THIS TAPE HAS BEEN RECORDED ON SEPTEMBER 22nd 1978 IN THE ENGINE HOUSE AT BANCROFT. THE INFORMANT IS ERNIE ROBERTS, TACKLER AND THE INTERVIEWER IS STANLEY GRAHAM.
[25 years later, one of the things that strikes me as I clean this tape up and transfer it to computer disc is the fact that we were in shock. There’s a note of anger and resignation that seems perfectly clear to me now. Remember that we had just been told that we would be out of a job just before Christmas. Further, Ernie and I knew that we were entering a process of attrition where the life of the mill would gradually wind down. I was tied into this. If I finished, they couldn’t run. Only Newton Pickles and myself could run the engine and I know Newton wouldn’t have done it because we discussed it. So, in effect, we were condemned to death by a thousand cuts. I mention this so that readers in the future can get a clear idea as to what was going on in our heads.]
(This tape would have been AC13, but seeing as it's Friday we are calling it AC14)
Let's have it off, go on .. Bloke who ...
R- Went to Blackpool for a day and he picked a loose woman up and she charged him half a crown and he went down on the sands, and , half way through t’operation she says "What do you do for a living?" He says "I'm a crane driver in t’quarry." She says "Well, lift the jib a bit, th’art in't muck hoil!”
Oh. Yes, aye, very good. Well, I'm almost sorry I left this tape on, but anyway we'll leave it where it is. Oh no, it's all right Ernie, I'm only pulling your leg.
[Apologies for that! Ernie was in full flow as I switched on and whilst I might tidy these transcripts up, I am not going to edit them.]
R- Well, you can scrub it out. You’d have to know about the quarry to know where the muck-hoil were.
Yes you would, aye. Aye, that's it, aye. Yes.
R - Oh, I remember when that quarry were employing a few hundred you know?
Which quarry were this Ernie?
(50)
R - Salterforth Quarries.
Aye, Sagars had that did they?
R- Sagars aye. Old Sagar's daughter, I went to see a house that she had for sale and she says “Do you know, this is built from the best stone in the world? Salterforth stone." Well I says, “I think you’re charging too much."
That’d be Ida wouldn't it?
R – No, I don't think it were Ida, it were t’other one. I don't know what they call her, didn't they call her Rose?
Aye. I think it might have been. Ida were a funny old stick weren't she.
R- Aye, she were, well they both were. Old maids.
Aye. Tell me something. As you're going up Tubber Hill and you get to the top, and you know, you go up past our house [Hey Farm where I lived at the time.] and then you go up past Bancroft Farm and you get on to the next hill, and you go up t’next hill. Just before you get to the quarry, on the right hand-side there is a big fine stone-built house with a rockery made of big stones out of the quarry.
R- Aye, that was Sagar's house.
Do you know, I thought it must have been because the stonework on that house is beautiful, have you ever noticed?
R- Yes, it's a nice house,
It’s beautiful. That rockery must have five hundred ton of best Salterforth stone in it.
R- Oh aye, it will have. We once took a pig up to that farm at t’top of Salterforth Hill, took a sow up there to see the boar. And when we were coming back .. well its feet were sore and it went into that garden and we chased it all over the bloody place. It must have dug ten thousand daffodil bulbs up.
(100)
Ten thousand?
R- There must have been ten thousand, there were bulbs everywhere.
Aye .. I’m beginning to get the feeling… I think you exaggerate a bit sometime.
R- Well, there were a lot.
‘Ten million flies on a…’ Anyway, let’s get down to the serious business of this tape. We’ve got that relaxed with these tapes that some people might say it isn't good oral history any more but anyway I think it is. On Wednesday this week, that's Wednesday the nine .. no wait a minute, it's Wednesday the twentieth of September 1978, the news filtered through to the lower echelons that we were all going to get the bullet.
[The notice giving us all notice of redundancy had been put on the shed door on this day. Ernie and I, together with everyone else in the mill, were facing redundancy square in the face].
R- That's right.
Now then, it's had two or three days to sink in, and .. without being.. I mean this really, without being bitter, or anything like that, think carefully about what you are saying, but I know you've been woven out before haven't you, how many times?
R- This'll be five times.
This is five times you have been woven out. Now, can you see any difference between this time and the others? When I say ‘any difference', you know, in the causes of the weaving out.
(5 min)
(150)
R- Well, first time if you remember, Widdups at Moss Shed wove out. That were, that were just for profit, there were no beating about the bush, it were a government scheme and manufacturers got forty pound for a loom that weren't producing cloth and sixty pound for a loom that were. To go out of business. And then they'd have price of t’scrap iron and all the rest of it. But they always find some excuse. First time, Widdups said to me, “Well, there is nobody to carry on." And he were getting old.
