Watching a Major Alarm Companys Pittsburgh Division Fall Apart

 In 1980 After finally having enough of the guard bit  I decided to look at going into full time alarm work where I could put my Electrical Skills to work . I did some research and found out Holmes protection was hiring  it was union position for a Runner/ Repairman . Holmes Protection was started in the late 1800's by Edwin Holmes who had started the first Burglar alarm Company In Massachusetts and later headquartered it New York They had branches in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia and where big time into the protection of high value stores Jewelry and Furs  They had 10,00 accounts just in New York  at one time .

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edwin_Holmes_%28inventor%29

http://www.csaaul.org/BirthofCentralStationIdea.html

http://uv201.com/Misc_Pages/holmes_alarm.htm

http://uv201.com/Misc_Pages/holmes_history.htm

 

Instead of installing alarm systems I would be responding to them armed and repairing them as needed. At the time I started they had over 3500 alarm subscribers  as they where known in Pittsburgh  by time I left after 6 months . They where down almost a 1000 customers due to poor service and expensive prices and failure to update there systems .  When the mills shut down couple years later and they lost another 1000+ customers the division was sold to Westec now known as Vector Security after I filed a complaint with Holmes Corporation in New York after one of there repairmen caused an alarm of mines to fail at a Foodland Supermarket because they came on site to fix the communicator the store alarm used to send alarm reports to Bethel Park Police receiver they maintained . They came into Pittsburgh to investigate and found things had gotten so bad it was time to sell it off. The crowning moment when they walked in and found another alarm company s receiver Minatronics / Guard Duty being monitored in  there central office  .Seems the 2 managers who where relatives  Jim and John Martin allowed Minatronics to come in set there receiver up and use one of the offices phone lines  temporarily after the building they where in was condemned,  but they never told corporate  they made such an arrangement which the former union Stewart told me about when I ran into him the one day. Westec did not retain him so he started his own company as did several other guys I worked with  a couple guys where retained by Westec some retired,  the rest I do not know what happened to them never heard from them again the 2 managers one started a security consulting service working with locksmiths  and the other went to work for mid regional alarm company. Many of the great older  guys I worked with some WWII vets are now well past retirement and most have passed away.

Eventually in late 90's ADT acquired Holmes Protection and the name has all but gone away there are a couple other alarm company's with Holmes in the name one in North Carolina  they are not related.

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/tyco-international-to-acquire-holmes-protection-acquisition-to-expand-tycos-commercial-security-presence-77962932.html

I walked into the offices of Holmes which was located in the old 6th street parking garage next to the old Carlton House Hotel. Filled out the forms  showed them my act 235 card and was hired on the spot when they heard I was trained as an electrician.
My first shift I was issued a company 38 special and holster  off the rack where weapons where checked in and out each shift. Since I was not yet 21 I was not allowed to own a hand gun I was allowed to carry a company issued gun you turned in after each shift.
I was assigned that night to Bill Hartman a gentleman in his 50's  who I would work with for first few nights . Our first alarm run was to Paragon Rubber a large tire distributor in the Strip District  where Holmes had many Alarms .
 The alarm had activated we meet the police at door and then carefully walked around to see where alarm had tripped and if there had been an actual entry. Since these alarms where all one loop there where no zone boards to find out even where the system tripped . All you could do was walk from point to point till you found it. Some of these buildings like Joesph Horne Company had several alarm panels to break the buildings into sections they where so big.
We found the problem was a pulled out trip wire at a garage door there was no entry .
 either a rat  pulled it out walking around or it was not set right a frequent problem.
we reset it and went back to office. Before we left we hit the mes room and Bill tells me about a young black man they caught in there  one time was hiding in between the lockers in the men's room
despite the fact the police where thru with a dog  he was not found till they where ready to leave.
Keep that in mind if you ever come here by your self he said. never saw Bill after I left Holmes still occasionally run into couple of the guys from time to time they have all found other jobs since the where fired by Vector 

To be continued.

