Memory Lane Mailbag: September 2

MY SISTER, Ivy, showed me the photograph of Mr Benford’s retirement presentation at Frank Cooper Ltd, the Oxford marmalade manufacturers (Memory Lane, July 8).

I can pick out some of those in the picture – Zena Brooks, Phyl Wheeler, Cynthia Dolton, Kath Bushnell, Beryl Wiggins, Lucy Gallaway, Margaret George, Emily Mariety and Ira Lucket.

I remember others but cannot think of their names.

I worked at the factory for one season when the oranges came in. When that job finished, I was put off. I was 14, having just left school.

I went back the following year at 15 and stayed on until we closed down during the war.

I was first back after the war to get the place ready for reopening.

German prisoners-of-war were there washing out the store jars.

I worked there until 1950 when I left to get married and moved to Reading.

We lived in The Hamel in St Thomas’s in Oxford. I am 95 this year.

KATE WARWICK Reading

More names

I HAVE BEEN able to add more names of Frank Cooper staff in your picture to those given by my friend, Kate Warwick (above). They are: Beatrice Collet, Diana Stratford, Beryl Mott, Jean Deadman, Doreen Holding, Win Prew, Ron Acres, Gladys Jones, Eileen Walker and Gladys Whiting. I started work at Cooper’s aged 14 in 1942 and became a supervisor. I left when the factory closed in 1967. I was asked to transfer to Paisley in Scotland, but declined the offer.

CYNTHIA STROUDLY (nee Dalton) Alpha Avenue Garsington

No end to the uses of Grandma’s apron

I CAME across an article on the history of aprons – and it brought back lots of happy memories.

I have a photograph of my grandmother and great grandmother wearing them.

The article read: “I don’t think our kids know what an apron is. The principal use of Grandma's apron was to protect the dress underneath because she only had a few and because it was easier to wash aprons than dresses, and aprons required less material.

But along with that, it served as a potholder for removing hot pans from the oven.

It was wonderful for drying children's tears, and on occasion was even used for cleaning out dirty ears.

From the chicken coop, the apron was used for carrying eggs, fussy chicks, and sometimes half-hatched eggs to be finished in the warming oven.

When company came, those aprons were ideal hiding places for shy kids.

And when the weather was cold, Grandma wrapped it around her arms.

Those big old aprons wiped many a perspiring brow, bent over the hot wood stove. Chips and kindling wood were brought into the kitchen in that apron.

From the garden, it carried all sorts of vegetables. After the peas had been shelled, it carried out the hulls.

In the autumn, the apron was used to bring in apples that had fallen from the trees.

When unexpected company drove up the road, it was surprising how much furniture that old apron could dust in a matter of seconds.

When dinner was ready, Grandma walked out on to the porch, waved her apron, and the men folk knew it was time to come in from the fields to dinner.

It will be a long time before someone invents something that will replace that 'old-time apron' that served so many purposes.

REMEMBER: Grandma used to set her hot baked apple pies on the window sill to cool. Her granddaughters set theirs on the window sill to thaw.

The Government would go crazy now trying to figure out how many germs were on that apron.”

JEAN JEFFS Sandford-on-Thames

Them and us – but who was to blame?

IN HIS letter (Memory Lane, July 22), Maurice Collier gives the impression that it was the trade unions which brought about the demise of the Nuffield and Austin organisations, but, as you might guess, it was not as simple as that.

I remember an American industrialist claiming that 99 per cent of all industrial unrest was management generated and this was almost certainly true of the Oxford works.

After talking to those who worked at Cowley, it was clear that they hated all those stoppages because all the time spent doing nothing meant less in wages.

They had nothing but praise for union shop floor stewards because, they believed, these people kept the plant running.

As they put it, going to management to resolve a line problem was a waste of time and, although it was not considered the right thing to do, it was the union representative who was best at resolving line faults.

I often called at the Transport and General Workers’ Union office in Cowley Road, where officials were constantly frustrated by stoppages at Cowley.

According to them, the management was so weak that that it had no control over the people who worked there.

It seems that troublemakers, who had a political agenda of their own, had taken over the running of the union at the Cowley plant and had no real interest in the workers at all.

At one time, Cowley started to assemble cars built by Honda and, as a result, some of the staff from Cowley went to the Honda factory in Japan.

According to one of those who made the journey, you would have thought that you were still in Cowley because the lines were almost identical. However, there were differences in management.

A Cowley quality control manager asked what process they went through to deal with faulty components. The answer was: “We don’t get faulty components.”

Another question was: “Since the management operates from an office on the factory floor, who’s running the main office.” Apparently someone else was paid to do that job.

The firm that I worked for believed that management should be visible and that all workers should be treated as equals, be given the best working conditions possible and be provided with information about the company's plans. In other words, workers should feel they are part of a family.

One got the impression that at the Cowley works, it was a case of them and us.

Many years ago, an American claimed that the trouble with British industry was that it had been taken over by accountants. Whether that was true of Cowley, I can’t say.

DERRICK HOLT Fortnam Close Headington Oxford

Happy childhood times in village

THE village of Wootton, near Woodstock, has many special memories for me. As a child, I spent many happy times there.

My grandfather, Frank Ernest Buggins, lived there all his life, as did his forebears. His nine brothers and sisters were also born there.

He was a shoe repairer and served his apprenticeship in nearby Woodstock before marrying my grandmother, Evelyn Moss.

He served the villagers by making and repairing their shoes in his own workshop, beside his cottage, for many years.

I have recently researched my family tree and discovered to my amazement that the family had connections with the Earls of Warwick and the Barringtons, of Barrington Hall in Essex.

My father’s cousin recently passed away, aged 93.

Sadly, she was the last member of the family to live in the village since the family settled there a few hundred years ago.

Her service was held in the local church of St Mary the Virgin, where many of the family were laid to rest.

Happy and sad memories of a lovely Oxfordshire village.

STUART COOPER Watermill Way Oxford