In the late 1970’s I worked for the University in their Energy Management Department as a Research Assistant, Grade II. What I did is of minor importance here. Suffice it that I had the run of the campus and virtually every master key. While that alone is cause for a story, this event actually took place at a research park that had no direct ties to the University.
When I originally got the job, I worked in a light bulb reduction crew under the supervision of Mindy and Phil B. They were husband and wife and young graduate students. Everyone on the crew had at least a bachelor’s degree, and I believe both Mindy and Phil had or were finishing second master’s or doctorates. I moved into the supervisor position after they left the University and I was pleased to see them around town from time to time. It was March 1978 when Mindy called me up to ask a rather unusual favor.
Both Mindy and Phil had gone to work for an environmental testing laboratory we will call ENCOTECH. It was housed in a medium-sized one-story building in a place we will call Research Park near the Interstate. It was housed in a white building that I remember as being round rather than square, sort of a dome pie shape. Mindy and Phil oversaw a lab with several post-graduates and in turn their immediate supervisor, Steve[1], ran most of the company. Mindy said that she and Phil wanted to take advantage of some dark humor circulating at ENCOTECH, but they needed an outsider to pull it off. If I accepted the mission, that would be me.
Those of you who live in or around the State may recall that in the mid-to-late 1970’s we had an environmental disaster when Polycloride Biphenals, (known as “PCB’s”), having gotten into the human food chain through contaminated cattle feed. PCB’s were and are nasty carcinogens and the matter was highly publicized for years. ENCOTECH had a large percentage of their laboratories dedicated to analyzing the stuff as well as the things that it supposedly had gotten into. Having all this “stuff” around gave rise to the dark comment, “I wonder when OSHA is coming”. The implication being that the Federal Occupational, Safety and Health Administration might drop in and shut down the whole facility. To be fair, there was no indication whatsoever that PCB’s had ever been mishandled, but the truth is only the partial springboard for bad humor. Thus, the water-cooler theme had become a rhythmic company tattoo, although no one really believed it to be more than ironic and idle musings. That is until Mindy and Phil asked me to impersonate a Federal OSHA inspector.
I was flattered, but I did not accept the novel offer immediately. I told Mindy that I would have to check out a couple of angles and that I would get back to her in about a day. They wanted the axe to fall on April Fools Day and we had time.
What I wanted to do first was to get a handle on what it is like to be a real OSHA inspector. You know, study the part to see if I could pull it off. I have plenty of experience looking like an ass, but I don’t typically volunteer for it. Ok, well at least not most of the time.
What I did know was that the University had, at that time, its own on-campus OSHA office. Budgets and OSHA itself has changed since them, but at the time there were two full time inspectors who shared a little office in North Hall, close to R.O.T.C. These guys worked for the federal government, not the University. In my capacity in Energy Management, I knew almost every nook and cranny of the campus, and I knew about this obscure agency outpost. I dropped by the next day to see what it I could learn.
When I arrived I found both agents lounging about the tiny space. Once they determined that I did indeed work for the University -(badge, large voice beeper going off, etc.) – and that I wasn’t asking them for a job – they were more than willing to listen to my plot. They were both older men who had seen service in other, more exciting investigative agencies, but they really warmed to my project. Never mind that what I proposed was nothing less than impersonating a federal inspector. Even now, I do not have the guts to look up the penalty for that. They dove right in.
The guys explained how the procedure I was interested in was controlled by regulations. These were contained in the Federal Register (“CFR”), and they had a nifty subset of the regulations that applied to OSHA in a huge three-inch-thick loose-leaf binder. The binder itself was impressive since was dark blue and it had the emblem of the United States Department of Labor on the front. The acronym O.S.H.A. was on the side in 2″ high white block letter down the spine. It was from this binder they took the relevant pages and made Xerox copies…. for me.
They explained that when they receive an anonymous tip, or for that matter any tip, they are required to investigate on-site within 48 hours. They then handed me the page that said so. Then they explained and handed me the pages that gave them authority to close down a facility, for weeks if they wanted to. They even showed me the bright red tags that they use to seal the doors of a closed plant.
Now no one ever really knows what they can get unless they try. I must have been a pleasing student, but who can say. I simply asked if I could borrow the binder book for a day and very much to my surprise they said yes. They even let me take the red tags.
I think the day was a Tuesday when I went to Encotech. It was the First of April. I stopped off at Energy Management, where I changed into a suit in the bathroom. Given my typical attire, this metamorphosis was enough to create a stir. Still, I did not let anyone know what I was doing or where I was going. At 4:00 p.m. I simply got in my car and drove to the Research Park.
