This chapter combines political, labor, and cultural history methodologies to compare the Lockheed aircraft factory in Marietta, Georgia, and the Scripto pen and pencil factory in nearby Atlanta. While the mostly male employees at Lockheed, a majority-white plant, enjoyed the job security delivered by defense contracts at the height of the Cold War military-industrial complex, the Scripto workers, the majority of whom were African American women, faced the more capricious turns of the market. Many of the disparities between these factories stemmed from their common management history found in the career of attorney, businessman, and civic leader, James V. Carmichael. Although situated within close geographical proximity, Lockheed and Scripto helped create disparate racial, political, and cultural worlds in the mid-twentieth century. The tale of these two factories uncovers the stark contrasts between the ways race, gender, and government intervention shaped different sectors of the postwar southern economy.
Playing the Past and Alternative Futures: Counterfactual History in Fallout 4