Were that one of t’sons or old Widdup?
R- It were John Widdup that said that to me.
He were the old one weren't he?
R- Well, they were all knocking on you know.
Aye but I think he, weren't he the father?
R- Aye, they called t’father Johnny but I never knew him.
Oh I see, so this John was one of the brothers.
R – That’s right.
Aye, and what were t’next shop that wove out?
R- Next shop .. next shop were Veevers at Brierfield.
What were the excuse there?
R- Bad trade, imports. They could import cloth cheaper than produce it here.
Chinamen living on a bowl of rice again. Aye.
(200)
R- Well aye. Could be. Well, in fact, I think it's true you know? And then, after Veevers, Watsons at Earby, that's three. Bad trade. And then Pickles's in Barnoldswick .. bad trade, and now Bancroft, how many is that?
Yes but ... that's five but there, there's another ones. there's another one, you weren't actually woven .. well were you wove out at Calf Hall, at t’flood.
R - Oh they started up again after the flood.
They started up again, but …
R- Oh well, that were early days though, they did weave out, but they still carried on manufacturing, that were Blackburn Holdens.
Yes. Like they wove out and then started again didn't they? Aye. Well, what do you. think about this lot?
R- Well, what can I think? It's, there's been indications here for years, that this place were definitely closing down. This time I've been here either ten or eleven years and all the time it's been .. going down hill. There's been … and yet in that ten years, or eleven years, I don't think I've been on the dole above three or four times for an odd week. So they staggered on really.
(250)
Yes
R- And it isn't a family concern, it belongs to a group, and it's big money. They talk about millions. And a bloody poverty stricken hole like this, not making a profit, it's chopped off. I'm amazed that it's run so long.
Well you know, I’ve always said to you, I've always said that there must be some reason that we knew nothing about, why they kept on.
R - Well that's what we used to think. I've heard it said that .. for Boardman,[The previous owners. K O Boardmans of Stockport.] that's before it were chopped, before it were turned over to this Gunga Din, he had a licence to import a certain amount of foreign cloth so long as he produced a bit in this country. Now whether
That’s true or not, but it sounds feasible. But now he's sold out. I don't suppose this Indian's bothered. I mean, I suppose his relations are manufacturing cloth in India, back to the bowl of rice. And big business is ruthless. I mean I'm uneducated, all I do's read t’paper and books. And it's ruthless. We’ve never had any industrial trouble here, not once in all the years this place has been running has there been industrial trouble, apart from about 1926, when it were like .. all over Lancashire. All them years without industrial trouble. No “Trouble at t’mill” Only trouble here's been
(300)
(10 Min)
on short time and, you know, running slack. Say in them days they were running
four looms, they might only have two.
And yet, on the whole .. obviously I'm saying this to you because I know
You agree with me. Bancroft is ... well, there is something about this place, I don't know, it’s….
R- It is. It fascinates people, how many bloody visitors do we get? Every nationality practically in the world .. coming to look.
Every one. [There’s a ]Picture of a Japanese bloke on t’wall behind you. Aye.
R - Aye. Is that him?
Yes. Toshiuko Ishuki.
R- Aye. My friend, Toshiuko Shiti!
Aye. And one little instance of that, I mean I know a little bit about this obviously, but you know when your wallet 'went diffi … [Diffi is army slang, short for deficient. It means missing.]
R- Aye, and I wonder who pinched that. It's been a worry to me ever since it happened about four years since. I always carried a few quid in a wallet in me pocket, hanging in the store room and when I got home one night, for some reason or other I wanted a pound. All gone, sixteen pound. It were a bitter blow to me that, I don't know who the hell could have got it.
(350)
What was the worst thing about it, the fact that the money had gone, or the fact that so much money had gone?
R – No, the fact that the money had gone, if it had been a ten bob I should have still been sorry, because when you're working with people, you naturally trust them. Whether it was some off comer or not I’ve never known. But it happened, and it grieved me, and it still does. Still, that's water under the bridge, it’s just one black spot on my Bancroft career. To think that somebody could steal Ernest Robert’s hard earned cash.
Aye, how dare they? Anyway we are faced with a position now where we are, as they say, weaving out. Now, you tell me just exactly what the process of weaving out entails: you know, what’s the mechanics of weaving out? I mean you've done it five times now, you've got a fair idea.
R- Well, every warp in stock, and every warp in a loom has to be woven out. And as it gradually runs down… say, I mean now there is weavers with ten looms. Well, gradually they'll run down to maybe four or five and then the usual procedure is for that weaver to finish and be made redundant, though she has five warps left. Now what we have to do is lift them five warps and put them to another weaver’s looms, maybe one here, and two or three there.
