Might have been a mobile village idiot ? !
mushroomman:
You were lucky to find a pub that opened in Wales on a Sunday back in the sixties so drink up Denzil and crack on with the next episode.Chris you mentioned the North Eastern Area Traffic Office in Leeds, would that of been in a street called Swinegate.
A mate of mine got fined for parking in the seventies and had to send his postal order to the traffic office in Swinegate, what an appropriate address.
It was at Harehills Lane for a long while
dosser:
Might have been a mobile village idiot ? !
The wage was for swine herding and the gallon of juice was to enable him to roam around the villages making a nuisance of himself which he has continued to do over the years since then ! Anon1. 
I’d come looking for you, Bewick, if I thought an ex-GPO Bantam would catch one of those fancy Mercedes things.
Retired Old ■■■■:
I’d come looking for you, Bewick, if I thought an ex-GPO Bantam would catch one of those fancy Mercedes things.
I could run faster ROF ( well I could many years ago 
) Cheers Dennis.
Retired Old ■■■■:
I’d come looking for you, Bewick, if I thought an ex-GPO Bantam would catch one of those fancy Mercedes things.
Hare and Tortoise ROF, the Bantam will still be plodding along happily many years after the Merc has been recycled into a washing machine! 
Possibly still on the same gallon of juice as well.
Pete.
Retired Old ■■■■:
I’d come looking for you, Bewick, if I thought an ex-GPO Bantam would catch one of those fancy Mercedes things.
I bet that your Bantam would of caught up with that Brady Octopus R.O.F. It’s been two weeks now and they still haven’t arrived in Port Talbot.
And he has the nerve to say that the B.R.S. and the Blue Dart drivers were always stretching the job out.
Bewick:
First day, Sunday. Run down from Kendal in me 'lal immaculate Austin 7even and collect the “Main man” Eric who lived in Dalton-in Furness, the pick-up time could vary from either 9:00 am to 10:00 am dependant on whether the Octopus and trailer was loaded ready or the 22 ton of Signode strapping for The Abbey was sat on a trailer ( usually a 4 in line
So filled up and oil, water and tyres checked off we’d roll about mid day or before to S.Wales ,we would stop at either Forton or Charnock for a quick bite but we didn’t hang about as we cut across and aimed towards The Brecon Beacons. Before we finally got down to the regular digs we used, Walfords at Llansamlet, we called at a little filling station at Abergowed ? to fill up with derv, the Welshman who owned it always appreciated our trade and he would give Eric 20 Players and I’d get a couple of mars bars or similar. It was an extremely hard job to keep the old “peepers” open so I would do what all decent mates did, give it the Big Zzzzzz’s at times !( no rope ends used in our motor)
Hi Bewick,walfords is now a fish and chip shop and Chinese takeaway ,he used to work down Swansea dock we used to stop in his cafe for breakfast in the mornings in the 90’s he is still around cheers John
Hi Bewick This was walfords cafe now a chip shop is this how you remembered it cheers John
Hiya “small coal”, now that shot has been taken many years after me and my mate Eric digged there ! But we used to reverse the Octopus and trailer down to the left of the shot on a short bit of dead end road. Which reminds me of a funny story as one night we were sat in the café later on having a brew when two plain Bobbies came in and asked if the Brady driver could pull forward and let them out with their car ! They’d been parked further down the lane on “obbo” ! My mate Eric said “I’m booked off sorry” ! He threw me the keys and said “Go and let them out mate, who ever they were after will be long gone” 
! Those detectives were ■■■■■■■ embarrassed I can tell you and the other lads sat in with us were in hysterics ! So I went out and shunted forward 20 ft and they shot out like “blue arsed flies”. Cheers Bewick.
Most trailer “boys” were in their teens, and were in waiting to become drivers; but we had one who had been a prisoner of war and spent years under Japanese military rule. His name was Freddy Wilding. He could drive a car, but he was a bundle of nerves and often absent. The drivers had enormous respect and sympathy for him. Johnny Wyatt was a hard hitting haulier and farmer who had no time for idiots and ruled Fridged Freight with a rod of iron, but Freddy had a job for life and if he missed a departure a stand in was usually brought in at short notice and Freddy was handed a paint brush or a broom when he turned up. A testament to the treatment that those who sacrificed for their country and performed their duty to the best of their abilities - whatever the outcome - were not forgotten.
I myself found that I liked making things and returned to fabrication, but I suspect that most trailer mates stayed in the haulage industry and used their experience to good effect. Jim.
There was at least one ex trailer brakeman/mate at Tilcon when I worked there, he had worked for a Potteries firm I guess? However at Tilcon he was a driver and quite a character, but now sadly no longer with us. I remember him bringing a Foden in for service and saying that the steering had been heavy for a week or so and when we looked under the bonnet the power steering pump had dropped off! I was told (true or not I don’t know) that he also ‘assisted’ a new driver get out of a sticky site when he got bogged down, he kindly jumped in the new drivers cab and extracted the truck from the mud…then reversed it back in again, told him “That’s how you do it” and got back into his own truck and left him to it!!
