Buzby's Boys

Chapter One

"Do Be Careful 007"

I looked expectantly at the gleaming chrome keys that were offered in my direction. The official looking key fob attached had the writing SWG 370S written in ball-point pen. My Inspector looked at me somewhat amused as a rather silly looking young man of nineteen grinned like a kid on Christmas Day opening his presents. We walked to the back of the van. Behind it lay neat bundles of various pieces of kit mostly designed for one of two purposes.

The first group of items enabled its user to climb telephone poles and the second would hopefully stop you from falling off once you were there. My boss duly went through each item and ceremoniously handed them to me as he ticked off each article from the long list on his clipboard. The items had very military, backwards way round names. My boss chanted "Ladder Poles No. 4, Belts Safety No.3, Dispenser Dropwire No. 1." My imagination took over and I'm sure I heard a Bingo shout of "House!". My gaffer looked like Q in the James Bond films demonstrating 007's latest bit of trick gadgetry. I expected him to say to me " Do be careful 007" a la Desmond Llewellyn, but no not this time.

I realised that this mental imagery had put an unconscious smirk on my face. I quickly regained my "look serious" face for the benefit of my boss who was by now half way down my kit allocation, not easy for me since I had always had an uncontrollable urge to take the piss out of every situation whenever possible. I was part of the Monty Python generation who ridiculed formality of any kind especially the red tape so loved by all government departments, one of whom now employed me, namely The Post Office Telephones.

"Q" finished his list and handed me the paperwork which foolishly entrusted to my care thousands of pounds worth of government property. I signed without looking at the form. I could have been signing my own death warrant for all I knew, but I figured this was probably not the Post Office's policy. I loaded all my new possessions aboard my nice brand new, shiney Commer van which was painted in Post Office puke yellow and plastered with Buzby stickers on the back door and on both sides. "Post Office Telecommunications" was written in seventies sci-fi font, you know those quadruple lines that you see in space films. Obviously someone upstairs thought this would make us look very futuristic.

Buzby was the little cartoon bird that appeared on the TV commercials promoting the use of the telephone. The blokes hated it because everywhere you went little kids would point at your van laughing and shouting "Buzby, Buzby!"

Unfortunately for us there was a record in the charts called "Telephone Man", a rendition of which greeted us wherever we went. You'd be working in someone's house and their bratty little offspring would kick off with "Hey baby I'm your telephone man," to which you would force a wry smile pretending you'd never heard it before when in reality you'd been subjected to it for the twentieth time that day.

I jumped into the driver's seat and pressed the key into the ignition. A quick cough from the engine and we were off to embark on my new career as a telephone engineer and stake my claim to history. As I headed for the exit I decided I could better achieve this if I had some petrol in the tank so I drove onto the street and back around to the "Ingate."

Not the best start.............. "Do pay attention 007".

The ubiquitous Commer van (picture courtesy of www.povehclub.org.uk/ )

Maltravers Road T.E.C. as it is today.

The building is still the same despite BT selling it several years ago.

It is now a business centre.

 

Maltravers Road "Ingate" pictured 17th July 2003.

The MT section exit door was sited about where

the first vehicle is. At the top of the drive you would

turn right into the vehicle compound.

 

 

Two of my old friends from my first staff IS 113 (later 111). Graham Cryer (left) and Tony Hardwick (right) pictured in the early eighties. Graham started about the same time as me in 1977 and we trained together at Otley. Tony was one of the senior men on our staff and was a great inspiration to the new lads. I helped out a few times on the Payphone Kiosk Party with Graham, Tony and the late Doug Johnson. Doug was a great bloke and we were all much saddened by his tragic death in 1980.

New feature Post Office Telephones/BT MT Section

The vehicle compound at Maltravers Road T.E.C. Sheffield. The carwash wasn't there in my time. This is more or less the view from our workshop taken in 1990 by Dave Milner.

Photo by kind permission. More photos of BritishTelecom, Sheffield on Dave's excellent site at: http://www.citysnapper.org/btsf/

Link To The Sheffield Bus Museum

Chapter Two

Everything By The Book

I had by this time worked for the Post Office for about three months. My days had been spent learning the job with other lads and on training courses at the Post Office Telephones training school at Otley, West Yorkshire. It soon became apparent that there were two distinct approaches to our work. One was by the book and the other was the obvious, easy way. The main departure from official procedure occurred when we had to span telephone cable, called Dropwire, across a road from a building to a telephone pole. The book had you ponsing around with all manner of pullies and ropes while the favoured way was more direct and involved dashing across a road carrying your dropwire dispenser with cable running out behind you. This was followed by a quick climb up the pole with the Dropwire over your shoulder. Hopefully you'd get to the top of the pole before a passing lorry dragged you to the ground resulting in a horrible death which would be most inconvenient as it would generate reams of paperwork.