(400)
Something like that. So gradually, as weavers weave out, they finish one by one, until there is only one warp left. That'll take about, at least three months.
I were thinking meself you know .. I suppose Jim’s got a fair idea, but December the twenty-second .. because they've some sets to tape yet.
R- Aye but they are sets that weave quick, and they only half fill them
Aye that's it, and spread them out, half warps. Aye. Yes.
R- So that they're half, you see, they'd be out in a week or two, maybe a fortnight or three weeks, they'll be out.
Yes. So really, when you think about it, the first man to get the chop's the taper.
(15 Min)
R- Oh aye, aye, he is always the first.
He is at the start of the process. So it'll be "Good bye Joe!” [Joe Nutter]
R- Aye. And it's damned hard work for tacklers, damned hard work, because I mean, you've already gaited t’warp, and halfway through you've to be lifted out, put it in another loom and gait it up again. And it's possible that you'd have to lift it out again.
And then of course, there's always the thing that .. we should point it out now, that we, tonight, we've lost one of the, one of the tacklers anyway because Fred Inman. finished tonight.
R- Yes, he did.
So I mean, that increases the load on the tacklers straight away.
R- Aye, it does. But you see, Fred's retired, and the Union comes in, and well, it's a Union rule and that's it, he had to finish.
Yes, in other words ...
R- Like he's working for pin money is Fred.
In other words he is cutting your wages down actually, by working here when we are weaving out. In what way?
(450)
R- Well I couldn't say…
Well you know what I mean, he is .. obviously Fred's got to be the first to go.
R- Aye that’s right.
And the management have evidently decided that they can dispense with his services straight away.
R – Aye, so he got the bullet.
The bullet. So we are weaving down, and .. one of the terrible things that's going to happen, I don’t know whether it's dawned on anybody else you know .. I mean we’ve had it happen here once while I've been here, but we are going to have the loom breakers in at the same time.
R - Well no, not necessarily.
I think we will Ernie.
R - Do you think we will?
I think we will. I think they are that bloody hungry and greedy. I think that they'll have to be straight in. I’ll tell you what they'll be doing. They'll be taking shafting and looms out as I'm running the engine to weave out. Because I do know for a fact, I don't suppose it’s meant to be common knowledge, but they've .. Jim, were on to Rushworths today.
R – Well, when a mill's weaving out they sent for these scrap iron merchants for offers. And that Rushworth you've just mentioned he is a very skilful man, he can walk in here and look around and say "So much” and they say he is a fair person you know, they'll get,, they ... I fancy they’ll get a better price off Rushworth than anybody else. Because I don't remember any other firm breaking looms up in Barnoldswick, only Rushworths. And oh there’s, there must he .. will there be thousands of tons of scrap iron in here?
It all depends how far they go, there'll be …
R - Oh they want every nut and bolt, they even pull bloody nails out of t’wall.
There'll be ..let's see, five hundred .. yes there'll be, there'll be getting on for a thousand ton.
R- There must be.
I mean, oh there must be, because I mean.. like loom’s will be about ... what?
R - I think they're four cwt. A forty inch Lancashire loom.
(500)
Aye, well, I mean, what is there…Well you have about, so that's five to t’ton and ..
R- Aye … There is about six hundred.
Yes, so that's fives into six hundred is…
R- Sixty. No, we are going to be a long way off a thousand tons, but there is a lot of tons.
No. No, that's fives into six hundred, that's a hundred and twenty. That's hundred and twenty ton ..
R - One hundred and…. Aye. And there is thousands of loom weights.
Wells that's what I mean, there’s thousands of loom weights.
R- Big ones weigh fifty-six pounds.
And there's all the shafting. There's all t’brackets, and them brackets weigh about three cwt apiece you know.
R- Oh, do they? And there’s four….
And the brackets weigh about three cwt apiece.
R- Aye .. and there is poor old Mary Jane here.
Oh, there’s thirty-five ton in the flywheel. No, by he time, and that big line shaft you know, and the brackets… There is some weight in there because them big brackets on t’wall will weigh five or six cwt apiece you know. At least.
(20 Min)
R- And then there is the iron pillars
Well, I don't think they'll take pillars and gutters.
R - I'm sure they won’t. T’bloody roof’ll fall in.
Aye .. no, but I mean I don't think they're going to actually demolish t'shop, but …
R - Oh no, they'll not demolish it, they can make this into a lovely mill.
But, well I mean, you look at the engine, you know what my feelings are about that.
