Men Employees

E. L. Cord insisted that quality had to be built into a car, and the men employed by the Auburn Automobile Company and Duesenberg Inc. were responsible for meeting that standard through administration, design, engineering, and most of the labor required to build the automobiles. They worked in one of the most competitive markets in the free world, and because early twentieth-century automobile production lacked modern industrial technology, building a car was highly labor intensive. Auburn reached its peak year of automobile production in 1927, when more than 14,500 cars were built in the city, with nearly 600 workers, 12 percent of the city population, constructing an average of 48 cars per workday. A larger and more modern Auburn automobile plant opened in Connersville in 1929 and employed as many as 2,500 workers. The standard workweek ran from Monday through Saturday, with ten hours of work and an hour for lunch each day, though during periods of maximum production, workdays of 12 to 16 hours were not uncommon. Starting pay for most workers was 25 cents per hour, and in 1936 the average pay for experienced Auburn factory workers was 55 cents per hour, while fringe benefits were minimal.

Auburn, Indiana · United States