My dads breakfast story

I like my dads story it is my equivalent of a wheelbarrow. It makes me think that the idea of sending trainee enginners to work with the men who will later entrust their lives to them was a good thing and probably reduced the number of switching errors. It a made me think of the relationship we have to the land and how because we can manipulate it so much with machinary we think we are more incharge than we are - like the floods in Sheffield in this day and age. it makes 1958 seem like a long time ago. I wish I was good with an axe I'd like to be good with an axe and able to draw so if I ever got the opportunity to do these activities in front of other people who could do them they would say "Boy that bloke is good with an axe" or "He has a good hand look at the way he holds a pencil he is clearly very good at drawing" alas I will never be very good with a pencil or an axe I will just have to become good at living with this fact.

The breakfast

It must have been in late October or early November 1958, I was a student apprentice working for Yorkshire Electricity based at Goole. The student apprenticeship trained its candidates to be electrical engineers for the power industry. They believed that, for an overall knowledge, the apprentice had to work in each discipline within the company.

I had already worked with the electricians on housing and industrial wiring and on appliance repairs. I had also spent the summer working at Ferrybridge power station, (the old little one on the river edge).
So it was me for the overhead line section. The staff had a cowboy attitude; ‘the mail has to get through’ spirit. They were tough no-nonsense men. They constantly bantered with anyone who in their eyes didn’t come up to scratch. As a new boy I had to absorb some of this. I mixed in with the best of them and won respect because I would do anything they had to do and was better than anyone with an axe. This was due to me being a lumberjack for nine months prior to working at YEB.

I loved the work - it was extremely variable; marking out routes, erecting poles, fixing steelwork and pulling out conductors and erecting them. It is strange that all this activity took place without mechanical aids but by manpower. By the time I became an engineer all this was replaced with JCBs, Land Rovers and Simon lifts - now only 4 linesmen are needed in a gang.

So back to the old days: a gang had a ‘Ganger’ who was in overall control and a driver, who did nothing but drive a big lorry that transported men sitting on planks across the lorry and all materials to site. The lorry had a lift-off canvas cover which, when off the wagon, was called ‘a Bivvy’. There were four linesmen who did the climbing and two mates who assisted in the climbing, with three labourers lifting, carrying and digging post holes and stay holes. The oldest labourer was in charge of the Bivvy and the fire and messing facilities.

So, on the first day we drove to site and lifted off the Bivvy to the Ganger’s instructions. He was a man of about 58 years at this time called Raith Penistone and it’s his breakfast. ‘Right lads’, he said, ‘Let’s get to it. Les, get the fire going well - we’re gonna supp’ at 1000 –ish’. Everyone set off to perform different tasks over a three to four hundred yard area of open fields. Les Asp was in charge of the fire. This was known as a ‘Fire Devil’ - it was the size of a five gallon oil drum with holes in it to let in the air. Les chopped firewood from scrap poles and lit it in the Fire Devil. We were supplied with coke which was then put in and the whole devil glowed with raw heat until we left site at 1500. Raith blew a whistle at 1000, ‘Get yer arses here’, he shouted, ‘We’ve only got fifteen minutes’.

Raith, being head man, was first to the fire. He carried a shovel which they all used called a ‘Grafter’, designed originally for draining. All the shovels were bright from use. He went into his snap box and took out a large parcel then looked at me grinned and said, ‘This’ll do, they belly good but tha int havin any’. He wiped his shovel on his coat-sleeve, removing most of the mud but not all. ‘What’s tha looking at lad?’ he said to me, ‘It’ll be sterilized in a minute’. He put the shovel on top of the fire. Steam came off after a couple of minutes, the blade was very hot. He opened his snap box, took out a large lump of ham and tossed it onto the plate. He then removed an egg and smashed it, shell and all, onto the ham. It sizzled away merrily. He removed two large slices of white thick bread, placed the ham and egg with shell between the slices and began eating. ‘He’s a real gourmet cook is our Raith, an no mistake’, one of the men said.

After about fifteen to twenty minutes Raith stood up shouted back to work, ‘You lazy buggers’, and peed onto the fire. A cloud of fumes was emitted and everyone dived for the outside. ‘Was that for my benefit?’, I asked someone. ‘It’s for no bugger’s benefit’, was the reply, ‘The daft bugger does it every day’. And he did. He was still doing it in 1965 when I, by then an engineer, shook his hand as he retired. He said to me then, ‘You want ser bad lad but we’ve had some shite doing yer job’.


Gordon Pool
October 2007