Participant Info

Membership Number
4926
Salutation
Mrs
First Name
Jean Orton
Middle/Maiden/Previous
Last Name
Melby
Address 1
320 Buffalo Hills Ln, Apt 229
Address 2
City
Brainerd
Zip Code
56401
Phone
218-829-4091
Work Code #
Date of Birth
09/25/1924
Date of Death
Deceased At Join?
Comments
When she was a teenager and her last name was Orton, she labored in a Northwest Airlines conversion plant in the Twin Cities, modifying B-24 Liberator bombers with aftermarket radar and camera equipment. The work of Melby and her crew — in some instances considered highly secret — took out the bombing equipment of relatively crude death machines and changed them into state-of-the-art weapons in a rapidly evolving information war against the Axis. Melby went on the line at a Northwest Airlines plant in 1943, only a year after she graduated from high school. Her job was bucking rivets; fasteners that can be described as similar to very thick nails with one flat end and one cylindrical end. When the other end of the rivet is flattened into its own head, or “bucked,” the rivet can fasten two metal sheets together. Although it seems like monotonous work, Jean remembered the extremely low margin of error she operated under: correcting a mistake would risk widening the hole the rivet was supposed to go into, and ruining the metal sheet. The working environment at the plant was deafening, and Jean has difficulty hearing today. Until VE Day in the spring of 1945, she worked multiple shifts a day, usually eight hours before she could go home for the night.
Name/Location of Company Worked
Dates of Work
Type of Work
Rosie Name if Rb or Rv
Is/Was Rosie a member of ARRA?
Contact Name (Deceased Rosie Contact)
Contact Email Address
Contact Phone Number