R - Aye, and mine, aye, all the engines that's been scrapped, I felt sorry for. And then there’s old Clara the duck. I’ll have to see that, I’ll have to see …
[Ernie is talking about an old duck that lived on the dam. All the weavers used to feed it.]
Oh Clara’ll be all right, there’ll be plenty of folks feeding her.
R- Aye, I hope there is.
And we'll leave the dam full.
R- Oh leave t’dam full, aye.
We'll scrap the bloody hand wheel, [For the clough.] and they can’t open it. That's the first thing we'll do, lose the bloody hand wheel. If anybody starts asking any bloody questions I’ll break the bloody screw on the clough and then it can't be opened.
R- Aye. Yes. Because it's a terrible sight that dam when it's empty.
I think so.
R- It looks like, it looks like, you know, like it landed on the moon. Desolate.
Yes. I was just going to say, craters of the moon. That’ll soon grass over though you know, you’d be surprised.
R- I suppose it would.
Aye, it would soon grass over would that you know. It’s very fertile soil you know Ernie. Very fertile, there's all sort's been running into it for years. You could grow bloody tomatoes in that I’ll tell you.
(550)
R – Yes, I bet you could.
Aye. Anyway, we’re getting a bit maudlin, a bit sentimental.
R- Aye, we are.
You know what Walt Fisher said about scrapping steam engines?
R - What did he say?
When they did away with the engines they did away with a lot of hard work. And it's right, it's right is that. I mean, you look at people like Charlie Sutton, been flueing boilers all his life, he’s buggered at fifty. He's got that many different sort of cancer they don’t know where to start. I mean, look at all t’people that's had to crawl under bloody boilers and flue ‘em and ….
R- Yes, I've been in t’flue, aye.
Scaling them and .. look at the firebeater's job, it's all right, but I mean, t’firebeater's job's no good. I mean .. this job in here .. all right, grand job, people come in, they think "Bloody hell he's got t'best job in t’world.” but you'll have noticed how I talk, a bit catarrhy, nasal, bunged up, [It’s the]oil in the air.
R - Oh there is oil in the air all the time. Aye.
Yes. That's why my nose is always snuffed up, always has been since I come to work here. And it's oil in the air, it gives you head ache.
R- Yes it will be.
I mean, it isn't so long since Arthur Morrison thought I had a bloody brain tumour, and that's all it were, bunged up sinus. Oh, he made up his mind that I had one.
R- You see, my life's been a hard working life, and it isn't long since I went, I had a pain .. I've only been to the doctor three or four times in me life.
Where exactly was this pain Mr. Roberts?
R - Near my heart.
Oh yes.
R- And I went to Doctor Whittle at Nelson, and he were a good doctor, he's retired now I think. Takes me shirt off and oh a pain at the heart and he tested me heart, blood pressure, and .. had a good listen back and front, and cough, give me a right good do, looked at me joints and then he sat down after he'd finished and looked at me. I were getting dressed. I sat down, I thought "Now for the bad news!” He said “Oh, first of all Mr Roberts. That pain, it's a kind of neuralgia, or rheumatism, it's nothing to worry about and I might tell you that you are a remarkable man."
(600)
And them were his exact words. I’d gone in there feeling knackered, and it's amazing, I come out prancing about. I called and had a pint or two on me way home and told the wife when I got home.
Aye. ‘My word you do look queer.’ isn't it, all over again, aye.
R - Aye. “A remarkable man - he says - for your age.” I were about fifty-six.
Well there is no doubt about it. I mean…
R - So it hadn't done me any harm, it's made me a funny shape, but apart from that, all me faculties and organs must be in working order yet.
Oh aye, but … anyway, to get back to ...
R- We seem to be drifting, about don't we?
We are drifting about a bit aye, we're going to have to do something about it Ernie. There was something in particular that I wanted to ask you, but this conversation has got so bloody interesting, it's gone completely out off me. Oh, I know what I was going to ask you. When you were weaving, … oh one thing that I did want to tell you,
(25 Min)
I knew there were something, this will sound terrible on the tape, I’m waffling like buggery but anyway, I was doing a tape with a little fellow called Arthur Entwistle last night, and he didn't weave for long, [He was] a musician all his young life, professional musician. He used to have a little band in Barlick called El Bonito and then they had one called …
R- Armageddon?
Rhythm Boys. And one called Broadway. Aye.
R-Aye. Well, none of them ring a bell.
No, but this was in old days. But anyway, he went weaving for a couple of years and he said two things that interested me. The first one was that with being in the band, you know, at the same time as he were weaving. He said many a time "'We were out while three o'clock in the bloody morning. Then I had to start weaving” And he said "I were on two loom, I'd just finished learning.” And he said, “What I used to do to keep meself awake, I used to sit on a buffet and sit so as when the slay come forward, it just tapped me on the back.” He said "If I started to nod off it used to give me a clout.”
