This Day in History (1969): 25-Course Program Offers Training in Maintenance

From the Feb. 19, 1969, edition of the Sun and Flare

Jan. 18 marked the kick-off of an extensive new program offering 25 courses in advanced maintenance to employee of Aramco's Transportation Division.

Courses range from one to eight weeks in length, and it is anticipated that approximately 150 employees will have the opportunity to take one or more of these special courses.

Designed by the Industrial Training Division, the program is set up to keep employees abreast of the techniques required to maintain new vehicles coming into Saudi Arabia and will also extend understanding and knowledge for personal advancement on the job.

Specific course requirements were developed under the direction of R.A. Kenning, superintendent of the Transportation Maintenance Section. Conducting the classes are Said Bitar, vocational instructor from the Industrial Training Shops at Ras Tanura, and Douglas Elliot, consultant from the U.S.

Eight company employees, representing all three Aramco areas, have begun instruction and are well into the first course, which is on diesel engines. Class members meet four-and-one-half hours per day, five days a week. The first hour is spent on classroom lectures and presentations, the remaining time putting theories to work on actual repair jobs. The class works as a team under the guidance of the instructors.

The advanced training program is divided into three general areas. The first covers light cars and trucks, and in this category there will be eight classes on such subjects as steering systems, power train, and major and minor turn-ups. The second general area is the lubrication field, where detailed lubrication needs are outlined for specific vehicles in three different classes. The third category, offering 14 different classes, takes in heavy duty trucks.

The current course on diesel engines will be followed by one on major and minor tune-ups for cars. Following that, a course in heavy duty transmissions and torque convertors will be offered. The complete program is expected to continue one year or longer.

Caption for top photo: CUT-AWAY OF A DIESEL ENGINE is used by Doug Elliot to instruct members of the first class in a series of courses on advanced maintenance being offered employees of the Transportation Division.

Also on this date

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2002 — NASA's Mars Odyssey space probe begins to map the surface of Mars using its thermal emission imaging system

1985 — William J. Schroeder becomes the first recipient of an artificial heart to leave the hospital

1976 — U.S. President Gerald Ford rescinds Executive order 9066, which led to the relocation of Japanese Americans to internment camps in World War II

1959 — The United Kingdom grants Cyprus independence, which is formally proclaimed on Aug. 16 of the next year

1949 — Ezra Pound is awarded the first Bollingen Prize in poetry

1884 — The U.S. South is battered by 60 tornadoes, one of the largest such outbreaks in history

1878 — Thomas Edison patents the phonograph

1674 — England and the Netherlands sign the Treaty of Westminster, ending the Third Anglo-Dutch colonization efforts in Brazil

356 — The anti-paganism policy of Constantius II forbids the worship of pagan idols in the Roman Empire.