Category Archives: Work

Frederick W. Pearce 1866-1928

From the Thames Valley Times – Wednesday 17 October 1928, page 3

DEATH OF BOROUGH SURVEYOR

A Conscientious Official Whose Life was Given to the Public Service

TOMORROW’S FUNERAL ARRANGEMENTS.

Resolutions of Sympathy : Morning Service at Congregational Church Abandoned

By the sudden death on Sunday morning, at his residence in Spencer Road, Strawberry Hill, of Mr. Frederick W. Pearce, the borough surveyor and engineer, Twickenham has lost a valued public official. For thirty years he had given of his best to Twickenham in conscientious and disinterested service and with a generous heart and hand.

The sympathy of the whole town goes out to the widow and family in the heavy loss they have sustained. Mr. Pearce’s life was given to the faithful discharge of his duties.

It is our painful duty to record today the sudden passing, at half-past ten on Sunday morning, of Mr. Frederick W. Pearce, F.S.I. who for thirty years had held the responsible position of surveyor and engineer at Twickenham, first to the Urban District Council, and latterly to the Town Council. He was 62 years of age last April.

A native of Somersetshire, Mr. Pearce came to London as a young man full of that boundless energy and thoroughness which characterised him all through his life. Entering the service of the Wimbledon District Council, he occupied the position of assistant surveyor, and on his leaving was made the recipient of a testimonial placing on record his valued services. He came to Twickenham in October, 1898, to succeed Mr. G. B.Raffin* who had obtained an appointment abroad [South Africa], and on Wednesday next would have celebrated the thirtieth anniversary of his work in the district.

Twickenham was at that time little more than a village, with a population of 1,600, but with the coming of the trains, the cutting through of York Street, which had just been completed and the building developments taking place on all sides, Twickenham was fast passing from a village to a town. With that development came the laying out of new roads, seventy of which were made up under his personal supervision in the succeeding ten years, the District Council of those days having wisely decided to undertake its work on a systematic basis. Richmond Road, then a narrow thoroughfare, was widened as we know it to-day. Further road widenings were made with the extension of the trams towards Hampton Court, Mr. Pearce always taking the long view, which succeeding years have proved the correct one, of wide thoroughfares for the traffic he foresaw.

Then came the acquisition of Radnor House and the raising of its grounds several feet so as to prevent the occasional floodings that would have made riverside gardens an impassability. The Teddington Lock was in course of construction, and Mr. Pearce seized the opportunity by arranging with the Thames Conservancy and the contractors to have the excavated material barged down stream and deposited on the gardens, saving the town many hundreds of pounds in so doing.

As the town grew the need of enlarging and reorganising the fire brigade was taken in hand under Mr. Pearce’s personal direction. The old horsed engines were replaced by motors, the fire station enlarged, and latterly, the chief officer of the brigade installed with living accommodation on the spot.

Another important project of those days which threw a heavy responsibility on his shoulders was the construction of the sewage works and refuse destructor, the work of which was so heavy that, at his suggestion, a consultancy was called in, Mr. Fairley, of Richmond, being engaged by the Council.

With the increasing population came the need of new schools and in the construction of these some of Mr. Pearce’s best work was done, for he was a keen educationist and knew exactly what were the requirements of an elementary school. The Orleans Schools, which were erected in 1910, were followed a year later by the Nelson Schools, which catered for the children in East Twickenham and Whitton areas. One of his last tasks was the building of another school at Whitton to meet the demands of that growing area.

War Time Activities

Then, with the need of an isolation hospital becoming apparent, one was erected at Whitton in 1906 from his plans and under his direction, in such a manner that when extension became necessary last year it was an easy and comparatively inexpensive matter, for he had had an eye to the future in the original building.

Then, with the coming of the war, during which the constructional work of the Council was suspended, he threw himself into the activities the Council undertook for the successful prosecution of the war, and how well he did it was nobly expressed in a few words at the meeting of the Congregational Mothers’ Union on Monday afternoon. He became the fuel officer and the transport officer of the Council, but there was much that he did during this trying period that extended far beyond the limits of those offices.