R – Aye, I believe that. Aye.
Yes. And the other thing he said was that he couldn't stand it. He said, “I’ll tell you for why, you might think this funny but with being used to percussive noises” , he were a drummer, you know, and all the rest of it. He said " Do you know.
(650)
the noise of them looms - he said - I were hearing tunes all day."
R – Oh, it happens to me that.
I says to him, I says,” Arthur, you've just said exactly the same thing as Ernie Roberts.”
R - Aye, it happens to everybody, I don't know. But I can go in that mill with a tune in me head, and everything's in unison. All t’clattering and banging, all right spot on. Aye, oh aye. Oh I don't know why he gave up because .. machinery were singing to him.
Well, actually, he saw the light and went down Birmingham.
R- Oh yes.
Went down Birmingham in nineteen thirty-nine and got into the Maudsley and he's had a good life.
R- Oh it's a different life altogether to this. My wife’s sister's husband's just finished at Ferguson Tractors in Coventry. He's fifty-eight years old and he's come out with a thirteen thousand pound cheque, early retirement.
Aye …
R – It’s incredible isn't it.
Aye it is. When you look at some of these buggers here, they won't come out with thirteen quid, little Fred Cope, and Fred Greenwood and …
R - Uh no, they won't. There’s nineteen years, her that I call Corsets, she's retiring in two weeks on pension and she'll get nothing, not a meg. And I've known .. no end of . people that's worked fifty years for one firm and they haven't even said “Tara” In fact in one case I remember in particular .. when this woman left he [The manager] said "A bloody good riddance and all, she's got past it." That's after a lifetime's work.
Where were that?
R- That were here.
And who were it. Who were it that left?
R- What do they call that bloke that used to .. him with the club foot, he used to drive this engine. Billy .. it were his sister.
Not Grace, no, not Grace. It weren't Billy Grace were it? No.
R- No, not Billy Grace, no, Billy .. oh it's a long while since. Not Billy Grace. Billy Chatwood.
Chatwood.
R- Chatwood, it were his sister, worked here all her life, and they were making some redundant .. oh it must be seven or eight year since .. trade were bad. And all them that couldn't claim redundancy were sacked, and they must have forgot about Billy's sister, that she could claim redundancy. And she said to Jim Pollard “If you sack me Jim, you'll break my heart." And them were her exact words. And he found out he couldn't sack her without
(700)
(30 min)
paying her. So she carried on until she was sixty. And she’d worked here forty years, say, all her working life she'd been here. And she were crippled up with rheumatics, She were, she were past it. But it .. I mean, a faithful servant "Bloody good riddance" Not very nice is it?
No .. one thing worries me, you know I mean, one thing worries me about the way that .. you must understand when I say this I’m not criticising the way you talk about the manufacturers, because I mean, Christ knows you’ve got something to talk about ... But have you ever come across anybody, any manufacturer who you would say, who you'd class as a good bloke and a good employer?
R- Well I, I've never known one personally, but I've heard a tale of what you might call hand outs, to somebody that were in dire straits. Not very often, but I think it's happened occasionally.
I mean, what we are talking about now, isn't there ., (beg your pardon) not the general run of what you call a good employer, but somebody that was well I mean, almost saint-like you know. Somebody that would do something… I’ll tell you one story I heard the other day, it was Daniel that told me, Daniel Meadows. When that place at Fence wove out .. what was the name, at Fence?
R- A little family concern.
Yes, when they wove out, there was one woman there that had been there for God knows how many years, due for redundancy, and she'd been away for just six weeks about half way through it, and they overlooked it. And I thought at t’time, I thought .. Well I mean, I don't know whether there is a rule covers something like that, but assuming there isn't and they could have held her to the .. minimum you know. It’d be a smaller amount, you know. I thought .. Well, I thought, that's a nice little story that. It shows that there is a little bit of heart in the job somewhere you know.
(750)
R- Aye. I remember just after the war when I were weaving at Pickles, when I come out of the army, and things had bucked up in general you know. Britain's bread hung by Lancashire thread. Weavers were like worth their weight in gold, you could even go ten minutes late and nobody'd say owt. Everybody in t’canteen at this certain time. So we all went into the canteen and this is t’first time in my lifetime I've seen owt like it. And there were a talk down you know. You'd think you were .. exploding a bloody rocket to t’moon all the bullshit what went on. And they were presenting a cheque for fifty pounds to a woman that had worked for Pickles fifty years and she
were retiring. And it were made a bloody public spectacle, a big thing, fifty bloody quid.
