Here’s a couple of very interesting photos seen recently on the web. A lot of us will remember Spielfeld, not that it was a place we looked fondly upon. The first photo I am guessing was from the 50’s but the second one was from the early 70’s. Promotor lorries would have started to frequent this border crossing from Austria to Yugoslavia at that time but it would be another eight years before I had the dubious pleasure of joining in the fun.
I do remember one trip, a dark and cold night, where I had slowly worked my way up to the front of the queue only to ■■■■ off one of the customs officers who made me turn round and go back down the slight hill and rejoin the back of the queue. After that little escapade I used the little border 30km north, Radkasberg I think it was called, and only used Spielfeld on my way home.
sandway:
Here’s a couple of very interesting photos seen recently on the web. A lot of us will remember Spielfeld, not that it was a place we looked fondly upon. The first photo I am guessing was from the 50’s but the second one was from the early 70’s. Promotor lorries would have started to frequent this border crossing from Austria to Yugoslavia at that time but it would be another eight years before I had the dubious pleasure of joining in the fun.
I do remember one trip, a dark and cold night, where I had slowly worked my way up to the front of the queue only to ■■■■ off one of the customs officers who made me turn round and go back down the slight hill and rejoin the back of the queue. After that little escapade I used the little border 30km north, Radkasberg I think it was called, and only used Spielfeld on my way home.
Recently came across these photos on the web of the Tankwash, filling station and cafe at Lokeren, Belgium. This is where I headed for on my first trip abroad when working for Invicta Transport from Maidstone. It was my base for a year whilst working the Benelux countries for Wim Vos. The third photo is of course when I was with Promotor and although I didn’t visit as often it was nice to give the rig a clean up after a long trip.
sandway:
Here’s a couple of very interesting photos seen recently on the web. A lot of us will remember Spielfeld, not that it was a place we looked fondly upon. The first photo I am guessing was from the 50’s but the second one was from the early 70’s. Promotor lorries would have started to frequent this border crossing from Austria to Yugoslavia at that time but it would be another eight years before I had the dubious pleasure of joining in the fun.
I do remember one trip, a dark and cold night, where I had slowly worked my way up to the front of the queue only to ■■■■ off one of the customs officers who made me turn round and go back down the slight hill and rejoin the back of the queue. After that little escapade I used the little border 30km north, Radkasberg I think it was called, and only used Spielfeld on my way home.
Please click on photo to enlarge.
I had number of “incidents” as Spielfeld - few of them favourable.
I think it was Tommy Burch who was with me a Spielfeld when we arrived together at 2.45… Our friendly customs officer did Tommy’s papers and then stopped to have a chat and a beer with his relief (the end of the shift being 3pm). They carried on drinking and joking and, at 3.15pm - having kept us both waiting for 30 minutes - the new customs officer charged me for overtime… All work after 3pm was chargeable. This didn’t help with my dislike of Austrians.
Another incident was filling out the green statistic form which most paid the agents to complete for them which I rather resented… I used to complete the forms myself being reluctant to fund the Austrians in any way.
I passed over my green form and the unformed man started screaming at me rather like his fellow countryman, that little corporal, shouting in German “Are you blind?” He didn’t expect me to answer him in his own language explaining calmly I wasn’t blind and would he kindly do his job…
I think it was my first trip to Aachen that the customs officer threw my papers onto the floor saying “Totales sheisse”… I collected them and asked him in measured tones in German if he would care to explain to his superior officer what he had just said and done to me… There was suddenly quite the reversal of attitude…
I think it was at Speilfeld where Tookie saw an Austrian overtaking the queue and pulled his cab out to stop him… Our Austrian friend stepped out and started offering his fists and Tookie smacked him straight in the face and the Austrian police came and grabbed the Austrian driver… Later while Tookie was in the queue the Austrian police appeared with the Austrian driver - his eye now closed… They seemed amused and called Tookie “Casius Clay” and said they’d keep the Austrian driver for 30 minutes so Tookie could get on his way.
On the matter of Austrians I had been waiting three days and nights queuing to get into Habur/Zacko in a several mile long queue - and in the dark 3 Austrian lorries with lights switched off zoomed down the road to the front of the queue which naturally caused outrage with everyone in the queue… Next morning as we edged forward the 3 Austrian trucks were parked in a row on the left hand side of the road with every bit of glass smashed and every panel dented. No sign of the drivers… Clearly they failed in their task to get to the front and through the border… I always wondered what happened to them. At the least they would have had a bad beating - if not killed.
Yes Efes, that Spielfeld was definitely the pits and all caused by the Austrians working there. I found the Yugo side ok and never had a problem with them.