I had never been in the ENCOTECH building, and I wasn’t exactly sure which of the doors on the round building was the front. I picked one near the parking lot and pushed on into what turned out to be a large and open typing pool. I had positioned the binder book just so the Department of Labor emblem showed over my arm, and the spine of the book was forward. It positively hollered “O.S.H.A.,” and I could already see eyes getting larger as I stood there waiting for whatever reception was about to occur.
A woman came up to me. I stated in an official voice – adequate to allow the curious to hear- “Robert’s the name, OSHA’s the game. Could I please see whoever is in charge here?”
We, that is to say Mindy, Phil, and I, already knew that the person in charge was Steve. The woman, a bit jumpy, said, “Er, he is in a meeting, but I will get him right away,” and disappeared. Just moments later, I saw a stocky, short man awkwardly approaching from the direction she had taken. It was obvious from the way he walked that he suffered from a physical deformity. It was equally obvious that, as the “in charge” at ENCOTECH, he was also bright and highly educated. His physical stature conveniently put his eyes right at “spine level” of the binder. I suppose the red tags that I had dangling from the book didn’t escape his view either. He quickly asked if we could meet in his office and I courteously agreed.
I followed him to his office and took a seat in the chair opposite his desk. This, in fact, was a critical part of our plot. To grasp all this, one must consider the layout of the offices and the fact that Steve shared a common wall with the office of my co-conspirators.
The offices were small and simple. They were basically narrow partitions that took on the building’s shape, being essentially a slice of pie. The widest part – the “crust”, if you will – was the outside and had a window. Unlike the open typing pool and the laboratories, the office had walls that ran to the ceiling. They were glorified partitions and the two feet near the ceiling were clear glass. This made a marginally effective sound barrier and afforded some privacy. My position in the chair meant that Steve’s back was to the common wall. Immediately after we entered the room, Mindy and Phil climbed onto a desk and were able to watch the whole miserable show without Steve’s knowledge.
It was quite a show. The original plan was for me to go on for just a few minutes. Then Mindy and Phil would come in and save their poor boss. No such rescue for Steve. Apparently, they were so enjoying his torture that they let me go on for a quarter of an hour.
I calmly explained to Steve – much in the manner the real agents had done for me – how our Southfield office had received an urgent “tip” regarding the mishandling of PCB’s. (I have no idea and frankly doubt there even was a “Southfield office”) I explained how sorry I was to disturb him, but the regulations made the inspection mandatory. And then I handed him the Xerox of the corresponding regulation. Since there was not much else on that particular page the effect on Steve was palpable.
I went on to explain a host of the other tidbits, each with it’s own complimentary Xerox copy. Ultimately, I lowered the boom when I told him – as cheerfully as I could – that we should not have to keep ENCOTECH closed for more than two or three days at the most.
By this time, the poor little man was literally on the rim of his seat, and I don’t recall him breathing much. To his credit, he rallied for his defense and had just started to tell me how good the Encotech procedures were when he noted a disturbance at his office door.
In keeping with the walls, the office doors all had a foot-wide panel of glass running from top to bottom. Looking through Steve’s door I saw our Mindy and Phil dressed in bulky white full containment suits complete with helmets, double breathers, the works. They were waving their gloved hands and nasally barking through the respirators, “APRIL FOOLS, APRIL FOOLS, APRIL FOOLS.”
Steve now went into a full-blown panic. He was highly engaged before, but now he was completely over-the-top. He swiveled toward the door and made wide cutting motions with his right arm while trying to scream, almost spit under his breath to the idiots at his door – each word a chop with the arm,
“NOT . . .NOW NOT!!! . . .NOW!!!”
This move was absolutely perfect. I took advantage of the split-second misdirection, reached into my coat pocket and slipped on a pair of Groucho glasses. The kind with the fluffly eyebrows, large rubber nose and mustache.
He swiveled back to me – to apologize, to grovel or perhaps just die – and saw my changed face. Still rigid, he swiveled back to look through the door at Mindy and Phil, who were now falling down laughing and struggling to get their breathers off. His total body unclenched, fell limp in the chair as he put his hand over his brow and said weakly, “Shit….. I’ve been had.”
Mindy and Phil introduced me as a friend and an “actor” I shook the little man’s hand and with a professional smile promptly left the building. My whole body felt like a smile, and I kicked the floorboards of my car as I drove slowly away like some comedy hit man. I did not laugh because laughing did not express the perfection of how it went down. Rare and beautiful, it was not genius, but luck that made the escapade flawless.
I have been told that Mindy, Phil and Steve all left ENCOTECH decades ago to pursue respected careers. I also understand that in the halls and labs of the facility, the story of the April Fools Day Inspection is still told.
[1] Steve is not his real name. In fact he was another Phil, but that would get to be too confusing, so I dub him “Steve”.