Yes. Now I’ll tell you sommat now. I'll tell you sommat now, that interests me. A lot of people who aren't in .. I mean, I class meself with you in this respect. I’m not saying that my upbringing. has been as hard as yours, it hasn’t, nowhere near, but we are both workers. Now a lot of people won't be able to understand our attitude to that. A lot of people who are in better circumstances will think 'Well, fifty pounds, it was very nice." It was a nice thing for them to do to show their appreciation
R – Aye. That's right.
... and give fifty pound, but I know that you look at it the same as I do. That were fifty pound ..
R- A pound a year. Aye.
... that were a pound a year. Now just hold on a minute, that were a pound a year .. so that were roughly just under a penny a day for a working life. There was two hundred and forty pennies in the old pound.
R- Aye there were.
... It was less than a penny a day during a working life. And when you come to consider what that woman had done for them, I look at it in the same way as you do, I think that something like that .. and I know, as I say a lot of people won't be able to understand this attitude, but I think it's a bloody insult.
R- Yes, I think it is an insult.
And I’ll tell you where the same thing goes on now .. and they make a big thing of it, Johnson’s.
R- Oh yes, Johnson’s, they have a pension scheme and…
Now, Johnson’s of Earby, Harry Crabtree and his wife retired, and they had I don't know how many years service in with Johnson’s, between them, and it's an American firm that owns 'em now. And what they did, they took ‘em down London …
R- Yes .. gave them a right good do.
(800)
(35 min)
They gave them a right good do and all the rest of it, and had him with his toupee on, down there you know, lapping it up ... Now I'm not saying it weren't a grand thing. I'm not saying that Harry and his wife didn't enjoy it, but I have that sneaking suspicion at the back of my minds that the people that had to go to that function…
R- Would go near the door, exit.
The managers and the directors that had to go to that function, when they went and the wife said "Where are we going tonight?" and they'd say "Oh, it's another, you know - it's one of them bloody present ..” “Oh Christ!” you know.
R - Oh aye. "There is a good old couple coming up, coming down from Yorkshire.”
Aye. "There’s some bum coming down from Yorkshire" you know. And "Oh, it isn't another of them is it?"
R- Aye. Though I’ll give Johnson’s their due…
But no, but you see, the thing is, it may be me, but I have that sneaking suspicion and I always think that .. I'd rather do without the bloody presentation ceremony.
R- Oh, I would.
I'd rather that they just paid a fellow what he were bloody well worth.
R – Aye. And call it a day.
And call it a day.
R- But it's a good firm is Johnson’s, in comparison. I mean .. that fellow had come out with a few thousand pound, I don't know how much. They've had a pension scheme for a long while.
Oh yes, it's a good firm. What were you just saying about Susan Longbottom? How much is it worth?
R- I don't know what it’s worth.
You understand what I mean don't you? Which would you rather have, Bancroft and the bullet or the conditions at Johnson’s and the golden handshake?
R- Oh .. I’ll have Bancroft.
I think I would. Now there is another thing that people will probably find hard to understand. Somebody might listen to this tape in hundred years, and I mean, they might have given up bloody working then, they might have chimpanzees doing it for them, I don't know. But wouldn't you agree with me that to a working man, his place at work, really is the best bloody club he's got.
R- Oh, it is, oh aye. If you are not happy at your work, well, I mean, in my experience I've gone working at places and thought, after a day or two, this in no good for Ernest.
Aye, and one of them were Johnson’s come to think.
R- Aye it were, I only lasted three weeks, I’m forgetting about that. Aye. No, it wouldn't do for me, they were all miserable.
Aye. Getting dangerous Ernie. I know too much about you.
R- I like a bit ... Aye. I like a bit of fun. I mean, we've had lots of fun here, real fun, laughing, not that bloody raucous ha ha has, real laughing, bloody tears coming out of your eyes. That’s laughing.
That's it.
R- I've had some good laughs here at different things happening. And there were no laughing at Johnson’s so we’ll just forget about Johnson’s.
(850)
Aye, the golden handshake ...
R- Oh yes, oh I’m right….
But .. anyway, we’ll get back to the job now. We’ve just, had a short rest, just had a parade round the engine house and you'd just started telling me sommat about shuttles that should have been on the tape.
R. Aye
Well, no names no pack drill, but anyway, there is a tackler trying to get two ends to weave but ...
R- Yes, and he couldn't manage it. So me, I mean I'm no bloody expert, but years and years, you pick these…
Wrinkles?
R- Aye, wrinkles you can call them. And .. you can get this fault on a loom, even one end or two, or a dozen, and it’s a picker. It's throwing the shuttle wrong, and I just said, “Put an off-side picker on.”