A merchant with old Holmes alarm sticker and new vector sticker

Working the Sewickley Bridge Detail lies and deciet

I was working down on the river the other day on a tow boat doing repairs to its fire system . while taking a break with the rest of those working I recognized the one repairman as some one I worked with many years ago when I was working as security guard part time while getting my business started .
We had both worked on the project when they replaced the Sewickley Bridge in 1980 he was one of the barge hands who tied up the barges and tow boats with cranes they used each day and would hand off the gate keys to me as I started my watch along the river at night.
At the time I was working for CPP security also known as California Plant Protection which was sold and is now out of business. The man who ran CPP in Pittsburgh ,Maurice Disspennett seemed like a decent guy that is till this job. One thing Maurice Dispennett promised me and 5 other who helped start CPP as the first 6 hired guards where we where going to be promoted to supervisor positions in the company
as time went on. Well I was the last of the 6 to leave and none of us ever got any kind of promotion
despite numerous awards I got while working as a guard. Nothing but promises and lies as usual from all the different company's I worked for seems like all I ever ran into where the scum of the earth when it came to company's who where hiring at the time. But those where bad times back then the steel mills and many supplying businesses had closed and everyone was desperate for work and just looked the other way when things where wrong. People wonder why I went independent and started my own company. Well if you went thru and saw in my life what I saw going on you would have as well.
It was great they could say they had an Eagle Scout working for them and that's as far as it ever went. Promises, promise, promises and lies is all I ever got from any employer .
I applied at  Suburban General  Hospital which has been greatly downsized  one time in the maintenance dept. after trade school counselor gave me the lead was told by foreman I would start at $6.50 an hour that was pretty good as minimum was $2.35 an hour to go down to HR dept and be told I would start at minimum needless to say I told them No that's not what I was told up stairs  and to go screw them selves and walked away. Found out I was not only one they tried this to. After talking to a friends wife who worked there at one time.
The school counselor was angry I did not take job till I told him what went on needless to say they never referred any one else there.
One time I walked from Neville Island to downtown Pittsburgh about 9 miles and put in applications every where , nothing. I waked and took a bus all over Pittsburgh and nothing but crap jobs and even crappier employers.
Strange thing now as I look back at all the places I worked for as a maintenance man till my 6 months and time to join union came up and they always had some excuse to lay you off just the way they did business back then or places guarded or guard company I worked for in my days before I went out on my own in 1981 . 98% of them are gone they no longer exist 30 + years later .
Just goes to show you what kind of employer and business practice they kept.

So on with what was going on along the river. When we first started guarding the river bank where equipment and staging was set up we also had to put on a life vest and walk out on the gang plank and make sure the barge lines where tight to make sure the barges where secure and not ready to slip away down stream in the Ohio river which could have been a bad situation. We also had to make sure the red glass kerosene lanterns where lighted at night and working to keep boats at night from running into the barges.
Well in the summer time and it not getting dark till 9 pm not a big deal not having any lights along walkway etc and even when it was dark you could still see by moon light . The contractor whose name I forget at this point promised to get lights up in a few weeks and a phone close by well
time goes on and nothing is happening. Now come on how hard is it to string up a few lights and a phone there was no excuse for this. Well one evening when my shift was up at 11pm Denny came to relive me for the 11pm to 7 am shift.
and it was the usual warm normal night except he would supposedly get attacked that night along the river.( later found out it was all a lie he did it because he was afraid to work this job due to no lights. The next few nights I was assigned to a different site they needed help at and when I got back down to the river 2 weeks later still no lights or close by phone. Remember there where no portable or cell phones back then and  OSHA was just starting  things would have been a lot more different today. Well I had enough I left a note on the superintendents desk wanting to know why things where not done and why they where putting our lives at risk now that a guard got attacked. Well next morning I get a nasty call from Maurice all upset I left the note I told him screw you,Its my life on the line down here not yours you where told and did nothing I was tired of excuses from everyone.
Needless to say after the note the lights and phone where put in. almost 4 months after we started the guard duty there. I stopped working for CPP that winter taking a better job with another guard outfit till they too lost some contracts and at that point I had had enough with the guard bit and since all the mills went down and no one was hiring and I had enough customers and income to run my business full time in 1981 .
and never looked back.
It is a shame how people are ready and willing to put other peoples lives at risk . especially during hard times I see it all going on again with the current economy and plenty of psychopath bosses and managers which studies now confirm .Thank God for OSHA who put these type of employers in there place when these corporate pukes will not do the right thing . I ran into Maurice couple years after that
and he was all upset that I had started an alarm business he said it took jobs from guards .
I laughed and said that's right so people like you can not exploit them any more and walked away.I understand Maurice is retired and lives up north some where now a days.
I have never run into any of they guys I worked with from back then, unfortunately some moved out of state to find work and many of them are now retired or dead.

