When I moved to Baltimore in 1976, the Bethlehem Sparrows Point Shipyard located near the city was possibly the largest private employer in the area. It was eventually demolished.
I worked in a local Social Security Office and interviewed many people who were retiring from Sparrows Point. Many of them didn’t have much education but clearly had worked hard and made a good living. They were making more than twice what I did at the time.
The guys who were born in rural parts of the South generally didn’t have birth certificates. We used Census records to establish their age. Their memories were very good. They could tell you where they had grown up and how far it was from the nearest town.
I remember one man who said he was born in 1914. I got the 1920 Census which showed he was 11. I had to get the 1910 Census and he was on it – one year old. I was sure he was born in 1909 and somehow had lost track of five years. He was 70 and doing physical labor at Sparrows Point. When I told him, his biggest concern was if it would affect his pension since they had a mandatory retirement age. I didn’t think so since he genuinely thought he was 65.
Sad! 