Pete.
My first job after leaving school was at Inter-City Transports London Depot right opposite Holloway Woman’s Prison, I helped the fitter which included repairing punctures (without a cage). The shunters would try to earn £1000 for the year and did, this was in 1958.
Inter-City had two Leyland Steer and Trailers normally Tramping from ■■■■■■■■■■■ but occasionally run on Night Trunk and on one such occasion the Trailer Mate fell sick with I think appendicitis and was rushed to Hospital in London. As I had on a couple of occasions
mated on one of the Chinese Six and Trailer which had been day shunted by Davy Coop as Driver, I was asked (actually told) to go as mate with the ■■■■■■■■■■■ based Driver this lasted about two weeks.
I later joined Suttons at their London Depot, situated behind Pentonville Men’s Prison, as a Trailer Mate with my first Wagon and Trailer
being one of Suttons 150LX Atkinson four wheeler and Trailers with the twin 10x20 wheels all round this was followed by a TVW six wheeler and a TVW four wheeler, a couple of Chinese six Atkinsons with 6LW’s an Eight wheeler with a 6LW and a Chinese six with 6LX, two Leyland Octopuses and a Leyland Beaver all at one time or another towed a trailer. There was about seven Twin Wheeled Dyson Trailers, two Hands with super singles (we called them balloon tyres in those days) and one Dyson single wheel 10x20 Trailer, all trailers were 20’ long and were expected to carry 10 ton loads, all my time as a Suttons Trailer Mate was as a Day Shunter on tip and turn where you could be finished at 10.00 or 11.00 at night but could also be finished at midday and was paid a gauranteed 68 hours per week working one Saturday in three…Tony.
This post has no connection whatsoever with Dennis’ thread, and I sincerely hope that he doesn’t take umbrage with me for jumping a ride on his underrun bar.
It’s just that Suttons Tony’s mention of hours paid, reminded me of a time in about 1970,…this site is all about reminiscences after all, is it not?,…when I drove for an outfit in Salford, called Wright’s.
They were based in Albion St., just off the A6 at Windsor bridge. Directly opposite the gasworks in fact.
This guy ran a fleet of half a dozen clapped out A.E.C. tippers, and at 22 years old, I think I may have been the youngest driver on the payroll. I only remember that the fitter was called Jonah, and one of the drivers was Dave Wolstenholme. He went on to drive for Safeway’s for many years afterwards, and the last I heard of him, he was still doing a bit for T.D.S., Tyldesley Distribution, carting reels of paper out of Geogia Pacific at Horwich.
Getting back to the point, we were never given an actual wage slip at the end of the week, we just got a roll of one pound notes with an elastic band round them. No envelope, no wage slip, nothing. We never knew if we were paying tax, national insurance, or what.
Every Wednesday I think it was, the boss would shout down from his upstairs office, " how many hours did you get in last week mate?". Of course, being honest, I would give the right amount usually, but there was this elderly driver, who’s name, if I ever actually knew it, I’ve long forgotten, unless it was Harry Gill, would frequently shout back, " hundred and sixty two boss ".
■■■■ knows what he actually got paid, but probably more than I did most likely.
There was this other driver there that we all knew only as ’ Zed ’ who bore an uncanny resemblance to Elvis Presley.and who’s wife made a living on the streets of Salford. Zed manufactured his own 0.22 calibre handguns from bits of scrap metal, and spent slack periods blasting chunks out of the walls of the office building. He was quite talented actually, but just in the wrong areas unfortunately.
I realise this may seem a bit far fetched, but it’s all absolutely true. I could tell you more tales, but you wouldn’t believe those either, so I won’t bother. All in all, they were just a bunch of absolute ■■■■■■■ nutters. It all seems so surreal now, looking back.
Needless to say, I didn’t stay there long.
Ah! now after a suitable interval to let all the “wanna be’s and has beens” flap their gums ! 
