History of Laycocks

[Albert T Smith]

Yes, that's right Albert, around 53/54 we lived at Hackenthorpe for a short time but then we moved onto Lowedges Road and later onto Gervase Place, not far from the house on Lowedges Road. Mum stayed at Gervase place for quite a while after dad had passed on, but eventually moved up to Stannington where she had a flat for a few years before she also passed on.

 

At Hackenthorpe, I can remember him doing two jobs but it may not have been at the same time - I am not sure as I wasn't that old. I know he had been doing some door to door selling - children's encyclopedia (and I still have mine in it's original box as it was posted!!).

 

I also know he worked at Laycocks because I went to Ridgeway school by bus and when he'd been on nights, he used to take me to the bus stop still in his working clothes and that smell from the factory (which I recall from going to the parties ) was still with him. I seem to remember being teased by someone about it once, but my dad soon put them right the next day - they got a right telling off!!! I did seem to think he worked at Archer Road at that time and only went to Little London after he'd had the heart attack and been told he had to have an 'easier' job.

 

Cynthia's husband will recall Harry. On a few occasions (Daily or Nightly) I would act has referee, regarding the up holding of the Queens Language.

I've many happy memories of Harry. Though we must have had a row sometime, I can not recall one, The pressure of the job created argument's over next to nothing. I can see him now, clocking the Helix Angle, finishes and hardness of the gears and splines. The MAAG calculated and created a precision chart of all the gears measurements and Harry would stick to them like he was reading the 'Times Newspaper'. (They were always correct)

Looking back. How we constantly worked to such fine tolerance's is hardly believable. Having arguments about half a thousand part of a inch or a finish about five micros too rough were common!! We all must have been nutty!

The smell of the mistic oil on all our working clothes was a better identification than a finger print. I've walked past people who I did not know, but knew, that they were wearing the clothes of someone who worked at the Overdrive Division.

One thing was that no-one ever bothered to steal anyones clothes!!

[Cynthia]

Of course Dennis remembers Harry. Regarding the smell of Mistic oil, Dennis never came home in his smock and he always changed his trousers at work, never the less I could always smell the oil and the first thing that he did when he came home was to go and have a shower before we had our evening meal.

He could not work to a thousandth of an inch now as I am sorry to say that he is legally blind. He had his eyes tested each year and had glasses to read, he had a test in December 2005 and his vision had not changed, in February 2006 he had a triple bi-pass and was prescribed blood pressure medication, one of the side effects was that they could , for a short time, cause blurred vision, in May 2006 he complained he was having problems with his eyes but we thought that it was the medication, however, when he asked to see the opthamologist at the beginning of August he had extensive tests and the outcome was that he has a hole in each retina. What a blow that was as he now cannot drive and I never learned to drive on the 'wrong side of the road' when we came here. Fortunately we have a big screen television and he (we) can still watch the three football games on each saturday

I should add that it had nothing to do with the tablets.

 

Cheers, Cynthia.

[Albert T Smith]

I'm very sorry to hear of the problems but I must just say that my memory of Dennis is that, 'He was the cleanest man that I had the pleasure of working with'. I would also add that during my fund raising days for the Muscular Dystrophy Group, He always donated well. Even if we'd just had, or were about to have a row about the job within a few minutes. The kind of work that we were involved in just made it so.

Now you will now just have to start to drive again, having a few driving lessons to start you off, would not be time lost.

[Cynthia]

Dennis asks if anyone remembers Billy Turney and the story's he used to tell ?, or perhaps Billy is a member of the Forum.

[Albert T Smith]

Dennis asks if anyone remembers Billy Turney and the story's he used to tell ?, or perhaps Billy is a member of the Forum.

 

Bill Turney passed on but I've many memories of his exploits.

If I ever was stranded on a Desert Island Billy and Derick Mullins would be my first choice of companions. Mullo would somehow build a sea going vessel out of sand and old Billy would knock up the navigation charts, make a compass and we would soon be safe!!

One thing would be that I'd never ever be lost for a really entertaining story which would exceed the exploits of 007 or ANY stranger than fiction real life stories by a mile!!

Did anyone have the time to listen to them? Lets have a ear-wig!

[samcdcd]

anyone work in there in early80s ? if so reveal yourself..........

[Albert T Smith]

anyone work in there in early80s ? if so reveal yourself..........

 

Hawk-Eye from the Blocking Ring, Overdrive, Clutch, Garage Equipment divisions now on Call!

[kevin63]

I used to work with Harry Jackson, Keith Godson, Simon Garside and also in our shop later on were Derek Hall and Ernist Bussy, i am afraid Keith, Derek and Harry are no longer with us.

There was also Les Holmes and Dave Spitlehouse working for development in the same shop, i know Dave has passed away but does anyone know if Les is still around, we had some really good times at Laycocks, especially when we were back in the shop but we all worked at all three factories, the main work seemed to be in the overdrive area, oh, and by the shop i mean Methods Engineers, i was in there in the early 80s and have still got a continued service record at LUK, 30 years this year but will always remember Laycoks, they were great times.

[julie22]

I used to work at Laycocks between 76 and 80. Worked in the typing pool as an office junior, but one of my jobs was to hand out the wages on a weekly basis to the factory workers both at Archer Road and at Little London Road. Can still remember all the wolf wistling as I had to walk across the shop floor (I was only 16/17 years old at the time).

 

Remember the 2nd Christmas I was there, the MD sent a note around the offices saying that everyone had to be back at work by 2.00pm. Our typing supervisor (we called the Dragon) told us if we were not back by 2.00pm we could get sacked. A work colleague and I (both 17 at the time) went to the Sheaf Pub and at 2.30pm decided we would stay out all afternoon, as Laycocks could not sack us, we were so indispensable!!! (Jobs were plentiful at that time)

 

We never got sacked!!!

[Albert T Smith]

For anyone interested, I've got a lot of photographs, scanned into *.JPEG graphic files taken from laycock Engineering Ltd.

 

I found a Photo Album some years ago that had been thrown by someone onto a scrap skip. These photographs were inside it.

 

Anyone interested in having a copy just P.M. me.