To the improvement of the riverside path between Marble Hill and Richmond Bridge he devoted much personal attention, being careful to preserve the rural amenities of the walk, particularly in the neighbourhood of Marble Hill, when raising the path and filling in the ditch. Trees there were which had to go but not one was taken down in the clearing which impaired the view from the riverside or from Richmond Hill.

The purchase of York House and the coming of incorporation had placed increasing burdens and responsibilities upon his shoulders. The alterations necessary to York House were much larger than was anticipated when taking over the building, and this work, coupled with the transfer of the offices from the old Town Hall, came at a time when the surveyor and his department were working at their hardest. The Strawberry Vale and St. Margaret’s road improvements were just completed. The demand for Council houses and flats was growing more incessant, the widening of King Street, the pulling down of the old Town Hall, the development of the Richmond House Estate, all had to be dealt with.

The purchase of Orleans Riverside Land, the development of the Cambridge-gardens and of the Cross Deep Estate, and the widening of St. Margaret’s road, Strawberry Vale, and Cross Deep had thrown heavy burdens on his shoulders, coming, as they did, on the top of his other routine work. The Council, realising it, offered him assistance, but he never complained, and worked on cheerfully to the last.

The Church He Loved

Full of boundless energy, even when his health was by no means good, Mr. Pearce, amidst all his manifold public duties, found time for many outside interests. To the Congregational Church on the Green, of which he was deacon for eighteen years, he was a devoted member and supporter, the children, especially, having in him a supporter and friend. He was its church secretary, and it is not too much to say that its existence to-day as a church is in no small measure due to his life and influence. Whilst fully alive to the social side of the church, he never lost sight of the place the church must fill in the spiritual life of its people, and it is a tragic coincidence that a meeting to consider the deepening of the spiritual life of the church was to have been held this week, mainly as a result of the suggestions he had made.

He was a Freemason, being a member both of the Richmond Lodge and Richmond Chapter, and of the Twickenham Rotary Club, whose motto, “Service above self” inspired his everyday life.

Another of his outside activities was the Lower Thames Valley Association of Surveyors, of which he was secretary. He was also a member of the Institute of Municipal and County Engineers and a vice-president of the Twickenham Rifle Club and the Twickenham Philanthropic Society. His many activities and official duties were placing burdens upon the shoulders of the surveyor, which his health, never robust in the past few years would not bear, and of late it had begun to manifest itself and twice on Saturday there were indications whilst he was at work that he was not well. But he worked on, returning to York House in the evening after the office had been closed to attend to some work he desired to see through.

On returning home he complained of feeling unwell and his medical adviser, Dr. Rayner, was called. In the morning he seemed better, but he was persuaded to remain in bed, and almost the last thing he did was to arrange for a message to be sent to the Congregational Church so that the duties to which he usually attended could be discharged to others. Then almost without warning, he passed away in the presence of the members of his family and Dr. G. H. Dupont, the borough medical officer who chanced to be passing the house at the time.

Tomorrow’s Funeral

The funeral will take place to-morrow (Thursday) afternoon. A service will be held at the Congregational Church at 3 and will be attended by the Mayor and Corporation, wearing their robes of office, and the staff at York House and the employees. The service will be conducted by the pastor ( the Rev. J. T. Rhys), who will be assisted by the Rev. Harold Bickley, B.D., of Northampton, a former pastor of the church, who on the occasion of his visit to Twickenham a few weeks ago was the guest of Mr. and Mrs. Pearce. The vicar (the Rev. W. P. Cole-Sheane), and the Mayor’s chaplain (the Rev. James H. Watson), will also assist in the service.

The municipal offices will be closed at 2.15 and the workmen in the employ of the Council will leave work at one o’clock.

EXPRESSIONS OF SYMPATHY

Public Pulpit References

Many have been the expressions of sympathy which Mrs. Pearce and family have received, and at most of the churches on Sunday evening there were references to the sad event.