So, in other words “Put the wrong picker in"
R- No, there is an off-side and an on-side to a loom as I told you before …Off-side. It could he left or right. He'd know, he knew which I meant. And he did that and it were all right. But he hadn't been doing the job so long you see. You can call it, what can you call it, expertise.
Experience.
R- Or experience, aye.
Aye. It's just knowing.
R- It is.
But I mean .. a lot of people can't understand. I mean, I'm actually encroaching on one of me own tapes here, I haven't made any yet, but I can do them any time. But .. I sit in that chair all day, and you know that I know if that far crankpin's running short of oil I know.
R- Because you can hear, you can hear it.
Well, I don't know whether you can or not, but Bob Parkinson said to me one day, I set off round the engine, and I come back and he says "What were up?" I says "That oiler’d stopped at that side.” “Eh he said - is it hot?” I said "No - I said - it just started, but it were short." He said “How did you know?" And I honestly didn't know, I honestly didn't know.
R- No. It must ... It must be instinct.
Well it's, I think actually what it is, I have me own theories about it. I think that actually .. the brain hears a lot more than it lets you know it's hearing.
R- Aye. I suppose it's possible that.
You know what I mean?
R - Aye.
Because I know that if I consciously try and do it, I can sit there while t’engine's running, and a lot of people .. I mean it isn't really noisy for t’size of it, but it does make a fair bit of noise, you've got to raise your voice.
R - Oh aye
But I can think of a part on that engine, you know, say the piston rings in t’far cylinder and I can listen to them, and you couldn't hear them. And I sometimes wonder whether I can hear them, but I can listen to them. I’ll tell you
(900)
(40 min)
a little thing that happened one day, and it were bloody funny and all. I was sat in that chair, and I had a noise on the engine and I couldn't reckon up what it were. I had a squeak, and I only got it at certain times, and I couldn't reckon this bloody squeak up anyhow. And I'd sat in t’bloody chair all morning trying to reckon it up. And I’ve walked round the engine, I couldn't find it... And yet when I heard it, it were as plain as day. And I thought to meself, "There's something bloody wrong here", and I knew that there were something. I knew that there were something funny about it. It didn't worry me a lot, it wasn’t worrying me as if I thought that something was going to overheat and do some damage or something like that, it was nattering me, because I knew that I should know what it was. I knew that .. you know you have this feeling, you know that there's sommat obvious and you can't see it. It's like everybody laughing at you, you know, and you walk into a room and you think "Christ Almighty, what is it?" and you look down to see if your fly hole's fast, you know. You know there's sommat but you don't know what it is, and it natters you. And, well I thought about this all morning. Well, well aye, on and off all morning, anyway it were no bloody good, I couldn't find it, so I went all round at dinner time and I hear this bloody squeak again, and I found out what it was. Do you know what it was?
R- What?
It were the bloody handle on the oil can. It sounds bloody silly. But you know, when you're oiling t’engine, when you're doing anything on the engine, you do it in time to t’engine, because you've got to do to hit moving parts.
R - That's right ...
.. you know, you get into the rhythm .. because there is all them little oil holes moving round, you know, and you've got .. and you get into the rhythm you know, and you can sing to yourself you know, as you are doing it, and plonking [a drop of oil in each hole] And as you put it in, when you're pressing the thing, you know, the engine's going thump, thump, and you are pressing the [handle of the oil can] you are pressing away, and of course it was squeaking in time with the engine! Who the hell’d ever think that an oil can that's covered with oil is going to squeak?
R - You wouldn’t would you?
And it were a new oil can. And I looked and I thought "well, you dizzy bugger" and I put a drop of cylinder oil on, and do you knows that oil can’s never squeaked since. And that reminds me of sommat else Newton told me, it's funny is this. What's his name? Hedley Bradshaw in Earby, he was running Spring Mill engines and he rung Newton up one morning and he says "Newton - he says – could you come up and look at t’engine?" Like he were, he were always a bit careful were Hedley you know, I mean .. you know, he was the sort of, a belt, braces and a little bit of string in your pocket just in case owt happens you know? And Newton says "Aye - he says - what's up?” "Well - he says – I’ll tell thee - he says - I have a little tune that I whistle to t’engine - he says - when I go round it in the morning. And - he says - this morning - he says - me tune wouldn't fit t’engine. Tha’d better come up and have a look" So Newton went up and t’bloody engine were running slow you know, that were it, that were what was up. But you know, that sort of thing, he didn’t know what were up but he knew there were sommat, he’d done his job. He’d done his job, there were nowt wrong with Hedley, he'd done his job. He didn't know what it were but he got
somebody there that told him what it were. But thing that put him on to
(950)
it, his tune wouldn't fit the engine that morning.