Recently I have been in touch with Richard Phillips aka Bill. He worked with Showhaul and Promotor and finally ended up with the most important job in the office as Transport Manager. Bill was always on top of the job and a great bloke to work with.
I asked him if he had any info on one of the Transcons run by Showhaul and I have attached his reply.
Hopefully you are reading this Bill and one day perhaps you can join in.
sandway:
Yes Efes, that Spielfeld was definitely the pits and all caused by the Austrians working there. I found the Yugo side ok and never had a problem with them.
Recently I have been in touch with Richard Phillips aka as Bill. He worked with Showhaul and Promotor and finally ended up with the most important job in the office as Transport Manager. Bill was always on top of the job and a great bloke to work with.
I asked him if he had any info on one of the Transcons run by Showhaul and I have attached his reply.
Hopefully you are reading this Bill and one day perhaps you can join in.
Please click on attachment to enlarge.
Yes, I aways liked Richard. A good fair fellow. He probably didn’t realise what moral danger he was in travelling with Poxy. I went to a friends house in Germany when travelling with Poxy and Poxy drank my friend’s house dry… He wasn’t overly impressed with Poxy I seem to remember…
Anyhow, Richard must have survived. Please pass on my best wishes. What’s he up to now?
I remember Zdenka - we always hooted our horns passing through Seal at the narrow point of the road on the way to Dover. I’m sure the neighbours loved us.
As many of you will know our old Rhodesian driver George Fardell is in a care home as his partner is unable to look after him. My wife therefore decided he needed cheering up and so asked me for enough photos of George to fill a calendar. I duly obliged and she produced a lovely 2022 calendar which was posted to him a few weeks back. She blew all the photos up to A4 size and found the 2022 monthly template on the web. The first photo shows a calendar she has done for us depicting places we have visited.
As we didn’t hear back from George or his partner we told Andy Maclean aka Jazzandy. He contacted them and and reported back that they had received it and were very pleased with it.
I have attached some of the photos she used all of which have been seen on here before.
Sandway, sorry to change tack a bit, but I’m still sat on the edge of my seat in anticipation of hearing the story of the infamous m/e trip. Come on old son please try to recall it. Also guys having only done Europe how did you go about buying black market fuel, maybe a silly question to some but never having had to do it I’m curious , thanks the bearded one
Attached are the rest of the photos my wife used to make George’e calendar. Thought I would post them as it won’t be long before I’m on the road again heading for the sun for the rest of the winter and may be off line for a while.
Hear what you say ‘thebeardedone’. At some stage I must learn how to repost some of the old stories on here. I’m sure a lot of new bods would find them interesting. Unfortunately we’re not seeing many new contributors from the ‘good old days’.
Supposed to be on the road heading south to the sun but thanks to Mr Macron I’ve had to put the trip on hold for a few (hopefully) weeks.
However, gives me the chance to post a little anecdote from Brian Algate’s daughter concerning Bluebird that Pro’s moved around the country at a more sedately pace than what it was intended for.
According to Rosemary the car was damaged on one trip. Hope Brian got a clear signature. Hate to think what the consequences would have been if Tom Miles or one of the lads at our depot at Dunton Green had inflicted the damage. Staggie would have gone ballistic. Well, even more ballistic than was his norm.
sandway:
Supposed to be on the road heading south to the sun but thanks to Mr Macron I’ve had to put the trip on hold for a few (hopefully) weeks.
However, gives me the chance to post a little anecdote from Brian Algate’s daughter concerning Bluebird that Pro’s moved around the country at a more sedately pace than what it was intended for.
According to Rosemary the car was damaged on one trip. Hope Brian got a clear signature. Hate to think what the consequences would have been if Tom Miles or one of the lads at our depot at Dunton Green had inflicted the damage. Staggie would have gone ballistic. Well, even more ballistic than was his norm.
I seem to remember the story about Bluebird (which I also transported back to Beaulieu one time - one of my first jobs at Pro’s)… The story as I knew it that the car had a very long wheelbase which could easily ground out when offloading from the lorry. Something small but sharp was sticking out of the flatbed - perhaps the sharp end of one of the ramps - that opened up Bluebird like a can opener - with a little curly bit of blue metal being left as the car was winched down…
I’ve been looking back through some of our old posts and have been surprised by the number of people employed by the company. Although the bulk of them were drivers we mustn’t forget those who carried out equally important jobs whilst we were on the road. I’ve listed below most of those whose names have appeared in various posts over the past six years. This is not the definitive list of those associated with the company and to those I’ve missed I can only apologise. It certainly doesn’t include many from the Childerditch (Ford Contract) era of the early 90’s.
