Though St. Marys Paper closed in 2011, memories of working in the paper mill’s offices remain fresh in the minds of a group of women who met on Tuesday for a reunion.
Appropriately, the group gathered for hugs, laughter and lunch at The Boiler Room - an eatery located in what used to be the lunch room for St. Marys Paper pipefitters - on the repurposed old paper mill property on Huron Street.
A group of women who worked at the paper mill get together for lunch once a month, but Tuesday’s reunion attracted nearly 30 women who worked at St. Marys.
The reunion came about after a flurry of emails between former coworkers.
“I stay in touch with Marlene Ash, a woman I worked with," said Susan Dalrymple, a former St. Marys Paper employee now living in Charlotte, North Carolina.
"I was talking to her before I came up here for a visit to my in-laws’ cottage and I said ‘hey, we need to get together for lunch.’
“I wanted to get together with a few of the girls that I've kept up with. She said ‘that sounds like a good idea.’ The next thing I know there's this list Marlene sent me of all the girls that are coming and I'm like ‘oh my gosh,’” Dalrymple told SooToday.
Dalrymple worked at St. Marys as an office assistant during the 1980s before moving to the U.S.
“I loved it. I had two great managers. I had good friendships with all the girls. Some of them are on my social media page to this day. I've known a lot of them for more than 40 years,” Dalrymple said, adding she's impressed with what property owner Tony Porco has done to repurpose the former paper mill’s buildings.
“After the mill closed down it was a sad situation but I think what the new owner has done is cool, like the restaurants they’ve put in here and the music conservatory building, which was the paper mill’s main office that I worked in. It's a beautiful old building,” Dalrymple said.
Noella Flood worked at St. Marys from the 1990s to 2010, starting off by working the switchboard and then in the purchasing office before eventually becoming a warehouse supervisor.
“Everybody loved working here. We've still got great friendships going. This is our old stomping grounds.
"We walk through here and all these memories keep coming back. It's perfect to have lunch where the pipe fitters’ lunch room was,” Flood said.
Helen Stewart has many positive memories of her days as a St. Marys Paper employee.
“I started as a stenographer back in the 70s. Then I went back to school and went to work in the environmental lab they had here. I had a management job as a hiring person and I was involved with the union,” Stewart recalled.
Both Stewart and her husband Bill worked at St. Marys Paper before retiring.
Bill worked as an electrical superintendent.
“I raised my kids thanks to the mill,” Stewart said.
“It was a really good place to work. There were good people. These girls are all good people, and strong willed. It was during the time when women had to fight for equal rights but it was a good time.
"I learned some good life lessons here.”
The group hopes to meet for another large scale reunion and lunch next year.