A different world – starting my first job after finishing school in the late Fifties
I LEFT King Edward’s Grammar School, Stourbridge in July 1959 at the age of 16, having achieved only 3 GCE passes – a situation that I had to rectify. However, my time at grammar school did help me gain other life skills.
Having made the decision to terminate my full-time education (not even discussed with my parents), I had to seek gainful employment. A career in civil engineering sounded appealing, as large steel structures fascinated me. An interview with the Youth Employment Officer threw cold water on this dream as he could only offer me interviews at a local bank and the Public Health Department at Stourbridge Borough Council. My father, however, did arrange an interview at E.E. Jeavons of Tipton who were Civil Engineers and I was offered a position in the accounts department, which did not enthuse me. I was also given the opportunity to apply for an engineering apprenticeship with at Coombs Wood, Halesowen. The training officer actually visiting my home to see if I wanted an interview!
With nothing resolved I departed for a cycling holiday to Holland and Belgium followed by a further trip in the UK. Upon my return my mother presented me with two advertisements from the Express and Star. They were both for jobs at Brierley Hill UDC; one for a trainee in the Architects and Housing Department, the other a similar position in the Surveyors Department. I applied for both and was offered interviews for both, conveniently on the same day.
Stewarts and Lloyds
The first interview was for the architectural position where I found myself sitting with seven other nervous applicants. Within an hour-anda-half I had accepted the position for an income of £240 pounds a year. Little did I know that the next two and a half years at Brierley Hill would herald a career of 51 years spent in the architectural profession.
Rota
By mid-september my employment had commenced and I soon felt at home, although compared to school the working day seemed very long. The council operated a rota system for Saturday morning working and it was soon my turn to man the housing complaints counter. The counter bell soon rang and I found myself confronted by “a forceful lady from Pensnett,” who shouted the words “There’s an ’oss in the fode, wan yo gewin’ to do about it?” My reply was, “pardon?” To which she retorted, “Am yo b----- def?” before repeating her initial question. Not understanding a word she said, I transcribed her actual words onto a complaints form promising action on Monday. You can imagine the mirth it gave my colleagues.
The department comprised of the Chief Architect, John R. Moore, a deputy chief, two senior, and, including me, two junior assistants. This was backed up by three clerks of works, housing officers and clerical staff.
On reflection, the major building projects being carried
out by such a small team was quite daunting: Brierley Hill Swimming Baths, Brierley Hill Civic Hall, Kingswinford Library, community centres at Quarry Bank, Hawbush, Brockmoor, Kingswinford and Wall Heath. This is without mentioning the large scale council housing developments being constructed all over the council area. The redevelopment of Chapel Street, Brierley Hill, was being planned, although it was being administered by a consortium of local architects, Adelphi Architects.
The majority of staff were housed in the Civic Buildings; it seemed like one large family and it did not take long to get to know most fellow employees.
Initially, my journeys to work were by cycle; in inclement weather it involved walking from my home in Wollaston to The Fish public house at Amblecote and completing the
journey by bus. It was often standing room only as they were often full of workers from Marsh and Baxters and Round Oak Steelworks. Travel changed when I acquired a Zundapp 50cc moped, thanks to the generosity of my mother, and this enabled me to obtain a motorcycle licence, allowing me to drive my next purchase, a BMW Isetta bubble car, without further qualification as it had no reverse gear.
The working day began by deciding on lunchtime food requirements. This could be bread rolls to fill from Robinsons Bakery, with boiled ham, pork pie or sausages, to cook on the staff room grill, from Knotts the butchers. Fridays meant a visit to Priests fish and chip cafe in Moor Street. My girlfriend (now my wife) came to work at Handy Angle in Mill Street (now Link 51); we still salivate at the memory of Priests egg, beans and batters. The cost of lunch was around two shillings. Birthdays were celebrated with custards from
Pearsalls Bakery. Lunchtimes were often spent playing table tennis in the staff room.
The highlights of the working year were the Christmas party (there were only two days holiday at Christmas and none at New Year) and the annual outing, when the offices were manned by the chief officers. We were transported by Hemmings or Noakes coaches for a day trip; my first was to London, routed in order that we could experience the recently completed M1 motorway. The second was to Southport via the Mersey Tunnel.
Besides receiving a training in architectural drafting and gaining a knowledge of building construction, there were diversions during the working day. As the office junior this often meant running errands.
Cars
When I started work there were quite a few pre-war cars on the staff car park – the advent of the Mini soon ended that. I had to take the spark plugs from the deputy architect’s Wolseley to Beckleys Garage and wait while they were sandblasted.
Specialist joinery items were made locally and I had to deliver drawings to Wheeler Brothers at Round Oak, who were joinery manufacturers and funeral directors. I was greeted by two middle aged men dressed in black who proudly showed me the template for the coffin of George Lovatt, made by them in 1933 when he died at the age of 63 weighing 48 stone.
The plan copying process was unbelievably crude; the original drawings were put onto a large glass drum together with a sheet of light sensitive paper and exposed to bright light. The resulting copy had to be “fixed” which meant taking it to another room and placing it in a long wooden box over a meat dish filled with neat ammonia. It was difficult to avoid inhaling the fumes. Furthermore, the ammonia had to be collected in large glass flagons from A.S. Price the chemist in the High Street and carried along the street then across the shiny entrance floor of the offices and up two flights of stairs.
The coroner’s court was held in the council chamber and incident plans prepared by the police force had to be copied, the most upsetting being a tragedy in Pensnett when several female crop pickers travelling on the back of a lorry were beheaded by a load of steel.
I also worked as an assistant polling clerk on two elections and on the 1961 Census.
This first experience of employment ended as swiftly as it started, when in March 1962 I accepted an offer to join an architect who had commenced business operating from a room in his house in Wollaston.
In 1976 I returned to work in the Architects Department of Dudley MBC, based above Dudley Building Society in Stone Street, Dudley – the successor to my original employer. I was employed as a senior assistant working on education projects, including the adaptation of my old school to a sixth form college. However, local government had changed dramatically in the intervening 14 years and I soon decided it was no longer for me.
Staff