R- Yes, that's right.
Which sounds silly.
R- Ah, but if you know, I mean, I can, oh it’ll he true that will.
Experience, experience.
R- Yes, aye.
It's like the plumber isn’t it? The woman that .. they had the bloody cylinder dinged, she sent for the plumber and he come and took one look at it and whistles to himself and thumped it on t’side with his hand and it just sprang out, “Pong!” She said ~ “That's good - she says - how ---much do I owe you? And he said "A quid" "Well - she says, you've only been here two minutes." He said "That's right, half a crown for coming - he says - and seventeen and six for knowing where to hit it!" And it’s right.
R- Aye, did I ever tell you that tale about plumber who rung t'doctor up? His wife weren't so well. And just as he rung up, this doctor were getting ready to go out to a function, done up in bloody tails and black tie and everything you know .. And plumber says “She is not well at all - he says - I wish you'd come and see her.” "Oh - he says I'm going to a function, give her a couple of aspirins, I’ll come in t’morning." He gave her a couple of aspirin and she bucked up. A few weeks later t’doctor rung the plumber up. "Eh - he say - I wish you'd come right away Joe,” like they were on friendly terms. Joe says "What's up?" He says "The toilet’s overflowing - he says – there’s shit everywhere." Plumber says "Give it a couple of aspirin and I’ll come in t’morning.”
Anyway, there you are. This tape's just been a little bit bitty but there are some good bits on it.
R - It can be edited though can’t it? You can knock them little bits out.
Oh we are not bothered about editing it. I mean we've done … I look at it this way, Ernie, we've got one or two tapes to do yet. We've done twelve bloody good tapes so we might as well enjoy ourselves on one.
R- Is that how many we've done? Twelve?
This is tape number fourteen.
R- Aye, it is.
And we’ve missed thirteen out so we've done , this is actually the thirteenth tape.
R- By gum we’ve been like a couple of bloody old washerwomen chattering!
Yes but, when you come to think about it, I don’t think in, say a hundred years, the people that listen to this tape’ll think that. Not for one minute.
R- No. Well, what I've heard of them it’s interesting, them bits that I have heard.
Yes, but I mean, what we've actually been talking about .. and I'm saying this to people that aren't even born yet, and that’s one of the things that I think that the people who do eventually listen to these tapes should realise is that we know that that’s what we are doing.
R- Oh aye.
We are talking to people who haven't even been born yet. And the idea of doing these tapes is to give them an idea of the sort of things that interested us, the way we looked at things, and I mean, I’m not saying we are right. I mean, there is no doubt about it that when you start playing hell about Methodists you are prejudiced Roberts!
R- Oh .. well I may be. I might be prejudiced, I don't know.
(1000)
(45 Min)
And when I’m on about retirement gifts I am prejudiced but that's not the point. The point is that this is the way that we thought.
R- Aye.
You see, I’m talking in the past tense, that's the way we think now. We think these things, we've had certain experiences and that's the way we've been brainwashed if you like, into thinking.
R- Well only today one of my young weavers came to me, she is eighteen this week and she said to me “Ernest, do you think my generation has it made" I said "Yes I do." she says “How, the hell do you make that out?" I says "Well I once saved seven and six to buy a bloody hat and it took me about six weeks - I says - If you want something, in comparing prices it'll not take you six weeks to buy it. So times must be a lot better, and I think you have it made"
Well, just take hats. It don't take them six weeks to save up for a hat now.
R- No. But it took me six weeks, and it were an Attaboy hat and I felt like a million dollars, I think I told you about it before.
You did, you got it pinched.
R- I went up to t’Majestic and some swine pinched it. I'd have chopped his bloody hands clean off.
Yes but you know that's what 1 call the lollipop theory of economics. You see it works. Instead of thinking how much a thing costs convert it into lollipops, you see, Say lollipops are five pence each and you're buying sommat for a quid, well it costs twenty lollipops to …
R- That's right.
Well .. if you were to go forward into the future you'd find that some things will .. if you were looking at the same thing then, some things will cost more lollipops and some things will cost less lollipops. And one of the things I have great difficulty in getting across to a lot of people is that a lot of things are a lot cheaper nowadays than they were twenty, thirty years ago. If you reckon up how long you've got to work to earn them you can have them in no time.
R- Oh yes, of course you can.
But the thing is, the funny thing is, they are all luxuries. Those things that are cheaper are all what you’d call luxuries. The things that you'd call essential all take longer to earn. It's right is that, you think about it.
R- Yes, more than likely right.
SCG/05 October 2002
8242 words