Peter Calderwood founded the company Promotor in 1969 ably assisted by his wife Liz after working for the Ford Motor Company for a number of years. The company grew as did the list of employees, mainly drivers. In the early days up to about 76 we had in the office, workshop, drivers and subbies the following personal;—
Jimmy Conlan. Billy Heath. Dave Clark. Bob Heath. Stevie Smith. John Taylor. Dave Thomas. Brian Algate. Bob Charlton. Chic Steadman. John McFall. Chris Sly. Johnny or Phil Bishop. Terry Weeks. Roy Cloke. Johnny Evans. Keith Reynolds. Carl Denherdt. Roger Graber, Tony Grainger. Barry Mason. Bob Archer. George Fardell. Billy Proudlove. Sue Ashdown. Dave Stagg. Mick Mitchell. Barry Chambers (Chalmers)! Roger Oakley. Barry Holmes. Micky Martin. Roger Lancaster. Phil Taylor. Joe Alexander. Peter Bullimore. Charlie Phipps. Peter Balfour. Peter Thornton. Alan Sewell. Debbie Lacy. Zdenka (Yugo Director). Moira and Neville (accounts). Christine.
Mainly drivers who appeared on the scene from roughly 77 to 87 include;-----
Bobby Keen. John Barclay. Graham Bertram. Ronnie Hart. John Ward. Dave Boulding. Jeff Gardener. Jeff Douglas. Ramsey Patterson. Paul Linscott. Clive Turner. Clive Newman. John Preece. Micky Twemlow. Stephen Lacy. Billy Took. Tom Miles. Dave Lloyd. John Cox. John Mantle. Richard Philips. Steve Marshall. Trevor Thayre. Tommy Birch. Alan Grant. Richard Brown. Micky Packham. Richard Dynes. Nigel Hassan. Bob Anderson. Phil Houghton. Simon Calderwood. Brian Stevenson and myself Brian Holmes.
Some later arrivals include;------
Tony Blackman. Chris Holmes. Frank Gough. Greg Chapman. Kit Wagstaff. Steve Gibbons. Stevie Davie. Trevor Newman. Paul Maloney. Tony Lamb. Mark Doyle. Elvis (workshop manager).
All this reminiscing has had me thinking. There have been some great posts on this Promotor thread, not just from us drivers. Peter Bullimore aka ‘brakeboy’ contributed some marvellous posts from the workshop point of view and we have to thank Steve ask ‘mushroomman’ for his entertaining stories and support in the early days of this blog. Another one mentioned for special thanks is Andy Mclean aka ‘Jazzandy’, Promotors thorn in the side. On the drivers front we mustn’t forget the invaluable contributions from Bob Heath, Tony Grainger, Micky Twemlow, Alan Grant, Efes and others who have posted their stories and photos.
However, I feel now is the time for me personally to give the ‘Promotor’ story a rest. We’ve had a good run and hopefully entertained many of you. I must thank Efes for his help with his anecdotes and stories. I’m not sure how many ‘old boys’ look in but I’ve noticed one of our original drivers, Dave Clark, still pops in now and again. If you’re reading this Dave please correct me concerning the list of early drivers and tell me of any I’ve missed. I hope Efes finds his missing photos to entertain us from time to time and also posts anything he thinks is of interest. I shall still post whenever I find anything that might be useful. I’m not disappearing completely. One thing I intend to do is post a picture of one of our lorries every now and again just so ‘Promotor’ won’t be forgotten.
Do you remember when the Italians had those odd rules about their lorries having to be right hand drive and the equally odd configurations re weights and axles. They even catered for the right hand drive lorries at the Autostrada peage by having a special lane for them.
The attached photo taken from our Italian colleagues M/E website shows what surely must have been one of their last right hand drive lorries before the regulations were changed.
sandway:
Do you remember when the Italians had those odd rules about their lorries having to be right hand drive and the equally odd configurations re weights and axles. They even catered for the right hand drive lorries at the Autostrada peage by having a special lane for them.
The attached photo taken from our Italian colleagues M/E website shows what surely must have been one of their last right hand drive lorries before the regulations were changed.
I believe the Swiss and Italian penchant for RHD lorries was to do with those that ran on the narrow mountain roads and needed to see over the precipices going one way; and be able to inch by the opposing traffic going the other way.
Found a couple of interesting photos recently. Both companies were good customers of ours at Trade Fairs. Petbow from Sandwich and Wilsons from Northern Ireland.
The last three show Davies Turner’s rates to the M/E courtesy of Mat Ireland. All I can remember is that by 87 or so Promotor were paying our subbies about £4,600 for a Baghdad trip.
, thanks the bearded one
