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:: Sunday, January 16, 2005 ::

Steel magnolia blooms in the north By Stephen Hudak, Times Picayune, LA
At 78, Bonnie Rooks, a great-grandmother of three, claims to be the oldest steelworking woman in North America. Doubt her and you'll have a fight on your hands.

'I ain't afraid of nothin',' she says.

The United Steelworkers of America, which doesn't track its members by birth date, can't say for sure whether Rooks is the oldest. 'But (it) sounds right,' union spokesman John Duray said.

Duray said he could recall only one older steelworker of either gender -- a man who had toiled into his 80s, refusing to retire because a divorce decree granted his ex-wife half his pension but none of his wages.

Most workers want out of the steel mill by the time they reach their mid-50s, the age when Rooks went in, said Ron Davis, president of Local 169 at AK Steel's Mansfield Works.

posted 11:46 AM :: reference link :: 0 comments ::

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