Melva Brannen – Finance

Melva Brannen has basically had two careers in her 90 years. She spent 30 years working in the finance department for the Southwestern Bell Telephone Company and, for the last 30 years, she has been active in the Telephone Pioneers, a dedicated and diverse group of retired telephone company employees who volunteer throughout the community.

Melva began working for Southwestern Bell in 1952 at the age of 32. Her husband was on active duty in the military and he encouraged her to work in case anything ever happened to him. And, unfortunately, she lost her husband at a young age and felt relieved that she had a career to support herself and her daughter.


She attended IBM School and learned the key punching process. She was hired at Southwestern Bell in St. Louis, Missouri to work in the payroll department. Key punch operators were in great demand at the time, as the company was converting everything from manual processes to machines. She recalls the tedious process of manually calculating employee payroll using a calculator and an employee earnings card to figure salary, deductions and union dues for thousands of employees. Even with the stacks and stacks of IBM cards that they had to process, payroll became much easier with the key punch machines. But it was a long, hard fight to get them.

When her husband was transferred to Randolph Air Force base, she moved to the San Antonio office of Southwestern Bell and helped transition the entire finance department to San Antonio as well. Melva worked her way up through many departments at Southwestern Bell: From payroll to reporting to revenues and disbursements to the estimate department to the audit department.


Melva recalls the days when companies did not want married women working. “If you got married, you had to keep it a secret,” she said. “I have seen amazing changes in the company. Now everything is computerized. There are women out climbing the telephone poles and think nothing of it!”


She was also glad to have retired when she did. She retired as a senior audit clerk in 1983, right before the divestiture of AT&T into Southwestern Bell.

“The accounting during that time was fierce,” she said. “The breakup of AT&T was rugged for the finance department.”


Telephone Pioneer

Since 1980, she has been a member of the Telephone Pioneers, an auxiliary volunteer group that helps the less fortunate in our local community and around the world. Melva has been involved with the Pioneers’ Santa program since the beginning, dressing up as Santa Claus and visiting nursing homes, orphanages and terminally-ill children all around the globe and bringing them small gifts. She says she has been everywhere, except the Orient – Australia, New Zealand, Italy, the British Isles and the Mediterranean.


“We did so much good with the Santa program,” she said.

“I remember being on an island somewhere and the children didn’t even know who Santa Claus was. But when you see 60 of them walk into a room at the same time, everyone gets a kick out of that!”


Still an active Pioneer, Melva keeps her Santa suit ready and hopes to pull it out of the closet again at some point in the near future. She had to pass up the last Pioneer trip to South Africa because her traveling partner had recently passed away.


“It’s been really rewarding,” she said. “I’ve probably spent a fortune traveling, but it’s all worth it. It’s been the most educational project I could have done and all the travelling has kept my mind interested and sharp. It’s what keeps me young!”