrave
website. Photo by Wells. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/13148024/george-henry-ott?_
Mankato
City Directory 1948, and World War II Draft Card accessed via Ancestry.com. https://www.ancestry.com/imageviewer/collections/6482/images/005252612_04494?pId=33961652
https://www.ancestry.com/imageviewer/collections/2469/images/13335598?pId=801934835
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