'How do we teach our children and our grandchildren that things have to change if everybody pushes it under the rug?' Marchello said as her lawsuit hung in the balance.

But she hopes her lawsuit will have some impact-that maybe one day female oil workers will have basics like equal pay and a safe working environment. Marchello no longer works in the oil industry, and she has yet to find another job that pays close to what she'd been earning. The United States is now the number-one producer of oil in the world, and the industry is only expected to grow under Trump. She had spent most of her employment being the only woman oil field worker at Garrison, according to her EEOC complaint, in which she claims that, when she reported lewd comments in the workplace, she was fired. Elma Garza got a $30,000 settlement from her company, Garrison Contractors, Inc. That means no trial and little attention. And approximately 98 percent of single-plaintiff civil cases settle in federal court. Most of these women can't file class action suits because there aren't enough women at their workplace to organize. “Shell is committed to a workplace free of harassment and discrimination.”) One of the more disturbing allegations in her complaint: On August 29, 2016, she found a sticker on her desk saying, 'If your pussy hurts, just stay home.' (“We cannot offer comment on pending litigation,” the company wrote when asked for comment. This July Ciara Newton, who worked as a refinery process operator at a Shell Oil subsidiary, filed a sex discrimination and harassment case against the company. She settled the case earlier this year for an undisclosed amount.

In her complaint she said she was demoted from pump operator to a desk job because of her gender and claimed she had received $2 an hour less pay than men with the same job title, along with being subjected to harassment. In 2015 Cindy Marchello, an oil worker I spent a lot of time with, sued C&J Energy Services, Inc., for sex discrimination. And the stories of harassment I heard were even more depressing-women getting called derogatory names, even being attacked on job sites, and male coworkers refusing to work with them.

The New Wild West by Blaire Briody