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Wilmot Breeden Limited

jmadone said:
Glenys, I don't know if you are still a member of the forum and I've just come across your post. My Dad was also a bumper polisher at WB in Amington Rd and I too used to visit the lake at the sports ground with him. Caught my first carp in that pool. Before he retired due to ill health, my grandad also worked there and I can remember my dad taking me to see him at work one Saturday morning (I was about 4 or 5 yrs old) and I was astounded by the noise and the sparks he produced polishing the heavy castings. At gran's house were several chromium ashtrays with a chrome metal bird attached. I later found out that were car mascots (Possibly Wolsey) and someone in the factory had the bright idea of fixing them to a cheap metal ashtray and sell them on.
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Seems it was an unhealthy place to work. Glenys's dad died at 52, your dad retired with ill health. I remember they were investing heavily in automatic polishing machines in the 1960's to distant the polishers from the worst of the dust.
 
devonjim said:
Seems it was an unhealthy place to work. Glenys's dad died at 52, your dad retired with ill health. I remember they were investing heavily in automatic polishing machines in the 1960's to distant the polishers from the worst of the dust.
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Yes my grandad suffered with breathing problems no doubt brought about by bad working conditions and also by smoking at least 30 cigarettes a day.
 
devonjim said:
I worked at Wilmot Breeden for some eleven years, until 1970. I never worked in Bumper division, but I thought your father may have known Frank Tye who was a manager in that division.
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Hiya, I will check with my dad this evening to see if he remembers Frank, my dad's speech is limited after his stroke, so we communicate on a basic level nowadays. He too used to cycle to work at 5am in the morning and did nightshifts (pretty remarkable work ethic if you ask me, I was only 5-6 years of age then but still remember him sorting out his flask and sandwiches. We used to live in Waverley Rd in Small Heath not far from the factory.
 
Hi , New to the site , just wondering if anyone remembers the Burrows family ?, at one time 7 of themselves at Wilmots.I know that Ron ( my dad) worked in maintenance at amington and fordhouse .
 
My mom worked at wilmott breedan she won a beauty contest bk then in 1964 for miss wilmott breedan her name was Patricia Barrett bk then.
 
Martyn1966 said:
Hi , New to the site , just wondering if anyone remembers the Burrows family ?, at one time 7 of themselves at Wilmots.I know that Ron ( my dad) worked in maintenance at amington and fordhouse .
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As an apprentice I played cricket for the maintenance team, so I knew quite a few of the guys in that department. I also worked both at Amington Rd and at Fordhouse Lane, the name Ron Burrows sounds familiar was he a millwright? A couple of names I do recall are Ron Simper, Bill Chadwick and Jimmy Catley.
 
Hi Jim , remember the names Ron Simper and Billy Chadwick, simper was head of electrical in maintenance, I think and dad was over the pipe fitters , until he left in 1981. You may also remember Bill Burrows who was in maintenance at Amington. They both had many happy memories of There times there , Dad started in 43 and was made redundant in 81.
 
devonjim said:
As an apprentice I played cricket for the maintenance team, so I knew quite a few of the guys in that department. I also worked both at Amington Rd and at Fordhouse Lane, the name Ron Burrows sounds familiar was he a millwright? A couple of names I do recall are Ron Simper, Bill Chadwick and Jimmy Catley.
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jimmy was a good footballer we had a great side 1960 1964
 
devonjim said:
As an apprentice I played cricket for the maintenance team, so I knew quite a few of the guys in that department. I also worked both at Amington Rd and at Fordhouse Lane, the name Ron Burrows sounds familiar was he a millwright? A couple of names I do recall are Ron Simper, Bill Chadwick and Jimmy Catley.
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jimmy was a good cricket player
 
Hi
I wonder if anyone can offer any assistance to me. I am looking to find out who worked at the Tysley site back in 1966. My mother in law Dorothy Evans worked there at the time. I don’t know if there would of been employees listed anywhere ?? This would be of great help if anyone can offer assistance.
 
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Jyoti said:
Hi
I wonder if anyone can offer any assistance to me. I am looking to find out who worked at the Tysley site back in 1966. My mother in law Dorothy Evans worked there at the time. I don’t know if there would of been employees listed anywhere ?? This would be of great help if anyone can offer assistance.
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Back in 1966 WB had several sites in the Tyseley area, Amington Rd., Farringdon, Rushey Lane, Kings Rd. I'm afraid I don't know of any listing of employees.
 