The flag at the municipal offices was flown at half-mast, and was on Sunday the first indication to many of the missing member of the Corporation.

The Parish Church

The sad news was conveyed to the clergy at the Parish Church on Sunday morning by Alderman F.C. Clark.

At the evening service prayers were offered on behalf of the mourners and the hymn “The radiant morn has passed away” was included in the service.
In the course of his sermon, Prebendary H. J. R. Osbourne dealt with the part that religion played in our daily life, and emphasised the close link between this life and the next. They had had that day, he said, a tragic example of that fact in the sudden passing of the borough surveyor, a most valued public official, who had done a great deal for the town; in fact, he worked too hard. It was a beautiful thought at such times to remember that he had been called to higher service.

Twickenham Brotherhood

Mr F. W. Pearce was to have presided at the meeting of the Twickenham Brotherhood at the Congregational Church, at which the address was given by Mr Harry Gosling M.P., the Minister of Transport in the Labour Government, who resides at Strawberry Hill. The chair was taken by Mr J B Potterill, who made a feeling reference to the death of Mr Pearce.

Mr Gosling said that Twickenham had lost a really valuable public servant. Alas, he had gone, and someone else must take his place. Life today was calling for high endeavour on the part of all of them and while they took off their hats in memory of their late brother, let each of them resolve to work a little harder in good causes than they might hitherto have done.

At the close of the gathering the congregation stood as an expression of their sympathy with Mrs Pearce and her family while the orchestra played Chopin’s “Marche Funebre.”

Congregational Church

The news reached the Congregational Church just as the pastor, the Rev. J. F. Rhys was about to ascend the pulpit for the morning service and was received with something approaching consternation; the deacons at once arranged that the service should be abandoned. The Rev. J T. Rhys who was deeply affected, made brief, but feeling, allusion to the great loss the church had sustained by the death of one of its deacons and its church secretary. He read the 23rd Psalm, offered prayer, and the service concluded.

At the evening service a resolution of sympathy with the family was moved by Mr. W Purchase, seconded by Mr W. Gould and supported by Mr E Dawe, and carried in silence, the members rising.

There were touching tributes of esteem and affection at the Mother’s Meeting of the Congregational Church on Monday afternoon at which a resolution of sympathy was moved by one of the members and supported by the Rev. Luther Caws Burden (Isleworth).

It was at first suggested that the wreath to be sent should be provided out of the funds of the meeting but the members unanimously rejected this saying they desired to be allowed to contribute personally to the wreath they would send.

One of the members expressed the thoughts of the gathering. She would never forget how quietly and kindly he had helped the mothers whilst their husbands were at the war. Another member expressed what the employees felt. “He was the chief of the workmen but a most lovable master.”

Education Committee

At the meeting of the Twickenham Education on Monday evening which held at York House, the chairman (Alderman V. G. Heptonstall) said; Before we commence the usual business it is my sad duty to say a few words of the terrible loss the town suffered yesterday by, as most of you know by now, the sudden death of our borough surveyor to this committee. It seems almost impossible to realise that only last week at the mayoral banquet he was laughing and joking with the rest of us. He had had thirty years service to the town and was a most thorough and capable man. To those who knew him a rather severe exterior covered a heart of gold. His great fault – if he had a fault – was in trying to do too much xxx xxx. He tried to do those things which perhaps he might have passed on to his subordinates. He did this because of his great love of the town. He never hurried. He was always deliberate in his opinions and work and had a restraining influence on many, whom I might call impetuous members of the committee and Council. The town had been built up in the last ten years and many of the things he did we shall like to look upon as monuments to his memory, for the improvement of the borough coincided with his period of office. I have found his help of immeasurable value when attending on our behalf, conference with Government officials. His eloquent and masterful way of presenting our case has been of the greatest assistance to us and the town. He loved Twickenham as few men do, and I feel sure that his death was hastened by the vast amount of work he did. We have suffered a heavy blow but we have yet to realise how exceedingly heavy that blow is. I move that a letter be sent to Mrs Pearce and family conveying the sympathy of Twickenham education authority.