There are still good employers around Pittsburgh they just where not hiring back then . But when you look at things all the way around all the great people I have met and people I have helped and lives I have saved it was a good thing I went out alone. having survived Stage IV Colorectal Cancer I do not know how much longer the good lord has planned for me to have on earth and my time working has been greatly reduced only part time now . But as long as I can keep contributing to this world in some manner as good ,bad and ugly as it is I will to try and do the right thing.

Its a pathway to park now but when I was guarding this was a weed  filled pathway to river front with no lights to see 

Guarding Neville Island Shit Holes

Old Dravo Products rear View

 After the Affordable Furniture detail For CPP  I ended up down on Neville Island  in the middle of Ohio River  Named after General Neville a Revolutionary War Hero .
Once all fertile Farms  and is now the Eastern half  all industrial  Plants  and other a mix of residential and small business.
Home to Dravo Corporation and PDM Pittsburgh Demoine Steel
and a large Cement manufacturing facility.  There all closed and gone now Victims of the steel mill demise.  The Island exploded with plants during the wars and the Dravo Boat yard made LST  Landing Ship Tanks there during the war , which required a pass to even get on the island .Back then no pass and you could have been shot.

Old Dravo Products

I worked 3 posts on the Island and still work on the island to this day as I provide Alarm and Electrical services to several of the small company's which opened up where Dravo and PDM where once located.

My first post was at the Dravo Products  Building a 3 block long complex which was at one time the Graham Nut & Bolt Company which closed during the depression . 
They made Steel Grating for cat walks  here and outlying buildings held a truck terminal and a repair and refurbishment shop for American Lafrance  Fire trucks which closed along with the terminal.

Guard Shack I sat in Vulcan Materials 

The place was a total shit hole I stopped at the guard shack at the main office to get a radio and keys and then proceeded a 1/4 mile to Dravo Products. This place was big  and you toured it every 2 hours and checked in hourly with the Dravo Guard  on the radio a very large hand held but it was much better than only having one phone to run to if you had a problem. The rats in this place where as big as cats you always had to be mindful of them ,when walking along the river bank.
The place was covered in inches worth of dust from the manufacturing that went on as well as tar where they dipped steel to rust proof it  and  the guard office was a small little office just inside the entry door with a small metal beat up desk .
You walked around the plant with a hard hat ever mindful of all the pipes and such sticking out   and  things where sticking out all over  and protruding from the floors etc. what a mess. No wonder this place closed. They never spent one penny fixing it or updating anything .After walking the plant you went out back thru piles of steel to check the fence line careful you did not trip over a rail road track and then you checked  the Fire Truck place and back.  Some times railroad cars where picked up and dropped off and you had to make sure  railroad workers locked things up. Luckily I never had a problem here but the place was old creaky and cold as hell, roof leaked when it rained   and no heat I always brought a heater with me to plug in to stay warm.  Finally they fixed this big old 3 phase electric salamander  heater for us which sparked when you turned the switch after they got enough complaints.
 Then a couple of weekends I ended up watching the main office post where we worked only weekends as regular Dravo Guards worked that position during the week CPP lost both contracts when the yards went down .  I still work in the yards taking care of fire alarms on some of the river boats that work the repair yard now run by a different company over 2000 jobs where lost down there and now about 50 people work the whole thing the offices where knocked down and replaced by flex warehousing .

