Dead End In Norvelt

Mom wants to get a sewing job at the Norvelt Pants Factory. Before World War II, the factory produced clothes for coal miners and farmers. During the war, the factory produced uniforms for the Army. Now, the factory only has a few workers, and they make brown or gray pants for office workers.

The 1080 poison produces a “massacre,” so Jack hurries to Miss Volker’s house to help her deal with the dead vermin. Scared, Jack enters the basement. He tells the vermin to run away if they’re still alive—he doesn’t want to kill them. He spots a box of Valentine’s Day chocolates. Mr. Spizz gave them to Miss Volker, and Miss Volker put 1080 poison in the chocolates to trick the vermin. Though Miss Volker killed them, she wants to give them a burial.

Miss Volker likes Girl Scout cookies, and she tells Jack to bring some Girl Scout cookies to the Community Center so that the older people can eat them. Miss Volker admits that she wants them to die so that her obligation to Eleanor Roosevelt will end. She thinks Norvelt might disappear. A few months ago, she sold her sister’s house to a young man, hoping that he’d bring other young people to Norvelt.

July arrives, and it’s Jack’s birthday. Mom now works at the pants factory. She gets the factory’s industrial-strength, petroleum-based grease remover to get rid of the stains on Jack’s shirt and remove the paint on War Chief’s face. Mom also hires a farrier to clip War Chief’s hooves. Mom offers Jack as payment for the farrier, but the farrier wants cash.

Aside from the grease remover, Jack gets three cotton dish towels, a “get out of jail free” card, a “one flight in the J-3” card (212), and a pass to see a double feature at the Viking drive-in. More so, Jack’s parents think it’s time to give him an allowance, so Dad hands Jack a $2 bill.

Jack’s birthday is on a Sunday, and Jack drives Miss Volker to church. She jokes more about him being her boyfriend, and she promises to give Jack her car after she dies. She also tells Jack to throw out his iron drops.

According to Miss Volker, too much iron in the blood leads to hemochromatosis—a disease that wrecks the pancreas and liver and causes depression. Miss Volker claims that the canonized American novelist Ernest Hemingway died of hemochromatosis.

In church, Jack thinks about how the spiritual environment creates a dreamlike time. He imagines heaven as a colorful place with infinite bread and no worries.

On the night of Jack’s birthday, Jack and his parents play Monopoly, and Mom claims that the game teaches people how to “ruin” lives. The Hells Angels arrive and set Miss Volker’s sister’s house on fire. The young person whom Miss Volker sold it to turns out to be the Hells Angel hit by the cement truck. Mom believes that the gang wants to scare the Norvelt community. Jack thinks about his book on “lost worlds” and wonders why the Greeks burned Troy and the Goths burned Rome. Mr. Spizz, who’s also the volunteer fire deputy, manages to save some of Miss Volker’s sister’s ceramic pots.

Miss Volker writes an obituary for her sister’s house. The column notes how Eleanor Roosevelt persuaded the government to make the houses decent, not barebones. Miss Volker writes that her sister’s husband, Chester Hap, helped people with their electricity; in exchange, they helped him build his house. The sister taught art at the Community Center, and she and her husband adopted a Japanese baby so that it wouldn’t live in a concentration camp. During World War II, the American government, fearing spies, forced Japanese people on the West Coast to leave their homes and live in the camps. The government located the Japanese baby and removed him. Miss Volker compares the apathy of the government to the hatred of the Hells Angels. Mr. Greene thinks Miss Volker is “los[ing] her mind.”

Dad has a new “top-secret job.” He believes that Miss Volker should follow her sister and move to Florida. He thinks that Norvelt won’t last much longer. Mr. Spizz takes pictures of Dad’s runway and says that he knows about Dad’s private flying lessons. Mr. Spizz won’t press the issue if Jack goes to the hardware store and buys him a tin of the 1080 poison. He’ll also forget about the ticket.

Mr. Spizz would go to the hardware store himself, but a Hells Angels kicked him, and he tripped trying to save the pots from Miss Volker’s sister’s house. Mr. Spizz claims that he needs 1080 to kill vermin in the dump by the gas station. Jack is suspicious, but he agrees to buy the poison. He has to sign a sheet when he buys it, and the last person who signed it was Mr. Huffer.

Mrs. Dubicki has died, so Miss Volker can now write an obituary for her. Mrs. Rena Dubicki was born in Slovenia in 1876. Her family came to the United States on an ocean liner. On the ship, her parents lost her, but fearing trouble, they didn’t tell the authorities. Eventually, they reunited. Mrs. Dubicki married, and her husband died of black lung disease. Since Mrs. Dubicki died on July 4, Miss Volker mentions American Presidents John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, who each died on July 4, 1826, and allegedly mentioned one another or their “last words.” Miss Volker praises Jefferson’s ostensibly populist ideology.