The Town Clerk said: On behalf of the staff of the Corporation, and as town clerk and the education secretary, I should like to take this opportunity of associating myself with what your chairman has just said. Mr Pearce would at the end of next week have completed thirty years service with the District Council and the Corporation. During the whole of that time I have been associated with him in the conduct of the work of the town. By the courtesy of the Mayor, I understand that I shall have the opportunity of amplifying my remarks at the next meeting of the Corporation, but in the meantime I should like to state that by the death of Mr Pearce the whole staff has lost a valued colleague, one whose assistance and advice were always readily and willingly given to any member who required it and xxx whose loss will be deplored in the municipal offices for many years to come.

The resolution was carried in silence, the members rising and standing with bowed heads in memory of a faithful colleague in the public service.

Other Public References

Feeling references to the death was made at the luncheon of the Twickenham Rotary Club on Monday by the president (Councillor C.H. Farthing) and a resolution of sympathy with the relatives was passed.

At the evening service at the Twickenham Green Baptist Memorial Church the pastor, the Rev. H. H. Gardiner expressed the sympathy of his congregation with the family and said how his death would be a great loss, not merely to the Congregational Church of which he was an active member, but to the other churches of the borough.

At the luncheon of the Teddington club yesterday, at which the Rev. Dr. Tatchell gave an address, feeling references to the death of Mr Pearce were made by the chairman (Mr. Carman).

* * * * *

* Mr Pearce’s relationship with the Council was apparently a much happier one than Mr Raffin had enjoyed. At the Council meeting where Mr Raffin’s resignation was reported Councillor Morrow ‘proposed that the resignation be accepted with pleasure’. ‘Where does the pleasure come in?’, asked the chairman. ‘Because it will be a great satisfaction to the residents to know that they are getting rid of him (shouts of ‘oh!’) and in future business will go on more satisfactorily than in the past’, came the reply. Councillor Beard said that he ‘believed Mr Raffin to be as honest and straightforward a man as ever came to Twickenham’. Mr Webb said that when he got notice of the resignation he thought it a happy release for the Council, after all they had gone through. Mr Goatly urged that the motion be not put as the resignation was a matter of fact and could not be refused.

Fred Pearce was appointed at a salary of £260, rising by £20 annual increments to £400. The RTT recorded the votes cast for each candidate: Pearce: 13; Webb: 6; Scott: 2; Towlson: 1; Morley: 1 and Maxwell: 0. One has to feel some sympathy for Mr Maxwell’s public rejection, but no doubt Mr Pearce was gratified by the clear majority he received. He was later described as Twickenham Council’s greatest public asset. According to a contemporary sketchwriter, “Yes I did say so, and meant what I said. I am sorry I cannot make myself plainer, but the facts are as I have stated and I have nothing to withdraw or add” would be his standard reply to anyone who questioned what he said.

Thanks to Dr Dick Cashmore for bringing this account to my attention and to Annie Morris for transcribing it

How I became a Building Inspector and why I left

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Note: many of the UK public still refer to a ‘building inspector’ though since the 1970s their formal title has been ‘building control officer’.

After leaving university I joined Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames (RBK) as a maintenance surveyor. Initially I joined a team responsible for school building maintenance, then moved on to maintenance of social services buildings. I worked alongside some great people who nearly fifty years on I still fondly remember. But our overall boss was quite the worst person I have ever worked under. Being torn to shreds (usually with no justification) in front of your workmates was a regular occurrence. And yet – Stockholm syndrome at work? – when he called me in and told me that to broaden my experience I was to be seconded to Building Control for three months I was apprehensive about moving into the unknown.