The next place I guarded on the Island was Vulcan Materials  they recycled tin cans  and  the place was again very large covering several acres and about 12 different buildings. They would bring the cans in then bath them in a acid bath to get the lining chemicals out of it . They had a mask for us to wear when we walked thru the mists in certain buildings , but it was not  the proper mask and we should not have been sharing a mask in first place . Some workers and guards did not wear a mask talk about stupid asses. I always complained about this and they did nothing about it but back then OSHA was only starting  and they got away with this nonsense. Once again this place was a shit hole leaky roofs and pipes and pumps and just no pride in the workers and how they took care of the place and in the winter time it was treacherous  ice every where I fell one time  and was not able to do the hourly round and called in to tell them and utility guy and supervisor where tied up on other jobs and  I had to skip a round and all I hear from Maurice D. is I should have called some one. I did it was 3am no one answered and no one was coming so I told him to take his job and shove it up his fucking  ass. I had enough of his fucking excuses.
and went to work for McGlenon Detective Agency after  Putting up with this shit hole place and Hepenstall Steel another dangerous shit hole of a place.  Vulcan changed names to ### resources and then closed its now been mostly torn down and is a recycling center. The new owners of these buildings cleaned out the crap fixed the wiring and piping patched and fixed the buildings inside and out and gave them a coat of paint and fixed the roofs  and made them safe to work in. The people who work here now all non union take pride in there company's .

Spring Cleaning time to start at New Security Company CPP Security

Statuettes which where given to clients

After conditions at Burns Security kept sliding down hill how they treated people I looked around for a new security company to work for that when a saw an add in the Pittsburgh Press for West Coast Security Company opening  a branch in Pittsburgh .
 CPP Security was a division of California Plant Protection  out of Van Nuys California .

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1986-06-17-fi-11813-story.html

 

I went to there offices above the store fronts in Dormont Shoppes  and meet with a man named Maurice Dispennett who headed the branch. This sounded new and existing as we where being hired as Security officers with better uniforms and pay etc. There where initially 6 of us and our first contract was at Affordable Furniture Manufacturing  on Lebanon Church RD. In West Mifflin 
Had I known what a liar MauriceDispennett was I would have never joined CPP but I gave him a chance

We where told by Maurice since we where the first ones hired we would all become supervisors some where down the line  a total and complete bold face lie  non of us did all the other quit out of disgust and I was the last original guard  to leave.

Affordable furniture was located in the  Old Continental Can Company which moved to Mifflin Rd. and eventually went out of business they made all kind of cans for food and paint etc.
one half of the plant was Affordable furniture the other a storage warehouse for stuff left over from government coal to gas conversion and other projects.
 The plant had CPP Security Officers  but ADT had an silent  alarm to protect the accountants office  .
They tried going all alarms and eliminate the guards but after several break ins one successful where alarms did not work they went to the combo.  The plant was fully sprinklered because they manufactured do it your self furniture from particle board the forerunner of the IKEA concept.
The plant would suffer couple strikes and eventually be bought out by Jove Machine & manufacturing another bold face liar as well Mr. Jove .
The plant then became  Ductmate corp  who made specialized duct work and when they closed it was torn down and is now a Target Store.

Affordable Furniture was a neat place we walked around once every hour.
inside and out the front and side double doors never locked properly  so I had lock and chain I used on them to keep some one from coming in unexpectedly   while patrolling the plant inside or out it was a big plant and took 30 minutes to cover. They never ever got those doors to lock correctly .
The machinery was all lined up in rows  and did different functions and they did keep floors and aisle clean but that was about it. The plant was old and falling apart.Between rounds we sat in supervisors office where the only phone worked. I was there about 6 months in all and several times  while out walking the perimeter of the plant have to run and use the phone because of accidents which happened  down on Lebanon church road. One so severe 6 vehicles where involved and spread over a 1/4 mile.
While working this site I received almost a dozen commendations for actions for detecting and preventing problems. One time while walking the plant I discovered a large propane tank leaking over on the storage time another a group of teens stealing 2 inch thick by 10 foot long copper bars from  what I thought was the Union railroad which served the plant. The west Mifflin cops caught them  and it ends up these where employees kids hired to cut the grass at the next door Westinghouse Transportation plant.now Bombardier Transportation
After railroad said it was not theirs.
I got a nice portfolio case as a Thank You from the chief of plant Security  at Westinghouse who wanted to keep the whole thing quiet .

Dealing with an Affordable Furniture employee theft

to be continued.