Jyoti said:
Hi
I wonder if anyone can offer any assistance to me. I am looking to find out who worked at the Tysley site back in 1966. My mother in law Dorothy Evans worked there at the time. I don’t know if there would of been employees listed anywhere ?? This would be of great help if anyone can offer assistance.
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Hi do you know which factory she worked in (Amington road Kings Road etc) ?
 
devonjim said:
Back in 1966 WB had several sites in the Tyseley area, Amington Rd., Farringdon, Rushey Lane, Kings Rd. I'm afraid I don't know of any listing of employees.
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Hi thank you for replying, it was the Amington Rd site, she worked at.
 
Jyoti said:
Hi
I wonder if anyone can offer any assistance to me. I am looking to find out who worked at the Tysley site back in 1966. My mother in law Dorothy Evans worked there at the time. I don’t know if there would of been employees listed anywhere ?? This would be of great help if anyone can offer assistance.
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Was your mother in law called Dot and did she live in Sheldon?
 
Hi all
my reason for the employee list is because I am looking for my husband’s biological dad. He would of been an Asian man, my mother-in-law as I said was Dorothy Evans, we do not have a name and therefore hope that someone on this site can help. My husband was born in February 1967, we believe his dad may have lived at 100 Adderley Rd, Saltley, Birmingham. This is the only information I have. Please help if you can, as it will mean a great deal to my husband to find his roots and further family. Your help is extremely important thank you
 
jmadone said:
Sorry to raise your hopes. my Dad worked with a lady at Amington Rd. named Dot but she lived on Cranes Park Road, Sheldon.
Jim
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no problem, thank you for your help. Hopefully someone will be able to help on this site. But appreciate your help none the less.
 
If anyone can shed some light or provide a direction that will help, as just need something to guide us and any information that may lead us to finding my husband’s dad.
 
Jyoti said:
If anyone can shed some light or provide a direction that will help, as just need something to guide us and any information that may lead us to finding my husband’s dad.
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hello jyoti as your search could involve a living person i have sent you a private message with some information...

lyn
 
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I was an apprentice at WB 1959-64. I was a member of the Catana Club which used to organise expeditions to N. Wales and similar areas for climbing and walking, usually camping or sometimes stopping at Youth Hostels.
In 1963 the members decided to do the "Three Peaks" - Ben Nevis. Scafell & Snowden - in one weekend.
It took a lot of organising. We asked the company if we could borrow a suitable vehicle and eventually we were allowed to borrow a Landrover from the Rover company.

The two main problems were the roads and communications. There were no motorways in Scotland in those days and no mobile phones. We had a climbing team of 5 which included me: a team of drivers and some others to put up tents and do the cooking.

We has to set out in the early hours of the Sat morning and it was mid afternoon before we arrived at Fort William to the for the climb up Ben Nevis. On returning to the car it was straight back south to the Lake district for a few hours rest and then up Scafell Pike. Back in the car for the journey to the foot of Snowden. We returned from that climb in late afternoon. For communications we had sussed out the nos. of telephone boxes in Lake district and at Snowden.
We stopped at tel. box in Scotland to make the arranged call and it was still a manual exchange and the operator asked for the No. The exchange was Onich. How do you pronounce that?

We had our 5 minutes of fame by appearing on television on the programme Midlands at Six and piece in the Birmingham Post -See below. The picture is in rather poor condition.
002.jpg 003.jpg Birmingham Post 2 Sept 1963

Regards from Redruth

Arnold
 
The company I worked for had to do work on Wilmot Bredons canteens, we had to strip the old wallpaper off a large high wall at one end, it was Vymura where the washable top pulls off and leaves the backing as lining paper. The wall was quite high so we had trestles and catwalks up to pull 20ft long lengths off. Halfway through we heard a commotion down below and there were a load of women rolling up the discarded vinyl to take home, We told them it was no good as it was a type of plastic and would not stick back on with paste but they wouldn't listen and carted it all away, some even waited for the rest to be pulled off so they could get enough for their room, I often wondered how they got on trying to put it up.
 
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