My base, which we called the T.E.C. (Telephone Engineering Centre), was located at Maltravers Road in Sheffield. It consisted of a large vehicle compound wrapped around a five-storey office and workshops building. There was a one-way traffic system from the Ingate through the compound, which contained petrol and diesel pumps, to the Outgate. Just in case you temporarily forgot which was which someone had taken the trouble to write "In" an "Out" on each of the gates. The site sloped down to the gates with the motor workshops located in the basement near the main exit. This workshop was where our vehicles were serviced and was known as MT Section. It stretched right through under the main building and had its exit near the In ramp. It seemed strange to me, and many others, that a workshop where vehicles were worked upon was allowed to be housed under an office building. The consequences of a fire in the MT workshops didn't bear thinking about. Our building was however Crown Property and therefore conveniently exempt from fire regulations. It struck me as a wonderful piece of hypocrisy that government owned buildings did not have to bother with regulations that were mandatory everywhere else. I suppose we were viewed as expendable.

Other than sitting on a time bomb our building was quite comfy. It was a typical government building. Everything was formally regimented and the décor was in the early cheapo style. Gory dark blue paint was splodged on the metal window frames. Our painter was so enthusiastic in his work that he did not stop painting simply because his brush encountered glass. Rules and regulations abounded. Notices for this, warnings about that, all signed by The Telephone Manager, all totally ignored.

That's the strange thing about people who work in an overly regimented workplace. Because it's impossible to conform to the plethora of regulations you simply ignore them all, even the sensible ones. An air of British eccentricity pervaded the place. A mood of "ignore the bullshit and it will go away" was firmly part of the psyche. It seemed like the same attitude that existed in the army had found its way into our job. This was not surprising, as many of the older blokes had served in the forces; some had been in the war.

These men were real characters. They had seen and done it all before. They had no respect for anyone or anything particularly petty bureaucracy. When you've fought a war as a young man everything looks irrelevant and trivial afterwards. These men had a refreshing couldn't give a damn irreverence to all and sundry, the worst cases of which were reserved for our illustrious leaders. They also loved a good laugh, particularly if it was at the expense of one of our bosses.

We reported to a signing on room on the first floor. Each morning I would park my car and walk across the compound through rows of identical yellow vans, up a flight of concrete stairs and into the large room where about a hundred of us would congregate. There was always a steady procession of my workmates who would join my journey across the yard. We would sign on and pick up our work from advice notes left in our pigeonholes. We were divided into small groups called staffs. I was on IS 113 which had about fifteen blokes attached to it. You see all very military. As we assembled each morning we would take turns to speak, via a private line, to our control located in Telephone House in the centre of Sheffield. We had to wait in a queue as one man after another checked off his work with our control. The other staffs formed a dozen or so identical lines.

In our case our controller was Terry, a guy in his fifties who had previously been an engineer. He was now our Distribution Officer or D.O. That was the way of things then, men were promoted from the ranks and this usually meant that the older a man was the higher his rank. The dead men's shoes school of management prevailed. There was a certain logic to this, as the work involved climbing telephone poles and was very much a young man's sport. We in turn were safe in the knowledge that as we matured we would be promoted up the pecking order to a less physically demanding job with better pay. The more experienced men supervised the young bucks. All very ordered and logical really.

Terry's morning patter was always the same. He had to check that each man he had got the relevant advice notes for that day's appointments. Terry's speech was all "thee's" and "tha's".

He would say in his broad Sheffield accent, " Morning Dennis, two fo dee mate." I had been brought up in the slightly posher, more middle class suburbs of Sheffield and for the first few months I needed a broad Sheffield phrase book. But I liked these men. They were down to earth with no pretentiousness and swore a lot which to a nineteen-year-old boy was pretty cool. They were the first grown men I'd ever seen acting daft and fooling around. We were like a big family and we all looked out for one another. The older blokes would look after the younger lads and dole out discipline in the form of outrageous piss taking to any young lad who got too big for his boots.

It was a very secure atmosphere for me. At last I belonged, I had a role in life, people accepted me. I had good friends who would stand by me and help me out. There was an "all for one and one for all", philosophy. I look back now with a great deal of affection to this time, in the late seventies, when life for me was good. Sadly most of the older blokes have died in the intervening years but I still hold these men in high regard.