How wrong I was! The atmosphere was so different. After my first day over dinner – I was still living with my parents – my mum observed: “I’ve never heard you talk about work with such enthusiasm; I think you’ll end up staying there”. How right she was! At the end of my secondment my temporary boss, Ken Beer, Borough Planning Officer, offered me a permanent position, along with a salary increment. I said that I would be more than happy to take the job with no increment but he insisted. When I told my old boss about the offer he exploded with rage, accusing me of ingratitude, underhand behaviour, disloyalty and the rest, adding that he would be going to see the Borough Engineer (my ultimate boss) to have my move stopped.

Back from his meeting he called me in and told me that despite his efforts my transfer could not be prevented: to his chagrin there was apparently a provision in the ‘Purple Book’ (local authority employment terms and conditions) that stated that your existing manager could block an intra-LA transfer BUT only if it didn’t involve a salary increase. That was why Ken Beer had insisted on me having the increment.

With my month’s notice served I went back to Building Control where I was to stay for eight years. RBK had been formed in 1965 as a merger of three local councils: Kingston, Surbiton and Malden and Coombe (M&C). Building Control might now occupy one office, but worked as three largely autonomous teams, as if amalgamation had never happened. Each had a District BCO, Assistant BCO and a trainee. Overseeing these was Peter Fuller, Principal Building Control Officer, who exercised a benevolent oversight over the office, largely leaving each District BCO to run their section as they thought fit. I started as M&C assistant, moving up to District BCO a year or two later. Each of us three had a very different approach: Paul went by the book, insisting on plans being correct in every detail; Peter, older than us, relied on his ability to get things right on site (which he invariably managed) and my approach was somewhere in between.

Several happy years passed during which I decided that I could see myself being M&C District BCO for the rest of my working life. I got to know my patch intimately and took a great interest in its history. Then the time came for Peter Fuller to retire. His replacement had a very different, hands on, approach to management. Before too long he said that things could not continue as before, observing (with some justification) that when someone submitted a plan, they were submitting it to RBK and for the response to be quite different depending on where within the borough the site was, was unacceptable. He produced a document setting out exactly how we were to do our jobs.

Us three District BCOs were self starters, each used to running our own shows, and under this new regime the job satisfaction disappeared. Within a relatively short period we all left. In my case it was to embark on nearly forty years of self employment. I joined RBK with the expectation that I’d spend my working life in public service. Instead, my ten years there were just the warm-up act!

On Maths Teachers

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Last Saturday saw the annual City Bible Forum ‘Life at Work’ conference. With the uncertainties of Covid-19 this year’s conference had to be a virtual one over Zoom. Whilst some of us in Melbourne missed the excellent food served up by our usual hosts, CQ Functions, many others away from capital cities were able to participate. One speaker was Eddie Woo, committed Christian and maths teacher extraordinaire. His YouTube channel, WooTube, started with him filming class lessons for a sick student in 2012, and it now has over 1.1 million subscribers. For his work he was made Australian Local Hero of the Year 2018 – a well deserved honour.

As for my own school maths teachers, they may never got to be known outside their local circles, but thanks to them I’ve spent 30+ years writing engineering software with more than a little maths. I owe them all a great debt.

Extract from Hampton Grammar School report

The facts do indeed justify the conclusion!

Two from Hampton Grammar School stand out. It’s an institution I carry less than fond memories of and yet I remember many individual teachers with affection.

Maths was my strong subject as this report extract shows (I’m not sure why this term’s class ranking was so low). Unfortunately I didn’t apply myself to most other subjects.

For O-level maths our teacher was the elderly (to us schoolboys) Frank Steffens. He was an old boy of the school having been Head Boy c.1924-5. He went off to university, then returned to HGS to spend the rest of his working life as a maths teacher. His apparent sternness disguised a kindly nature. He wanted every boy in his class to succeed and we did. I’m not sure whether today’s teachers would be allowed to make the weakest pupils of the week sit in the front row on the following week, but it was a tactic that worked!

