 When Dottie Roach Williams went to work for Hope Natural Gas Company 43 years ago, there were no female managers or clerks.
"Lots of changes since then," she said.
The Grantsville woman retired Friday from Dominion Transmission's Grantsville office where she has been the field clerk leader, after starting to work for Hope in Parkersburg in 1963, a year after graduating from Calhoun High School.
The employees honored her with a good-bye cake and refreshments.
"I went to beautician school and got my license, but never practiced," Dottie said. "The time has flown by, with lots of changes and lots of retirements," referring to the dozens and dozens of Calhoun's "Hope men."
"Its been a great group of working men who have passed through the doors," she said.
Dottie started with the company in Parkersburg, moving to the Grantsville office in 1974. By then the company had been down-sized from well over 100 workers to about 80. Today, there are about 35 employees in the Grantsville district.
One of the big changes, she said, was being first taught how to run a (PPX) switchboard. "Now we're all computers, microwave links and radio," saying the skills have dramatically changed.
Also changed, the name of the company from Hope Natural Gas to Consolidated Natural Gas Supply Transmission to Dominion Transmission, with corporate offices in Virginia.
Now the company is reportedly being sold to Equitable Gas.
Dottie is the daughter of the late Ray and Thelma McCoy Roach, and the wife of the late Mike Williams, longtime Grantsville barber.
An early riser, Dottie said "I guess I'll have to get use to sleeping in."
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