Recent content by freddy

Chris, are you still in touch with Jim? He hasn't been in here for a while; be nice to know he's OK.

Chris, Dave, Both of you will recall Billy Ford (another keen angler) I'm sure. When the cleaning line on 3B section, the old manual barrel lines, caught fire a number of stalwart heroes (!) led by Frank Paget rushed to tackle it with hand held extinguishers. Bill had got hold of one of the...

Hi Dave, I lost touch with Goosey when I left Ionic, so I've no idea as to his whereabouts then or now. He did work in the stores, but did other stuff too.

Chris, Lovely to see you. Bob's wife was Joyce. Judith and I went on a number of fishing club nights out with them .... they were both wonderful company and an absolute hoot together. Another stalwart of the angling club was Gordon Woodley. Earlier on in the thread I managed to get his dad's...

The canteen ..... the wonderful lady in charge was Mick Lehane's (progress chaser and transport) wife. She was a kind soul and just like Mick, full of fun. I think her name was Lil, but not 100 % sure after all these years. I bet Jimmy Gull will remember. When I was working morning shifts...

Brian, I'm so pleased to see you back in here. I can't be precise about Mike's passing, we hadn't been in touch for some time. I was told he'd died by Bob Pountney, plating manager of W G Allan in Wednesbury. Mike ran his own small plating supply outfit at the time; Allens was a customer of...

Hi Dave, Chris, Jim et al, I met Roy Castle when he was working in Wales at (I think) Merthyr Plating where he was Manager/Senior foreman, something like that. This would be around 1998 /99 when McDermid took over Wm Canning. I had commercial responsibility for Wales dropped on me and sort of...

A lot late coming into this thread as usual ... I learned to swim at Rolfe Street baths as a small boy; I'm afraid I can't remember the name of the lady who taught me, but she was a very kindly motherly type of person and gave me the priceless gift of confidence in water. My late father was a...

I remember Ron Hale very well. Gren Picken was an outstandingly funny man ( he wasn't alone!) and worked in 21 shop on the old manual phosphate line with John Stamp(s). He was a great man for a curry, on twilight shift he insisted on mega quantities of curry sauce on his bought in meal. I met...

Rosie, I've only just picked up on this thread, but just a note to say that I remember Sammie very well; always full of laughs and good humour.

Frank, No, the pic of the GKN building wasn't where your Dad had his office, at least in my time. When I knew him his office was accessed from the main reception area on the ground floor and didn't (from memory) have that corrugated glass panelling. The offices that did have that sort of...

Frank, Just how I remember him. Great pic, and a great memory, thanks for posting.

Dave, How nice to see you in the forum once more; I hope all is well with you and yours. When this wretched Covid thing is behind us, we'll make a date to meet in Poole. We take a cottage in Dorset every now and again. The building in the pic isn't the factory we all worked in, it's the one on...

Hi all, I've greatly enjoyed reading all the recent activity in the forum, though I only caught up with it today. Chris, Like Dave Quick I recognised you instantly. I have one very clear memory of you telling me that my then girl friend Judith who was waiting in reception for me to finish...

Dave, Great to hear from you again, and also one of Bert's grandchildren. Whoddathunkit? I really respected Bert, not least for his occasionally acid sense of humour, but also for his technical brilliance. We've been pretty regimental about this CV-19 thing and the lockdown and so I'm...