Kansas Dickies Worker of the Year Award

Dodge City Daily Globe - 07/28/2006
by Krissa Smith

The Minneola woman, a USDA meat grader at Cargill Meat Solutions and National Beef in Dodge City, recently won Dickies Kansas Worker of the Year award.

Muriel Bonsall, a USDA meat grader from Minneola has been awareded the 2006 Dickies Kansas Worker of the Year. Dickies marketing company chooses the winner based on the nominee's sincerity, the nominee's level of dedication shown to his or her job and the extent to which the nominee represents the spirit of the American worker in a short essay the nominee submits to Dickies.

Bonsall said her friend, Mary Derstein, gave her the theme for the composition. Derstein held Bonsall's hands and asked, "What do you see?" Bonsall replied, "I see the hands of a working woman." "No," Derstein said. "Your hands are so much more than that. Your hands are who you are. They represent the inner you."

Bonsall wanted to tell others through her essay that their hands do more than work, they show their character.

"We have a gift in our hands," she said in a recent interview.

Bonsall has worked as a USDA meat grader for 30 years, and she said she enjoys the challenge of her job.

"The decision-making process is mine," she said. "When I make a decision, it's a decision I own. I have a lot of factors to evaluate. I have to do it very fast, and I have to do it very well."

Since the plant's sales cooler department runs more than 400 beef carcasses an hour, Bonsall has only six seconds to decide whether each beef carcass is USDA prime, choice or select.

"I have to make quality decisions, quick decisions, and I like that personal challenge," she said. "You have to be very focused. It's repetitive, but it's a challenge because it has to be accurate."

Bonsall is one of only a handful of female USDA meat graders in the United States. Out of 14 meat graders in Dodge City, two are female meat graders.

Bonsall rotates working six weeks at Cargill Meat Solutions then six weeks at National Beef. She also travels across the United States to fill in for meat graders who are on vacation.

Bonsall said she has never seriously thought of quitting her job.

"I was trained as a child to be very dependable and accountable," she said. "My dad was a railroader and never missed a day of work. So it's like, 'can't do it.'"

However, she has the option of retiring in three years, and she is considering it.

Bonsall found out about Dickies Worker of the Year competition when she attended the PBR Built Ford Tough bullriding contest in Albuquerque, N.M., in March. She saw a Dickies booth advertising the competition and decided to go online and enter an essay.

The marketing firm notified her at the end of June by e-mail and voice mail that she had won the Kansas Worker of the Year award.

"It was the happiest answering machine message I've had in about a decade," she said, smiling.

Bonsall also competed for Dickies American Worker of the Year, but didn't win. For winning at the state level, Bonsall won a Dickies coat with her name on it, a $100 gift certificate for Dickies clothing and a Dickies watch.

The following composition won Bonsall Dickies Kansas Worker of the Year award:

"'What do you see?'

"'I see the hands of a working woman,' was my reply.

"'No,' my friend replied, 'You see dependable hands earning a steady paycheck 30 years grading beef carcasses, USDA Choice, etc., in a cold cooler. Giving hands as a former Mrs. Kansas America, sharing Bibles to searching hearts in Russia. Nurturing hands moonlighting five years as a massage therapist, soothing athletes' taut muscles of horses or humans. Strong hands completing daily livestock chores of feeding to pulling flank straps on bucking bulls.'

"Everyone's hands tell an American worker's story as unique as their fingerprints."

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