There was a strange ceremony performed each morning as we walked in the signing on room. For some reason, no one knew why, every time you walked into the room a chorus of "Na then bleeder" would erupt from the blokes already assembled. You could ascertain your popularity by the volume of the daily greeting. The louder the shouts of "Na then bleeder, I thought tha'd pissed off," the more popular you were. The older blokes were greeted by a cacophony of shouts while we new boys were only treated to a modest ripple. As your popularity increased so did the volume of your morning greeting. A sort of audible awards scheme that you could measure every morning. There was a technique of verbal delivery involved too. They would talk out of the side of their mouths thus creating the correct whining noise.

Leader of the "na' then bleeder" brigade was a really nice man called Frankie. He was something of a legend when I first met him. He was a small squat guy in his fifties who always had a smile on his face and a pleasant greeting even if he hardly knew you. He had served on submarines during the war and now didn't give a flying toss about anything. His job was Survey Officer and because of this everyone knew him.

Frankie stories abounded and everyone had some anecdote about him. We had a T1 (foreman) called Tony who had known Frankie for years. Tony would enthral us with Frankisms past and present. Tony told me that Frank used to work in a four-man gang with him in the late fifties/early sixties. They used to put up poles and install telephones when hardly anyone had one at home. Frankie was foreman of their gang and during a job out in the Hope Valley, near Sheffield, Frankie's gang had to put up a pole near a cement works. The ground out there was rock at about two feet depth and so it was common practice to use Gelignite to blow a deep enough hole. Frank had to calculate the amount of explosive to do the job. Unfortunately his maths was not too good and he somewhat over-estimated the required amount. Frank got the blokes back to a safe distance and detonated the charge. The thing went up like Hiroshima and because of its proximity to the cement works lifted a huge cloud of white dust into the air, which promptly came back down to earth right on top of Frank. His concerned colleagues rushed forward fearing the worst only to collapse laughing as Frankie staggered out of the cloud looking like a flour grader in the Homepride advert. Frankie voiced his considered opinion about the success of the operation by announcing "Bloody hell I think I put a bit too much in the bastard".

Tony told me that they would sometimes while away afternoons by blasting a manhole cover into the air to see who could project it furthest skyward. Bets were taken and a form of blasting Olympics developed. My own favourite Frankie story was told to me by Reg another one of the older lads.

During their gang days in the fifties they would drive down to Fitzalan Square in the centre of Sheffield. There was always a copper on traffic duty in the centre of the square. This was before traffic lights and the old bobby would direct operations at this busy intersection. Anyway the lads in the back of the lorry would bang on the old flip up indicators causing both of them to pop up simultaneously as they approached P.C. Plod.

By the fourth day the good constable had decided the joke had worn a bit thin so he pulled them up and gave the driver a stern warning that he would book him if he did not give a clear signal the next time they came through. Next day the copper was waiting for Frankie's lorry and as it approached a life sized plastic dummy's arm promptly came out of the window signalling a left turn. The arm was painted pillar-box red. The Policeman burst out laughing and waved them through as Frankie winked at him through the open window. The copper shouted "Cheeky bastard" as they sped past.

I loved all those stories about a time when the pace of life was slower than it is today. People took the time to enjoy life and did not worry about the material things or the self-image obsession of today. Back in 1977 when I joined the Post Office we were in a summer of contentment safe in the knowledge that we had a secure job with good pay and a pension at the end. This was of course before Mrs. Thatcher did her hatchet job on us. But back then all of that was yet to happen and we felt very happy with life. We worked hard but enjoyed our work and our mates' companionship. Back stabbing a colleague was a hanging offence and we covered each other's backs. We were a team of men who would stick together and not creep to our bosses.

Things are different now. People are scared and have no security not even in the jobs where it was once guaranteed for life. They will backstab and creep their way up the career ladder only to be tossed to the lions when they have served their purpose. I saw some fat Tory on the telly the other day suggesting that there were a lot of people who were near to retirement fiddling the system by being on Invalidity Benefit and that this was obvious because of the rise in the number of claimants. He then went on to quote loads of meaningless statistics to prove his point. There's a man who has never done an honest days work in his life. Its O.K. for him, he will get a fat pension when he's sixty.

Nowadays once your forty no one will employ you and as soon as you have an injury you're fired. At the Post Office our storeman were the old crocks who had done their time climbing poles in the middle of winter and had the arthritis to prove it. When they were injured or too old to do the outside work they were found a job in the stores to bat out their time. It was then the gold watch job and off to a peaceful retirement. Nowadays they'd get fired and thrown to a world that doesn't want you because you're too old or crocked from years of service to an employer who doesn't give a toss. You're then called a scrounger by some arrogant, upper-class yob who made his fortune by the hard work of having been born into a rich family.