Where are we, rolling into The Abbey onto the “Bridge” to weigh in 22ton of Barrow Steel’s finest product " Hello you Brady Boyos and how are things up your way? " Weigh’d in and I would then climb in behind the wheel 
and we would run around to the Stores Dept. Eric would go off to see the Storeman and I would get stuck in to loosing the ropes which had to be wrapped up precisely and tied tightly. We delivered into a number of the bays where the Signode banding was used and usually Eric always knew which bays would require “stocking up” from the previous week and apart from one bay in particular which he had to back the trailer into he let me do the manoeuvring which was OK once the trailer was dropped but I used to get in a right tangle at first with shunting the drawbar into a bay but I persevered and Eric was always patient but I finally got the hang of it ( up to a point !) but he was the “Virtuoso” and he could put the trailer anywhere, it was a treat to watch at times it really was !. Anyway, I’m forgetting to mention that outside the first bay we usually pulled all the sheets off and this was another precise operation, all four had to be folded absolutely perfectly then I had to roll them up as tight as cigars and fasten them with a the couple of sheet ties that were left out of the roll for the job. We had, from memory, three main sheets, two “flappers” and two “steel sheets” plus a cut off piece to cover the seven sheets to keep them dry when they were stashed behind the headboard on the Octopus, the ropes were under the rolled sheets ( No ropes allowed in the cab ). All tipped and back to the “Bridge” to tare off, then Eric would go to the phone and ring Bowens,“Hiay Jack ( Reece) Eric here how are we looking this morning ?” " Well now then Mr Brady let me see now" " How will 20 ton of tin plate out of MB Neath for West Houghton do you Boyo ?" " Spot on Jack I’ll give you a ring when we are loaded" sometimes we ran into Bowens yard which is where I recall meeting the Bowens , Vivian Bowen, Gwynne’s Son was a very decent sort of chap and as was Jack Reece their Transport Manager I can see him in “my minds eye” sat at his desk like it was yesterday . We didn’t always load out of Eagles Bush, sometimes we went into Trostre or Velindre Works to load tin plate and it wasn’t always for W/ Houghton, it was sometimes for MB in Breeze Lane , Liverpool, and occasionally MB at James St or Botcherby , in Carlisle, which wasn’t what we really wanted as it was too far North ( and over Shap), Lancashire was more suitable but Jack would sometimes press us to do him a favour with a Carlisle load if he was struggling ! Occasionally, very occasionally, Bowens couldn’t re-load us so Eric would ring Trevor Philips, " Well now then Brady has Jack let you down !! well lets see what I can do, can’t have you Brady’s stuck down yer in South Wales empty now can we " Without fail Trevor Philips would give us a West Houghton or a Liverpool and to give them their due respect they knew that we were first and foremost Bowen “subbies” and there never was any hard feelings like " You can ■■■■ off Brady you only ring when Jack Reece can’t help" ! So we would get reloaded and this is where the tin plate was sheeted and roped like they’d been “ironed on” and on the nearside( my side) all the hitch eyes had to be in line down the trailer and the Octopus and if they weren’t ( not quite) it was “bit rough that brother” but it was a sight for sore eyes when you looked back down the motor and trailer from the rear corner window, I wish I had started using a camera in those days ! and dependant on how quick we got reloaded we were sometimes able to get a “flyer” up the road to the “new M5” and make it to The Sunset at Penkridge, but many a time we were still at Llansamlet on Monday night. We only rang Ma Philips to cancel our beds ( in good time for her) on a Monday if we were off up the road on Monday,and not to book them as She always had two beds down for us on a Monday automatically. I’ve got to say that the times I spent down in South Wales in the 60’s were great, many happy memories and “salt of the earth people”. Here endeth the episode Cheers Bewick.
You can put me in the "has beens " category Dennis. I paid scant attention to what I was in or what was under the bonnet, but the totty on their bikes in Cambridge… Jim.
As an aside to this thread I recall that at the time around '67 when the first 180LXB’s were launched and the first 20 tonner artics arrived and the South Wales hauliers started running them, John Raymond in particular was one. Well on our runs out of S. Wales with the Octopus and trailer loaded with the same tinplate loads we’d come up behind them on the grades and “walk” past them, what a “downer” it was for The Boyos with their new powerful Gardners ! Just a bit of jest, the LXB would probably be doing twice the MPG of the Power Plus Octopus ! Cheers Dennis.
Great stuff Dennis. Reading the list of MB factories just in the North West, and there were several others dotted about the country, it makes you wonder what happened to all of them?
You might well ask “GF” ! When I ran my first motor I used to go into MB Acton ( J & W Watt sub) and load 20 pallet loads of tins for the then Glaxo factory in Kendal on which I had to use every “stich” of sheet I carried to cover the high load!. And sometimes I went into Acton and loaded 4 pallets of tops for Kendal which were fairly heavy as there was “no air” between them, the tops had been trunked up from MB Portsmouth IIRC so as you say there was MB plants all over the place many of them close to the food canners. Cheers Dennis.
Metal Box Westhoughton was a regular source of loads for Bolton and district hauliers, courtesy of Bolton Kay Street BRS depot, which always seemed to have plenty of surplus work. I remember the pallets of lids, I always thought they spoiled the symmetry of the load. Regular destinations from Westhoughton I remember going to with cans were Vale of York Canners at Wetherby, and Filtrate Oils at Leeds. Plus the frequent “emergency” inter-factory transfers of tin plate, Westhoughton to MB Carlisle being a regular. As a nation we now probably eat much less canned food with the growth of the frozen food market, so less tins are used. Heinz at Kitt Green has its own can making plant.