Eight decades as a sparky
Almost eight decades as a sparky has been less of a trade and more of a way of life for electrician Charles Bullas.
The 90-year-old has shown plenty of staying power in a 76-career that spanned a wartime secret project, switching some of the last cotton mills in his native UK from gas lighting to electric, and working on the weapons systems for the De Havilland Mosquito aircraft.
Bullas has taken his expertise down into the mines, to a nuclear power plant, and he has passed them on, teaching a plethora of proteges.
But it’s now time for the Palmerston North man to to flick off the switch and retire – or at least make his second attempt.
‘‘I moved to Palmerston North when I retired from Hutt Valley and I was walking to the shops one day and heard a voice saying ‘hello Charlie’, and it was someone I had once taught,’’ Bullas said.
It was then, in 2005, that he was recruited for a part-time role with Etco, an electrical apprenticeship provider, to teach its night class as a tutor.
‘‘I’ve just seen the results for my last class of students and they all did very well, as usual, with all achieving over 70 per cent marks, and most between 85 and 94 per cent.’’
Bullas left grammar school in his native Lancashire at age 14, in 1941, when World War II interrupted his plans for university.
He took up a seven-year apprenticeship with a small local electrical and plumbing company.
One of the first jobs he worked on was converting a wallpaper factory into a munitions plant to make mortar shells.
He was called up to the army at 17 and ended up working on a top secret project to develop the Centurion tank.
After the war he returned to his former job before going to work as chief electrician at a mine and then joining De Havilland.
His experiences there included being taken to the UK’S former Windscale nuclear power plant following a fire – where he viewed uranium rods ‘‘glowing the most incredible blue’’ through a special filter.
This, together with his concerns about the UK’S hydrogen bomb programme shaped his decision to move his family, including his five children, to New Zealand in 1962 and switch to teaching.
Bullas has taught generations of future electricians, including at the former Technical Correspondence Institute and the former Hutt Valley Polytechnic.
Etco’s national learning support manager David Barnes recruited his former tutor in 2005.
He said Bullas was an excellent electrical engineer and teacher.
‘‘His knowledge of the subject, particularly regulations and theory, is phenomenal, and he always had a great rapport with his students,’’ Barnes said.
A true tradie, Bullas plans to keep busy in retirement with a few home DIY projects, and pursuing his interests in woodwork and metalwork.