Chapter Three

The Good, The Bad And The Ugly

In 1977 we were an odd looking bunch. We were mainly in our late teens or early twenties. This was because the Post Office had recruited large numbers of engineers to satisfy the British public's sudden desire to be put on the telephone. People were waiting a year or more for service such was the demand.

Clothing and hairstyles were pretty bizarre at that time. Long hair and droopy moustaches were in and I'm sure we looked like a gang of Mexican bandits at times. Some of the older lads had perfected the Charles Bronson look. Ford Capris, particularly the silver Bodie type (from the TV series The Professionals) were in plentiful supply in our car park. I had one myself and I thought I was really cool as I drove it around town posing. I looked particularly Mexican bandit as I had a moustache and long dark curly hair. In the summers I got very tanned because of the outdoor work and at times I could have posed as an Arab camel trader.

Young men and their cars are an easy source of mirth and many a piss-take ensued because of our collective obsession with our cars. One particular lad always had something flash to drive and he'd buy a different car every few months.

One day he shepherded us out to the car park to admire his latest set of wheels. It was a silver Ford, which he had lovingly polished to an eye watering shine. We collectively made all the correct approving noises as he demonstrated all the on-board gadgets just a little too much. There is a fine line when showing off such a device and this lad had just galloped over it at full tilt. A piss-take was inevitable and I decided I was the man for the job.

He always parked his car right next to the building in the same spot. Conveniently for me we were having some building work done on the roof and scaffolding had been in place for a couple of weeks prior to the silver Ford's grand coming out party. I retrieved about a dozen bricks from the builder's skip and lovingly placed them around the silver Ford. The addition of a foam "brick" painted red and placed on the bonnet was the final touch to my plan. I briefed the other lads to go along with whatever I said and waited for the silver Ford's proud owner to appear. My victim duly arrived and as we talked in the signing on room I shouted "Bloody hell look at that," everyone turned around to look at me and then look in the direction of my pointing finger.

"What's up Dennis?" was the collective enquiry.

"A load of bricks have just dropped past the window" I exclaimed with as much panic as I could muster despite almost pissing myself.

A gaggle of blokes pressed against the window and looked down thirty feet to the car park below. The silver Ford's owner was almost frantic as he pushed to the front dreading what he was going to see. Sure enough his worst nightmare had come true, for as he looked down to his parking place he saw a load of bricks lying all around his pride and joy. Close to tears he rushed to his baby and as he lifted the "brick" from the bonnet its lack of weight almost caused him to throw it over his shoulder. He realised he'd been had and made the mistake of glancing up just in time to see a couple of dozen silly faces looking back at him all rolling with laughter.

I soon developed a reputation as a practical joker. I was reminded of possibly my finest hour when years later I bumped into an old colleague called Alan in a pub. Over a pint we reminisced about the old days and Alan said to me "I'll never forget the one you pulled on old Dwarf".

Dwarf got his nickname for obvious reasons. He was about five feet nothing and had a habit of being the butt of a lot of wind-ups. He was a nice bloke but was the type of guy who always had a new hobby. One week it was CB radio, the next photography. This hobby endeared him to the lads because he was in charge of the Post Office's camera club. This club's main activity seemed to be photographing young women with very few clothes on, often none at all, hence Dwarf's sudden popularity. He seemed to have endless albums of his snaps, which he would periodically share with us. Apparently most of these young ladies were students trying to make extra cash and Dwarf duly obliged.

He also used to dress up as Buzby for promotional events. He had his own little Buzby costume complete with head, yellow body with wings and a pair of red tights. We all thought it was hilarious until we saw how much overtime he was getting for his appearences at the various shows in the area. He once got stopped by the Police on the way to an event and he had to get out of his car wearing the Buzby outfit. I understand the constable was somewhat shocked to find that Dwarf's Ford Escort was being driven by a small yellow bird.

I have to set up the story. Dwarf had got permission to leave a quarter of an hour earlier than the rest of us in order to pick his kids up from school. This broke rule number one:

1. Never do anything different from everyone else.

This is because the piss-takers will undoubtedly take aim in your direction. When avoiding piss-takers there is only one defence and that is to stay firmly in the crowd. Dwarf had obviously forgotten this. Every night as he left us to go home he was treated to a rendition of "Hi ho, hi ho, its home from work we go" followed by the Snow White and the Seven Dwarf's whistling. After a couple of weeks Dwarf forgot about rule number two which is;

2. Never let the piss-takers know they have rattled you.

Otherwise…

Dwarf started to retaliate with shouts of "Childish wankers", as he skipped through the exit. I obtained a tape of the sound track of the film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and I carefully copied the relevant song onto a cassette, which I took to work along with a portable player. One of the lads, Roger, had a loud hailer (don't ask why), which was duly installed along with the cassette player in a desk drawer near a window that overlooked the car park. I gathered the lads for a final briefing barely stifling my giggles. I told them not to serenade Dwarf as he left and to let me do the talking.