I was in the ‘Latin A’ [express] stream which meant that we took our O-levels after four years instead of five; for maths we took the ordinary exam in January followed by Additional Maths in June. There were 32 of us in the class (not streamed for maths); 28 of us got a grade A in the O-level, 4 got B’s and 4 C’s (when pass grades were A-E), an extraordinary achievement. Later, in the sixth form Mr Steffens took us for a general studies class. Us boys were amazed that someone so ancient (he would have been in his early 60s!) could understand and explain to us the science behind Dolby stereo!

We started our A-level studies under Stan Barton, who was also Deputy Head. With an interregnum between heads, he was often called away and so would set work for us to get on with in his absence. Not too much work was being done when Alan Waltham, head of maths, happened to walk by the classroom and hearing our chatter decided to investigate. He decided that it would be best if our group could sit in his classroom and get on with our work while he taught his main class, breaking off occasionally to check on our progress. Finding that four of us were well ahead of the others he offered to coach us to sit pure and applied maths as two subjects rather than sit the combined paper, an offer which we accepted. And so this left him teaching three different groups at the same time! And we all passed!

Then to Reading University: No specific maths classes but in my last year those of us in the Building Surveying stream had a weekly structural engineering class. It was the high spot of my week, not so for most of my fellow students. Our lecturer, Mike Hewitt, owned a calculator which could calculate sines and cosines! We were in awe of this device which had cost him a couple of months salary. We did our calculations with slide rules! He understood that some were not mathematically inclined: “In the exam there will be seven questions and you have to do five. 4½ will be mathematical questions and 2½ essay questions [i.e. one half-and-half]. That’s so those of you who can’t add up 2+2 can at least pass on the essay questions and the clever buggers among you [looking at me] can’t get 100%”. He’d be pleased, I hope, to see what this ‘clever bugger’ has been doing for most of his working life.

2019 – Good memories

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Another year ends and the 20s are about to begin. I can look back on 2019 with almost unalloyed satisfaction. High spots of the year:

  • A two-night mini break by rail to Warrnambool.
  • Seeing our church continue to grow, with the opening of a new service in Docklands.
  • Being headhunted to help with our church ‘mums and bubs’ midweek meeting creche. For some reason this old single guy seems to be quite good at looking after little people!
  • A four-night cruise, Melbourne-Sydney-Brisbane, on Cunard’s Queen Elizabeth, made even more special by being upgraded to a suite. No upgrade for my 2020 cruise though!
  • Visiting Brisbane for the first time.
  • Through the year working as a volunteer with Habitat for Humanity, building homes in Yea.
  • Visiting friends and family in the UK – when I emigrated I promised to go back and visit them each year, a promise I had to break in 2018 following surgery, and taking a first-time stopover in Singapore on the way home, something I will do again
  • Through the year working as a volunteer guide at the Newport Railway Museum, also joining the works team.
  • Taking a winter holiday in Port Hedland – seeing big boys toys close up.
  • I only got to see one musical but it was a superb one, ‘Come from away’, the remarkable true story of thousands passengers and the small town in Newfoundland that welcomed them in the aftermath of 9/11
  • And continuing to run my software business, which celebrated its 30th birthday in April and once again reached my annual sales target (just).

School holiday jobs remembered

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Fifty years ago I got my first real job, a real step towards being an adult. Several more followed which I still remember.

Hounslow Co-op

My first paid job (1968-69) was as a Saturday boy at the Hounslow (SW London) Co-op department store. I was sent to work in the men’s shoe department, perhaps not the department I would have chosen if I’d been given a chance. But what a great first job. My boss, the inappropriately named Harold Sainsbury, was perhaps the finest boss I ever worked for. He’d served in the navy in WW2, lost a leg and afterwards found employment repairing shoes, then moving to retail.

Mr Sainsbury (never Harold!) set us juniors high standards – no dust, all shoes straight etc – and made it clear to us that he’d rather we sent a customer away empty-handed than sell them a pair of shoes that didn’t fit properly. The Co-op held the local contract for welfare-assisted parents: they’d come in with a voucher asking us to supply (say) a pair of school shoes. He stressed to us that such parents were to be treated no differently than anyone else, an injunction that shouldn’t have been necessary, but the previous warrant holder had lost the contract through treating such clients poorly. He looked after us staff too: on one occasion I used my tea break to go to a local electronics shop. When I returned to work rather breathless, he told me to go to the staff canteen and get my break. A really great place to work.

