Z1205/169

Male. Drawer of bricks, Stewartby b. 27.05.1933 SIDE A (00 mins)One of 11 children (7 sisters, 3 brothers), born and raised in Wootton. Lived in village until 1960. House had only 3 bedrooms. Mother's family from Wood End, Kempston. Father was a hand drawer at Stewartby brickworks, then went on to make special bricks - involved in selecting bricks for Ideal Homes Exhibition demonstration housing each year. (05 mins)Father cycled to work, then had a moped. Worked with a brother. Interviewee worked with others on Kiln 20. Load barrows: 84 x two and five-eights, or 72 three-inch bricks. Hard work. Early tunnel kilns held 60 - 70,000 bricks; smaller ones 20,000. 1976 was worse for temperature - very hot outside and about 400Celsius inside kilns. Rubber grips on trucks used to burst into flame and you had to leave the kiln. (10mins)Very cold winter, 1963. Frost and snow started on Boxing Day '6 and continued for 11 weeks. Bricks loaded by hand on to lorries. Forklift trucks introduced. Piecework pay. Grandfather used to work on burning on Kiln No. 8. Remembers visiting the knot-hole (clay pit) - now Stewartby Lake - when at Stewartby School. (15 mins)Scraping clay from the bottom to the top to get a good mix. Moving the dragline machine form one pit to another very slowly across the road. Record drawer of 18 million bricks. (20 mins)Barrow drawing until 1953/4. Then lift truck drawing and setting. He went on lift trucks from 1964 until 1989. Grandparents lived next door when he was a child. Attended elementary school in Wootton until after the Second World War. Finished school at Stewartby in 1948. Used to breed rabbits and chickens and grow all their vegetables. Had allotments. Never went hungry, despite 13 in family, including parents. Caught wild rabbits. No inside water at home. Used standpipe on road. Used to help on smallholding from age 9 years. (25 mins)Milking cows by hand when 10 years old at Saunders Farm, Bedford Rd., Wootton. Worked there until he entered Army just after 19, for two years. Thought it did him good. Parents were stricter then. Village policeman. One sister was also in the army for 3 ½ years. Packed buses to Bedford for cinema at weekend. (30 mins)Joined brickworks in February 1955. (32 mins)End of Side A SIDE B (00 mins)Once mechanical handling was introduced, work in the brickyard was easier. Father used to come home form working at the brickyard and go to do seasonal work on the farm. When Hanson took over London Brick works, they put young men in charge who didn't know anything and got rid of all the people that knew anything about brickmaking. He took voluntary redundancy. (05 mins)Returned to work on the land. Laments the decline in public transport. Experiments in brickmaking using gas-fuelled kiln. Used to be 10 fork-lift truck drivers. (10 mins)4 on night shift, six on days. Changes over the years. (12 mins)End of Side B END OF INTERVIEW Original Interview 40 mins

22 October 2002

From: 1930 To: 2002

item

London Brick Company,
Hanson Brick Limited

brick worker, cycling, wages/conditions, climatology, frost, schools, World War Two, allotments, rabbits, water supply, child labour, milkman, farmer, cinema, army, TRANSPORT, gas, STEWARTBY, WOOTTON, Kempston Wood End Green