Man of steel

I read this today in the Corpus Christi Caller Times. I posted this on my blog because I am very proud of my grandpa. He has managed to do so much in his life and has made a great impact on so many people's lives. It's an honor to call him grandpa! At the same time I am thankful for him because he has been a great role model for my own father in many ways. I know that I will tell his story to my kids and grand kids and hope and pray that they will follow in his foot steps.

At 82, Pete Perez still going strong at Army Depot







Pedro 'Pete' Perez, 82, has helped rebuild hundreds of planes and helicopters during his 57-year career in civil service, including 34 years at the Corpus Christi Army Depot.





He is the only employee at the depot who has earned a 50-year pin, which he placed on his belt with his other service awards. Perez is the only employee of the depot's more than 3,600 civil service workers who has earned a 50-year pin. He wears his history on his belt.
Attaching the nearly 60 years in five-year service award pins to leather was no challenge for Pedro "Pete" Perez. The 82-year-old has engineered, snipped, fabricated and riveted or bolted thousands of miles of aluminum, stainless steel and titanium to patch gunshot holes and cobble together the outside skin of aircraft damaged in four wars. The 5-foot-5-inch, 130-pound sheet metal mechanic scales scaffolding daily at Corpus Christi Army Depot to root into tight helicopter compartments with a bucktail wrench to flare rivets.

Perez is the only employee of the depot's more than 3,600 civil service workers who has earned a 50-year pin.

"It had to be special ordered," said Lois Contreras, spokeswoman for the depot.

Perez leads 14 sheet metal workers who are among the thousands he has trained in the skill he first learned in the Navy right after Pearl Harbor was attacked.
After meeting his wife of 49 years, Norma, while taking college courses in sheet metal mechanics, Perez worked his first 21 years in the civil service repairing tail booms of airplanes at an Air Force base in Laredo. He transferred to the Corpus Christi Army Depot's Hangar 45, the Cargo Helicopter-47 Assembly Division here, in 1973 shortly before a major layoff. But with his experience, Perez was among the first called back to work, said his longtime supervisor William "Flaco" Dodson.




"Pete's taught me most of what I know," Dodson said.

During the past 10 years, since his wife died from complications of diabetes, Perez has been bolstering the replacements for an aging work force that local employers often complain doesn't have enough skilled workers, Dodson said.

"Pete's a role model, up and down, nonstop," said Arnold Mendez, a production supervisor. "He teaches these young guys through example."

Perez is the first at work by 4 a.m., Mendez said. And he has accrued 5,000 hours of sick leave that he will be credited when he retires at the end of this year. That's after he has donated 100 hours each year to other workers with family or health problems. When he retires, Perez will have worked in civil service for 58 years.

He works just as hard as those he leads, said Herb Saenz, 37, a sheet metal mechanic who has worked with Perez for nearly two years.

"I've learned job dedication from him," Saenz said. "He gets onto us for being late by just giving us that look.

"Pete climbs, drills, grinds and rivets more than most of us half his age," Saenz said. "And we get to hear his stories from World War II and have the honor of working with somebody that experienced in the field."

Perez also enjoys the challenge of engineering the repairs, he said while pointing two fingers toward the rafters.
"Thanks to God, I'm still kicking," he said. "I can't sit at home, so I help them learn all I can. I keep telling these young people to care for this job, you cannot get better without working your butt off."

Pete Perez stands in front of a Huey on Wednesday at the depot. The Huey, which saw extensive action in Vietnam, was one of the first aircraft Perez worked on during his 57-year civil service career.