[Edit March 2023] A YouTube live chat reminded me that I was working at the Co-op when a key change was made. When I joined, Coop members got a dividend of sixpence in the pound (2½%) on all purchases. When buying something, you gave the assistant your ‘divi number’ which was set on the till by a series of levers. When the sale was rung up the till punched a card with the date, amount and divi number. At the end of the day these cards were collected (across the store there must have been thousands) and sent to the Coop data processing centre so that every member’s account could be credited accordingly.

While I was working there, this system was replaced with Co-op trading stamps, modelled on Green Shield stamps, from memory one small stamp for each 6d spent, one large stamp for each pound. These were stuck in a book, 40 pages, each page taking 40 small or one large stamp. When the book was full it could be used in part payment (£1) for purchases.

Dixons, Richmond

Being interested in photography, working in a camera shop appealed to me. So for one summer holiday I got a job at Dixons. Quite different to the Coop. The aim was to sell, with little regard to what was right for the customer. Discontinued and high profit items (e.g. own brand Instamatic cameras from Macau) carried ‘spiff’ payments – sell one and you got (say) a five-shilling bonus. There was a strict dress code (I was told off for wearing a dark jacket and dark non-matching trousers rather than a suit) and on Thursdays we weren’t allowed to go to lunch until the delivery truck had come, 4.00p.m. one day! On this plus side I did enjoy handling all the camera equipment and the fact that I did know something about it didn’t go unnoticed. And I made good use of the staff discount. But after one summer holiday I had no desire to go back.

AA Teddington

Not so much a holiday job, rather filling time between leaving school after resitting A-levels in January and starting university in October. I worked in Revenue Analysis, one of team that handed all the payments coming in from shops and patrolmen. All done with the aid of a hand operated adding machine. Added challenges came from a lengthy postal strike and the introduction of decimal currency. This was a really happy place to work. Frank Hackman and Tony Fanning, both probably in their 50s, exercised a benevolent oversight of us young people (John, Graham, Jill, Pam, I can still picture you) and I was sorry when it was time to leave. And working here paid for my first car!

Roskill Information Services

This was my first university summer holiday job. RIS did an annual survey of new homes – a small team recruited from my fellow students went round the country inspecting three houses a day. I sat in the 14 Great College Street office opposite the Houses of Parliament checking their survey forms before passing them on to our data processing bureau. Building materials manufacturers, suppliers and other firms would buy the consolidated report. For a payment they could have their own questions added to the survey form (e.g. ‘what make is the CH thermostat?’). After this I continued to work for RIS during my university holidays compiling metal trade statistics. This was long before the internet so had to be done the hard way – I remember being sent to Westminster library one Christmas to note daily copper prices from the last year’s FT. It was freezing and I ventured to asked whether the windows could be closed. “No,” came the reply, “if we shut them, the vagrants will come in.” So I sat there all day wearing my coat!

The firm was founded and at that time run by Oliver Wentworth Roskill (1906-1994), the third of the four sons of John Roskill KC, all of whom achieved eminence. His two elder brothers were Sir Ashton Roskill QC (1902-91), chairman of the Monopolies and Mergers Commission, and Stephen Roskill (1903-82), a distinguished naval historian. The youngest, Eustace (1911-96), was a Law Lord who chaired the Roskill Commission on the third London airport. Quite extraordinary! Judith Chegwidden, my immediate boss, was then a young recruit who stayed with the firm for her entire working life, becoming its MD. Interestingly, after leaving Roskill, Piers Nicholson, the partner to whom Judith reported, went on to a new career as an expert in sundials. At the end of one project he took Judith and me to lunch, the first time I’d eaten in a ‘posh’ (as it seemed to me) restaurant.

That was the end of casual work – next chapter of my life, working for RB Kingston upon Thames.