Dwarf's early departure was duly ignored by the erstwhile choristers, which caught him on the hop.

"What's up with the singing?" he inquired.

"Oh we've got fed up of it, it's childish," I answered in our joint defence.

"Its about time you grew up.... you tossers," muttered Dwarf as he slammed the door behind him. The expression lamb to the slaughter sprang to mind.

I knew Dwarf always used the lift to go down to the car park. He would then have to go about a 100 yards diagonally across the compound to get to his car. As soon as he had left our room I rushed to the desk containing my cobbled together public address system. I placed the cassette player on the desk and held the loud hailer's mike over the speaker. The bullhorn, which was attached to the mike by a long curly cord, was placed on the ledge of the open window and pointed in the direction of the musical ambush as we waited for Dwarf to appear below. Just to be on the safe side I'd turned the volume to maximum. Sure enough we saw Dwarf about to cross the compound that was by now packed with blokes parking their vehicles, talking to various gaffers, and generally milling around. I hit the play button and right on cue a deafening rendition of the Snow White original soundtrack blared across the yard.........

"HI HO! HI HO! IT'S HOME FROM WORK WE GO!!!........".

As we stared out of the windows, about a hundred faces turned as one towards the racket that was screeching at full belt from our window. My eyes were focussed on Dwarf who was by now over the initial shock and displaying an appropriate hand signal in my direction. Roger shouted over the din....

"For Christ sake turn it off".

But I wanted savour the moment, which I did until Dwarf's still gesturing hand disappeared as he drove his car out of the gate.

Roger, by this time, had worked out that the list of people who had access to a loud hailer consisted of his name and no one else's. He was therefore likely to get the blame should any bosses make an attempt to find the culprit. The rest of the lads were concentrating on controlling their bladder function and were rolling around doubled up. I sat back and milked the applause of my appreciative public. This was surely my finest hour.

One of the funniest things that happened to Dwarf was at the Sheffield Show. Dwarf A.K.A. Buzby was entertaining the crowds at Hillsborough Park next to the football ground. He used to go to shows with the Post Office Telephones promotions department and on this particular day he was dressed as Buzby walking around the show grounds shaking hands with children and old age pensioners while his promotions colleagues handed out brochures.

Unfortunately the activity attracted a gang of skinheads who surrounded Dwarf and began to push him to each other just for a laugh. As Dwarf was being man-handled he was shoved particularly hard towards one of the skinheads. His wooden Buzby beak caught this moron right on the bridge of his nose which was broken by the impact. He screamed "Buzby's stuck the nut on me" as blood gushed from his busted nose.

Well done Dwarf!!

 

 

Post Office Test Telephone 280

 

Eddie and The Hot Rods

"Do Anything You Wanna Do"

Big summer hit of 1977. Great song which I've just learnt to play on the guitar after all these years. Eddie and the Hot Rods were arguably the first of the "second wave" of Punk.

 

The Stranglers

"Golden Brown"

Another hit from the summer of 1977. We used to hear it all over town when we were at Otley Training School.

 

Elvis songs "Suspicion", "Moody Blue", "The Wonder Of You", "I Just Can't Help Believing" and "Suspicious Minds".

Elvis died a month after I joined Post Office Telephones and a result all his records were played constantly on the radio at the time. I'll never forget the shock of Elvis' death. I was told the news by my mate Ian Saunders who used to pick me up in the mornings to go to work. Ian later became Lord Mayor of Sheffield and everytime I saw him or his picture in the papers I would think about Elvis.

 

Chapter Four

Rules Of Engagement

I should point out that the noble art of piss taking did have very strict rules. Firstly a piss-taker should never focus his aim for malevolent reasons. Never use it to bully or humiliate anyone. The main reason for the activity is to give everyone, including the victim, a jolly good laugh. I fell prey to various piss-takers and commended each of them for the precision and dexterity they achieved.

