Leyland's Industrial Past

[Peter119]

Hi All

Finally got a good supply from the printers of the Guide to the Industrial Sites and it is available either from the Historical Society website at £4.95 plus P&P or from Great Grandfathers in Towngate for £4.95.

Inside the book there are details of the next stage of the project, the oral history survey

Peter Houghton
Chairman, Leyland Historical Society

[Peter119]

Following our appearance at the Transport Festival the Leyland Historical Society committee realised that we were missing out recording the oral history of the factory workers who helped to run the industries of Leyland and Farington in the last century.

So whilst this appeal is primarily going out to the people of Leyland, we want to open out the search to help us establish a database of Leyland and Farington workers.

We are not just talking about the Motors, but also the three rubber works, Leyland & Birmingham Rubber Company, BTR, Leyland Paints, the cotton mills or any other factories, workshops or other manufacturing premises in Leyland and Farington.

We will then record their memories for future generations making them available to the North West Sound Archive, the local museums and schools.


Please complete the following details and email to the Society

Name ……………………………………………………….

Address…………………………………………………………………………………………….

Telephone Number …………………………………………………….

Employer …………………………………………………

Department ……………………………………………………

Job Description ……………………………………………………………………………….

Period of Employment (Years e.g. 1940 - 1955) ………………………………………………


Please email completed details to [email protected] or hand in at our next meeting

[Colin Damp]

A footnote or two...

In the late 50s my mum, Marian Damp, worked the "housewives' shift" at L&B. It was a time of pretty full employment and they created a shift which women could work and be home in time for the kids to come back from school. Among other things, they packed inflatable rubber dinghies for aircraft ejector seats and one day were visited by a man called Johnnie Squires, a test pilot from English Electric at Warton who'd had to bail out of a Lightning fighter over the Irish Sea and had come to thank them personally.

As to the BTR takeover, I covered it as local reporter for the Evening Post. It was in the 70s (because I left Leyland for Devon in 1977) and it was what's known as a "reverse takeover" where the firm whose shares are priced higher on the stockmarket (L&B's) does the taking over, but actually becomes a subsidiary of the other (BTR).

[noel]

I worked for BTR before the L&B "takeover". The lads at L&B used to joke that the take over was the other way round. I suspect if it had stayed out of the BTR group some way other than selling off the 37 acres of land for building would have been found. Bankers, you just can't trust them.

[Colin Damp]

There's still a Leyland & Birmingham Rubber Ltd, listed as being in the Middleton area of Manchester, but what connection it has (if any) with the old L&B I don't know.

Try looking at www.leylndandbirminghamrubber.com

[noel]

That company is part of Nufox Colin. When L&B were closing down, Nufox's owner Peter Ostenfeldt bought some of the L&B extrusion equipment and orders and transferred the business to his Nufox site at Middleton. I worked there as a temp. consultant for a while. They also took over some of the Hiflex range when the hose company on Centurion Way closed. The L&B "headstone" as I call it which once stood above the L&B front door on Golden Hill Lane, is now on the lawn outside the Nufox Building. They maintain there are 3 separate companies on site, Nufox, L&B and Dunlop, although they all use the same staff and there are only about 10 shop floor in total.

[raymo]

Nufox can now include Eurocraft Ltd. in their portfolio.
Eurocraft Ltd. went into liquidisation and as I believe, Nufox have bought the name, some manufacturing rights, data base and templates.

[noel]

I didn't realise Eurocraft had gone bust. That was another spin-off from L&B in the mid nineties.

[Peter Harris]

What a shame they knocked down the wonderful Victorian building that housed the L&B boardroom and erected that offensive housing project in it's place. It looks like a modern day Gorball's. I am glad though that they knocked down the L&B Boiler room, when we were kids I used to look up and see the constant belching of black smoke under pressure rising upwards. The only sight that came close was the revolting yellow smoke plume rising from the copper smelter stack at Mt Isa Mine in NW Queensland providing ample sulphur to assist deforesting parts of pristine jungle in Indonesia by acid rain. I remember one day the wind changed and there is nothing that wakes you up in the morning better than a few lungs full of hydrogen sulphide - oh yes!!

[anacortesdamp]

I remember a big fire in the old L&B. That big steam engine that ran the machinery, which was visible through the big windows in the middle of the building ran out of control and reached a speed where the big flywheel broke loose. It smashed out through the front wall and took off across Leyland. IIRC it had gone quite a way before it stopped and I don't remember how much property damage it did on its course.


Frank