Leaving school at the age of fourteen was a very bad time. The country was in a very deep depression with around three million people unemployed. So to find work was practically impossible. I had various short time jobs including working on a milk float, working for Hills Bakery, a short time as the golf pro’s shop keeper on Shaw Hill and then at a joiner and cabinet makers in Chorley. That employer apparently employed cheap labour. When he had a contract he would take an extra lad on and then finish him. I didn’t know at the time as I thought I was right for an apprenticeship but we found out later that was what he did. Even his senior lad was finished when he was approaching twenty-one as he would have had to be paid full rate. His name was Owen Griffiths, a very nice lad and the first “King’s Scout” in Chorley. To be a King’s Scout one had to be a first class badge scout and pass four King’s Scout badges. Owen joined the peace time army and was killed in the battle for Hong Kong, Christmas 1941. He is interred at the cemetery in Hong Kong.
Around 1932/1933 my mother bought me a bicycle, a B.S.A. and which I insisted should have a three speed, as that was a big help in cycling, being able to go in smaller gear uphill and faster on the level. We bought it at a cycle shop in Chorley, near the big lamp. The shop owner was named Daniel Hesketh, being one of the main cycle shops in Chorley. The cycle cost £5-19-6, plus an extra 6d for the bell. A three speed was always a pound more than a single. I rode it home and used it a great deal, especially when I started work at Leyland in 1935 (11/2). I had that cycle till 1938, September, when I sold it in part exchange for a more modern one which had a dynamo hub fitted, which made the light as you rode (make Raleigh, bought at Balls, Towngate, Leyland). The cost of the new cycle was £7-10-00, which I had to pay for myself, even though I was using it for transport to work. That September was the month of the Munich crisis when Neville Chamberlain visited Hitler and came back with the notorious piece of paper, declaring “Peace in our time.” One year!! On the earlier bicycle I had a lamp fitted, which we could detach, but later became more modern when I had a dynamo fitted which rotated on the rear wheel, giving light to back and front. Rear lamps later became compulsory; up to then one just had a rear reflector. Whilst at work one had to take out one’s rear light bulb to avoid it being stolen.
After I was dismissed from the joiner I had no option but to go in the mill and learn to weave. Previous to all that, my mother had taken me to Leyland Motors factory at Grime Street, Chorley to see if I could be employed. The maximum age for an apprenticeship was sixteen. Mum requested the works manager to come out to her for an interview, which he did. He told the employment manager to arrange that I sat for the apprentice exam which was held at the Day School in Leyland. One had to pass this examination to ensure you got an apprenticeship. I received the letter informing me that I was to sit, so the day came for me to go to Leyland. The only way to get there was to walk as there was no bus service. I had got part way when I realized I had not got my letter of introduction so I raced back and poor mum was in rather a state as she realized I had not taken my letter. However, I raced to Leyland and was in time and a few days later my parents received notification that I had passed and would be employed when there was a vacancy. That was in 1931.
We kept waiting and waiting but no letter came. I understood later that if your father or someone was already in the works you would have a chance. This I proved, as a boy who was in my night school class and sat for the test a month after me was taken on – his father worked for Leyland. I never did get the apprenticeship. My night-school years started when I was just fourteen. My first year was not a success but I went for the same course again and the following year the teacher personally complimented me in the front of the class for sticking it out. My weakness the earlier year had apparently been maths along with my youth and not paying enough attention. I passed quite well and the following year went to Chorley Technical College, which of course later became Chorley Grammar School. That year there were only two of us who received a first class pass which meant you had to have a first in all four subjects, one, of course, being maths. I was very pleased with that. The following year I took first-year cotton weaving and again got a first in maths and second in the remaining subjects. The night school terms lasted from September until April the following year. During that summer whilst I was working in the mill, one evening I went for a cycle ride with a very good friend of mine and casually mentioned if he got the chance, as he worked at Leyland head works, would he speak for me. I started my second year in cotton weaving. Arriving home one evening, my mother informed me that the friend, Arthur Walmsley, had been down and told them there was a vacancy where Arthur worked in the Service Department. I was eighteen and seemed resigned to the mill which was soul-destroying. After much consideration, I asked mum and dad their opinion. Dad said not to go. Mum said, “You go lad”. So on the Saturday morning after we finished at 10.30am I cycled down to Leyland and was introduced to my future manager. I had then to give seven days notice at the mill and on the eleventh of February 1935, I commenced what was to be forty-four years including my war service. One night after work whilst I was still seventeen I had cycled to Preston to the Army recruiters centre to see about joining the army, but I was underage. I was informed to come back when I turned eighteen. My parents never knew that I had been, but I told my sister. How fate takes a hand! If I had joined then I would have been in at the outbreak in 1939. I was so fed up with the mill I wanted to get out at any cost. It was a good job I did as the cotton industry went into complete decline.
Continue to 11. Leyland Motors & Alice Pearson