Dylan Brogan
Linda Buckley at her retirement celebration at Oscar Mayer with her son’s dog, Bailey. The party coincided with the factory’s final day of operation.
Linda Buckley has seen a lot of changes at Oscar Mayer since she started working there in 1971.
“My first job, believe it or not, was canning bacon for the Vietnam War. We would wrap the bacon up in little cans so they could ship it overseas,” says Buckley, who worked at Oscar Mayer for 46 years. “It really was a family company then. Oscar was still there. My father worked at Oscar Mayer. My father-in-law worked here. Two of my brothers. It’s like that with everybody. We were all family.”
On July 28, Buckley said goodbye to her Oscar Mayer family with a retirement party that coincided with the plant’s official closing. Although the facility stopped processing meat in June, a skeleton crew of workers remained to clean the facility and put it to bed.
They clocked out with little fanfare for the last time around 2 p.m., an hour after Buckley’s party started across the street at the UFCW Local 528 union hall. Friends and family gathered to sip beer, eat cake and share memories.
For most of her career, Buckley worked as a clerk for the company’s sanitation division doing payroll and managing the office. She’s witnessed the slow exodus of jobs at Oscar Mayer over the years.
“When I first started clerking, there were 300 people in the department. When I left, there were just 60,” Buckley says. “It just wasn’t quite the same after the Mayer family sold the company in the early 1980s. But people’s attitudes really changed after Kraft Heinz announced the plant was closing. It was so different than from when I started.”
When Buckley began the job, 4,000 people worked at the east-side facility. Oscar G. Mayer Jr. was in still charge at the time, the third and last Oscar Mayer to run the family business. By the time Kraft Heinz announced in late 2015 that it was closing its Madison division, there were about 1,000 workers.
For the past eight years, Buckley has worked as a union steward. After the closing was announced, she spent her time helping workers navigate retirement and other benefit options.
“If someone put in enough time to earn a good pension or insurance, it’s fine. If they didn’t, it’s bad. There’s a lot of people who worked here for 15 years that walked out with basically nothing,” says Buckley. “It was a very bitter end. And what I think hurt a lot of people was that it dragged on so long.”
Russ Tinoco, a mechanic in the plant’s powerhouse, worked there until the very end, heading over to Buckley’s party right after he clocked out.
“I’m in shock. Doesn’t feel real right now. I’m sure it will soon,” says Tinoco, who has worked at Oscar Mayer since 1995. “But it’s been weird the last month since production ended. It’s a ghost town in there now. I’d turn a corner and still expect to see a lot of people.”
Tinoco says he hasn’t found a job yet but is hopeful he’ll land on his feet. “I’m one of the lucky ones. I had enough time here to give me a little breathing room so I don’t just have to take any job. I can find the right job,” Tinoco says.
Buckley, 68, is ready to retire. The fate of what will happen to the Oscar Mayer site is still unknown. Buckley hopes another employer takes over the facility.
“I’d love to see another company come in that would give people a living wage and benefits again,” Buckley says. “It was the people who made this place, and any employer would be lucky to have them.”
1883: Company founded by Oscar F. Mayer and brother Gottfried
1919: Oscar Mayer purchases a farmer’s cooperative meat packing plant on the outskirts of Madison.
1957: Oscar Mayer makes its Madison facility the company headquarters.
1977: Oscar G. Mayer Jr., grandson of Oscar F., retires
1978: Hog slaughtering ends at Oscar Mayer, leaving 600 out of work.
1981: Sold to General Foods for $464.6 million
1985: Philip Morris buys General Foods for $5.6 billion
1995: Oscar Mayer is merged with Kraft, another Philip Morris subsidiary
2007: The Altria Group, formerly Philip Morris, divests its shares of Kraft Food Group
2015: Kraft Food Group merges with H.J. Heinz Co. to form Kraft Heinz. The new company later announces the closing of seven North American factories, including Madison, cutting around 2,600 jobs.
