Ticket to Ride

Abstract

As women set out to enter the skilled trades in the late 1970s, Kay Webster first made an ultimately unsuccessful effort to take up plumbing via the union Route. Although she never went through the apprenticeship program, she learned the trade “by the seat of her pants” and worked at the craft for 14 years without benefit of a union book. Webster was able to stay employed doing residential jobs during boom and bust cycles. She also taught plumbing in a couple of programs and was able to pass on her knowledge of the trade to other women.1