I once had a bad accident while driving my Post Office van. I stopped at some traffic lights and the lorry behind me didn't, ramming me into the car in front. I escaped from the resulting sardine tin with severe whiplash and a very stiff leg. This resulted in ten weeks off work while I recuperated. I returned as soon as possible to relieve the unbearable boredom I'd experienced during my enforced rest. I was left wearing a surgical collar for several months after which I knew broke rule number one;

1. Never stand out from the crowd.

I was certain that my arrival complete with neck brace would spark a volley of jokes and piss taking. Of course I was not disappointed. My sardine tin had been written off by my mishap and the lads on my staff had to unload all my kit when the vehicle was disposed of.

This free access to my belongings was of course an irresistible target and an opportunity too good to miss. My mate Bill set to work with a great deal of zeal. On my return I went to check my gear, which had been stashed away for me. I went through the various tools and found that all my screwdrivers had been lovingly filed away so as to render them useless. Old pots and pans had replaced my usual test equipment. Bent knives and forks had somehow found their way into my tool wallet. Of course this was a veiled welcome back, which we all enjoyed and laughed about.

Bill of course had a rather strange occurrence happen to him some weeks later. He arrived at a customer's property to find that on opening his toolbox instead of it housing his gear it now contained a couple of house bricks and nothing else. Despite a thorough search we never did find the culprit for that one.

These are the rules of engagement, if someone takes the piss out of you, laugh along with it and then when they've forgotten all about it strike back with an unexpected riposte. This may seem a bit childish but this behaviour does have a number of good things about it. Firstly the laughter gives everyone a feeling of comradery. Secondly it tests out a bloke's psyche, it gives you an insight into the man's character. If he can deal with a good piss take and laugh along he's probably a good bloke, a team player. If he doesn't laugh and gets stroppy, beware, he's most likely a bit of dickhead who takes himself far too seriously. Thirdly it acts as a kind of safety valve for the frustrations and conflicts that will inevitably develop between men who constantly work together.

I fell victim to Bill on several occasions and we were always good friends. His personal favourite was to tie a kipper to the exhaust of your van when you went away on holiday. On your return, after a few minutes driving, the rotting kipper got nice and hot and of course very smelly. Even if you disposed of Bill's fishy gift immediately you'd still have its lingering aroma to keep you company for at least couple of days.

He also thought it was jolly funny to turn his van's windscreen washers to point to the side so that when he pressed the button to activate them they would douse pedestrians standing at bus stops. He thought this was hilarious until somebody re-routed the pipe so it pointed at the van's unsuspecting driver who promptly got a face full of his own medicine.

One time I was driving back from Doncaster with a guy called Graham in a Bedford TK lorry. This vehicle had a large box behind the cab that acted as a storage area for all your gear. On the front of this box was a small door which when opened allowed long ladders to protrude out over the cab. The cab itself was separate from the cargo area at the back.

While we were loading up to leave Doncaster our mate Pete had gone into the back of the vehicle to put some stuff away. The only access door slammed behind him and was quickly locked leaving poor old Pete abandoned to the darkness, as there were no windows. Meanwhile the two pranksters were riding along in the front having a jolly good laugh at poor old Pete's predicament.

Suddenly there was banging on the cab roof. Pete had opened the small door and was now standing with his head and shoulders sticking out into the fresh air. We opened our windows to deliver a volley of suggestions about Pete's parentage all the while laughing and feeling pretty pleased with ourselves as we drove along. The banging stopped abruptly and the two of us, sitting comfortably in the front, thought that Pete had got bored with trying to disrupt our tranquillity. All of a sudden a big tarpaulin sheet fell across the windscreen completely blocking our view. Graham slammed on the brakes and a smirking Pete was liberated from his mobile cage. Touché!

On another trip back from Doncaster we were riding along in our Simon platform. This was a lorry with an elevated platform on the back rather like the ones that firemen use only smaller. We were driving along taking the piss out of people who were walking along the streets. There were four of us in the front and we were giving the pedestrians a real verbal mauling.

Strangely people kept turning around and glaring in our direction. We were comfortable in the knowledge that they could not possibly hear us as all the windows were shut, until someone realised that we had left on the intercom that linked the driver to the operator in the bucket on the back of the platform. All our abuse was being broadcast at full volume from the loud speaker on the back of the lorry. Oops.

A Simon platform in action

We decided not to waste the ability to reach our public and after some spurious announcements that the water supply was about to be cut off for three days, we treated the good people of Doncaster and Sheffield to a medley of Elvis's greatest hits which finished with a my grand finale of Suspicious Minds in the yard at Maltravers Road. One of our gaffers came to investigate the commotion and pushed his way through the throng of grinning blokes to our lorry. He gave the signal that our performance was at an end to which I replied in my best Elvis voice "Thank you very much Sir"

He didn't see the funny side of it and stomped off in a huff much to the amusement of our assembled fans. Shouts of "I'll get you Butler" done in the On The Buses "Blakey" voice rang out as the silly bugger marched off.

