Organized Labor

By Richard Bermack contributing Writer and Photographer

At the Sheet Metal Training Center in San Francisco, across the hall from a room with rows of yellow wooden drafting tables circa 1950s, another classroom is filled with AutoCAD computers and a video projector. “Some things have changed a lot and others are still the same,” explains Frank Cuneo, the training coordinator for Sheet Metal Workers’ Local 104. “We still use traditional drafting tools for basic layout, incidental patterns and sketching, and we use AutoCAD and other specialized software for detailing ductwork and complex layouts.”

Story & photos by Richard Bermack, Contributing Writer

After the sheet rock is hung, the drywall finishers come in, and the race is on. A finisher loads the “bazooka” – an automated drywall finishing machine comprised of a three-foot pipe filled with drywall compound and tape dispensers on the side – and they are off. The finisher sprints across the room running the bazooka along the wall, leaving a trail of tape and drywall compound. Guys with flat knives, brushes, and corner machines go running after the bazooka, attacking the tape with their respective tools. Everyone is moving at break-neck speeds to the rhythm of a silent beat, trying to get their job done before the mud starts to harden.

• Carpenters Local 22, Plumbers Local 38, and Electricians Local 6

Story & photos by Richard Bermack, Contributing Writer

When we think of public servants whose job it is to protect the safety of San Franciscans, police officers and firefighters are the first that come to mind. The city’s building inspectors probably wouldn’t even make the list for 99 percent of the population because what they do goes unnoticed by the public. But when the safety systems in buildings function properly during an emergency, when buildings survive quakes and survive decades of use, it is in no small part because the Department of Building Inspectors’ staff ensure strict compliance of the building code. The DBI was a part of the Department of Public Works until 1998 when it became its own department in order to provide better service to the development and building community.

By Richard Bermack
Contributing Writer and Photographer

While most craft workers have to travel many miles to far-flung jobsites every day, skyscraper-size construction projects travel each year to the workers at the BAE shipyards. Cruise liners from Alaska to Mexico make their annual voyage to BAE for their physical checkup, and perhaps an occasional propeller replacement or paint job. When they leave the dock’s office, they are as good as new.

Story & photos by Richard Bermack, Contributing Writer

From the ancient pyramids to the Palace of Versailles to a parking garage in San Francisco, plasterers have been making buildings durable and beautiful for over 9,000 years.

Over the years, the materials and the skills have evolved. Still, watching plasterers coat the inner recesses of the ceiling of the corner wall of a parking structure, one is reminded of the skill and craft that went into creating the walls of a 16th century cathedral. Although we often think of plastering as spreading a thin coat of a mud-like substance over concrete walls or sheet rock, there is more to it than that.