Now I'll take you down and introduce you to Mr. Hardin.
As soon as I can.
You have to wait. That's all I can say.
All right, goodbye.
You the gentleman who's been complaining about the lack of office help?
You don't get someone to sit at that desk pretty soon.
You'll have to dig me out from all this paperwork.
I have somebody for you right now.
You better have four hands.
She's 22, graduate from secretarial school, honors student,
conscientious, loyal, eager to work.
Go on.
I don't believe it.
She's outside. Would you like to meet her?
Sure. Bring her in.
And tell her to have her pencil shined so that we can get started.
Miss Mary Newton, Mr. Kurt Hardin, I think you'll find your work cut out for you.
How do you do?
You should have seen his face.
He just looked at me like he couldn't believe it.
What did he say?
He said, how do you do?
He said it twice.
And then he turned around and went back to his desk
and said he'd see me tomorrow.
Well, what did the other guy do then?
Mr. Nelson? Yeah.
He smiled like there was some sort of a joke.
And then he took me down to the medical office.
Did anybody say anything about you being the first colored girl in the office?
They didn't have to.
You could see it in their faces.
The way the girl in Mr. Nelson's office looked at me.
Maybe you just imagined all of it.
Well, that's a crazy thing to say, Mama.
Why should she imagine it?
It's the truth.
You just don't understand.
Yes, I understand.
You may not think I understand, but I do.
You think I can't understand because I'm your mother and I'm older, but I do.
What you're going through isn't new.
When I was a young girl, I had to leave high school to get a job.
I would have given anything to work in a shop, but
it just wasn't done where I lived.
Nobody ever heard of a nigger working in a shop where white girls and white
women came in to buy things.
So I got a job cleaning house.
And I cleaned house and cried at nights until I got married.
Maybe my mother had something she wanted very bad and couldn't have, and cried
about all night. I don't know.
But now I have you, children, and I've watched you grow up and finish school.
And now Mary's working in a shop and crying her eyes out
because she can't work in an office.
Well, maybe she can work in an office, and if she can, I don't want to see her
throwing away the chance because she's afraid.
Maybe those people hate her. Maybe some of them do.
And maybe she's imagining a lot of it, dreaming of trouble to hide her fears.
And if this is the way it is, then she's got to find out.
And the only way to find out is to go to work tomorrow.
Or else, when she has her own kids, she's going to have to watch them
get hurt and cry and be afraid.
And she'll always wonder if she couldn't have suffered it for them and maybe
made their lives a little easier.
The way I sometimes wonder now.
Good morning.
Mr. Nelson.
Yes?
I'm resigning.
Seriously?
Seriously.
[...]
I appreciate your getting here on time to tell me.
You know exactly why I'm quitting.
I think you may receive a personal invitation from Mr. Todd Dennis of Dennis
Industries to present your case to him personally.
That it should come to this.
Tell him I'd like to see her right away. Let's squash this.
And get Lyle Ross on the phone.
Oh, uh, Beth.
May I ask you a personal question?
Of course.
Where do you stand on all this?
You've heard the policy discussion.
How do you feel?
Well, honestly, Mr. Dennis, I wonder where everybody's been.
I mean, doesn't anybody in this company read the newspapers or go to the movies?
I think it's about time we woke up.
You can be a great help to us right now.
How?
By giving the new girl a chance.
By making sure that she gets a chance.
You mean by being especially nice to her?
No, not especially nice.
Just plain, ordinarily nice.
Common, garden variety nice.
You have a certain amount of prestige here. Use it.
Well, I wouldn't want the other girls to think I
was doing it just because I was the boss.
Don't you start being frightened, too.
Think about it.
It's not an order.
Just a random comment on humanity.
I'm sorry you want to leave, Miss Wright.
Up to now, you've been an asset to the company.
I'm sorry too, Mr. Dennis. Up to now, I've enjoyed working here.
I suppose you'll be looking for another job.
In a plant that doesn't hire Negroes, of course.
In a plant that doesn't hire them to work in the office with me.
Well, that's going to be more and more difficult.
I think you understand my position.
I know your position. I don't understand it.
It's not difficult to explain.
I know. I've heard it all before.
Surely you don't expect us to adjust our policies to meet your approval.
Frankly, I'd rather not work than to work under your new policy.
Rather not work.
Well, you're lucky.
How do you mean?
Lucky you can afford that alternative. I can't afford it.
Neither can most of the people working here.
Look, Mr. Dennis, I just don't understand why my leaving has
suddenly taken on such importance.
I wish I felt flattered by all the tension.
But I'm afraid I don't.
I'm afraid I don't.
[...]
The fact is, your leaving the company is much more important
than a personal matter.
For me or for you.
I'm not going to even attempt to argue with your prejudices.
I know that in a few minutes here, I can't change whatever has made you think the
way you've been thinking for a lifetime.
But if you don't mind, I'd like to put the shoe on the other foot.
You're a popular girl here.
Probably with good reason.
What you do, quitting that is, they set an example for a lot of other
girls who can't afford your independence.
I'm responsible for this company.
That means I'm responsible to the stockholders, to the people working here, to
myself, even to the whole country, indirectly.
It's too late to crawl back into a shell.
I'm afraid I don't understand, Mr. Dennis.
That's right.
What's the difference?
I'm going to ask you to stay on here at Dennis, in spite of how you feel.
To give us...
To give this girl...
To give yourself even a chance to find out if we're right.
You're putting me in a pretty tough spot, Mr. Dennis.
Well, it may not be as tough as you think.
You're making it awfully difficult to refuse.
It would have been so much easier if you just bawled me out.
This is something that has to be handled reasonably.
Will you give it a try?
I think it's only fair to warn you.
[...]
I may do all the wrong things.
You may be sorry if I stay.
Well, every day I'm in business.
I'm taking chances.
I'm willing to take this one.
I'll think about it, Mr. Dennis.
I will say this, though. It's the first time
I've stopped to think about it at all.
Thank you.
Hi. I'm Miss Meryl.
Hello, Mary. The secretary is usually in here.
Will you join us?
I'll give you a hand.
Anybody? This is Mary.
[...]
What department are you?
I'm watching the program.
Worked for Kurt R.
[...]
There was no mass walkout. No one quit.
A few girls even tried to help out.
Presentment turned to curiosity.
Then curiosity became interest.
In time, Mary was no longer the new girl.
And new girls no longer meant trouble.
So we all settled down again to the difficult business of making a living.
[...] I'm waiting for you.
I'm waiting for you.