Chapter Five

Fox On The Run

It was about this time that I was introduced to a pompous oaf who was our boss's gaffer. This prat had somehow conned/brown nosed/blackmailed his way up the promotion ladder. He was known as Assistant Executive Engineer officially, but we had some rather more colourful names for him. Although he was from Sheffield he tried to put on a posh voice that never quite worked. He obviously considered himself to be above us mere mortals. We disagreed and vowed to bring him down a peg or two should the opportunity arise and sure enough it did.

One day I was working with a lad called Baz who was one of only three black guys at our place and he was a bit shy and reserved, because of this we all made a special attempt to make him feel welcome. This particular day Baz and I were working at a Water Board pumping station on a new housing estate at Chapletown, near Sheffield. Although it was a sunny day it had been pissing down with rain for several days before and the site was a real quagmire.

We had about ten spans of dropwire to put up to the pumping station, which was in the middle of a field. Ten poles had been newly erected especially for the job.

As we worked I noticed a Renault car parked in an entrance to the field about 200 yards away. It was pointing directly toward us and looked really out of place. I was immediately suspicious that we were being spied on, so I told Baz to do everything by the book as I thought it might be one of our bosses trying to catch us out. The work was carried out in a manner straight out of the training manual complete with helmets, high visibility jackets, eye shields the lot. Baz and I were really over acting securing all our ladders with ropes, a really epic performance laid on especially for our observers who obviously thought they were still undetected.

Eventually we arrived at the pumping station in time to see this silly little car bumping across the field towards us. Because of the soggy ground it slithered along as if driven by the world's drunkest driver. It duly arrived where we were working and out stepped our boss, Brian (who looked like Barney Miller from the TV series), along with his boss.

Our illustrious Assistant Executive Engineer had a very large pair of army field glasses strung loosely around his neck, which he clutched to his chest as he strode purposefully towards us. I looked at a smirking Baz and said "Bloody hell, its Rommel!" as Baz's face contorted into a stifled laugh.

The Desert Fox and his sidekick duly arrived next to us.

"We've had a birds eye view of you chaps working in the field," said Rommel trying to sound like a Spitfire pilot from a war film.

"Oh really, have you ?" I exclaimed trying my best to sound surprised.

"Yes we have, we've been watching you from over there for about an hour and I'm glad to see you using all the correct procedures. Now what's going on"?

" You can see more clearly from over here ", I said as I led him towards the muddiest part of the field.

Rommel realised why I was wearing my Wellington boots just as his own suede Hush Puppies squelched and then disappeared below the surface of the thick mire. As his shoes disappeared he tried to escape the ground's muddy clutches only to see his ankles go out of view soon followed by his lower leg, which made rather a mess of his nice light brown suit. Brian rushed to his boss's aid and after a couple of minutes wallowing the two of them squelched back to their car. I did a good impression of an innocent cherub as Baz and I waved them off as their car slewed across the field towards the road. As soon as they were out of sight Baz and I burst into uncontrolled laughter and suggested in his absence that the Desert Fox might stay in his office from now on.

On another occasion the Desert Fox decided to address the whole depot in the signing on room. We were all duly assembled and much hilarity ensued as about a hundred blokes speculated about the pearls of wisdom we were about to hear. Our Inspectors were also there and they took up a position at the front of the crowd facing us as Rommel entered the room looking a lot like Captain Mainwaring from Dad's Army. Muffled comments of "Pompous twat" murmured under several people's breath were greated with sniggers and more verbal observations.

The Desert Fox cleared his throat and began his speech as if he was conducting a briefing for a war time bombing raid on Dresden. After a few seconds sarcastic shouts of "We can't hear you at the back, old boy," echoed from the crowd together with more chuckles. Rommel, in the best Captain Mainwaring style, ordered one of his Inspectors to get a cable drum for him to stand on. Of course he expected one of the large drums (about three feet diameter) that stood at the back of the throng of blokes to be passed forward. Unfortunately some wag at the back threw a drum of jumper wire (about 6 inches diameter) which landed right at Rommel's feet.

The Inspectors thought this was as funny as we did but they were forced to stifle their laughter and collectively began to pull all sorts of funny faces trying to hold back the uncontrollable urge to laugh. We of course did our best to encourage their desire to burst out laughing with some funny faces of our own. The Desert Fox didn't understand the joke and asked again for a larger pedestal to orate from. Like the man said "Pompous twat"!

Chapter Six

Being Frank

Working from a van all day did have some obvious problems. The main one was toilet facilities or rather the lack of. It was O.K. in towns because you could always find a public loo, the locations of which were soon committed to memory. But when you were out in the sticks you had to rely on and ingenious device developed by the boffins at the Post Office officially known as Bowls G.I. (Government Issue). This was a euphemism for a piss pot which was an aluminium bowl about nine inches in diameter with a wooden handle on the side. The modus operandi involved you going in the back of the van having a slash in the Bowls G.I. and disposing of the contents in whatever way you could. That was when the fun started.

If your mate was in the back having a piss using said bowl, it was jolly funny to set off driving. As you sped down the road doing your best to get the van to perform all manner of acrobatics you could do a good impression of the roller coaster at Blackpool. The poor guy in the back looked like the crew from Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea as he bounced off the walls clutching his bowl in one hand and his manhood in the other. The resulting spillage would be hosed out ASAP. Of course timing was everything. Because of this many blokes had perfected the art of standing outside next to the van's side door in order to use the bowl. This was fine until the van set off driven by its smirking driver leaving the poor bloke to get arrested for indecent exposure. Even better was to set off very slowly in order to get your mate to do a desperate crab walk alongside in a vain effort to maintain his hiding place and his dignity.

Then there was the problem of emptying the bowl. The usual technique was to emerge from you back door and sling it to the side into the bushes. This was fine until a poor unsuspecting member of the public happened to be walking his dog past your parked van. Incidents of near misses abounded along with some reports of direct hits.

During his gang days Frankie used to have a crap in the back of the lorry. In those days telephone handsets were packaged in brown cardboard boxes awaiting installation and Frankie found that these boxes could also double a suitable receptacle for his morning crap. Only problem was that Frank thought it was rather nice to put these boxes back on the shelf after use where they would sit anonymously among the other boxes until the gang's fitter would sooner or later make the mistake of taking Frank's box thinking it contained a telephone.

Frank was once indulging in his morning ablutions in the back of the lorry safely behind the vehicle's roller shutter door when a rather demur lady customer came looking for him. Unfortunately she made the mistake of searching for Frank in the back of the lorry thus exposing the squatting gang foreman to the whole world or at least a quiet Sheffield suburb. As Frank clutched his copy Sporting Life the shocked lady realised her mistake and quickly slammed down the door leaving a bemused ex-submariner to continue his work in peace. Of course Frank told the entire depot about the incident in great detail as he thought it was hilarious.

Of course any job that entails climbing to, and working at, heights is by definition dangerous. In the late seventies there were still a lot of telephone poles well over fifty feet high and some as high as seventy. Oddly enough I had a fear of heights when I joined the Post Office Telephones. I didn't realise until then because I had never climbed anything higher than an occasional tree during my early life. Now I was expected to climb telephone poles for a living and so I had a fair amount of teeth gritting to get my head round the fact that I just had to conquer my fear.

Early in 1978 I encountered a huge tree trunk of a pole while working in the centre of Sheffield. It was located to the rear of some office premises and the telephone cables attached to it spanned right over a three storey building to the next street. I have to say that as I stood at the bottom and looked up I wished I had plumped for a cushy office job instead of the act of suicide I was about to attempt. The diameter of this giant Redwood look-a-like was about three feet and rose up to something that resembled a small twig at the top where shortly I was supposed to take up residence.

All poles had a mark carved on them telling you the year it was planted and its total length. I read the date, 1910, length seventy feet. This was about 1978 so the thing had been there for sixty-eight years . It was older than my granny and now I was expected to climb it. We used to tap the base of the pole in order to detect any rot. This was a rather hit or miss affair as the technique involved listening to the noise your hammer made as it came into rapid contact with the wood. A solid thump meant all was well while a twangy drum-like echo spelled disaster as this meant the pole was hollow due to wood rot and was liable to snap and fall over as you climbed it. In this case you would put a red D sign in place and report back. I did the tom-tom test and all sounded OK so I popped my ladders against the mighty Redwood (actually a Scots Pine) and began to climb it very nervously.

I got to the top of the ladder, which I secured with a rope as per the textbook as I didn't want my mum to miss out on the death benefit pay out on a technicality. I stepped onto the first steps and did a nifty impression of Lionel Blair in mid dance, as the rickety poles steps wobbled about due to their age. The generations of my telephone engineer forefathers who had trod this path before me, all the way back in time to 1910, had gradually slackened the three coach bolts that held each of the steps in place, not a nice feeling.

"Lionel" eventually made it to the top and safely belted in I looked out across the city. What a wonderful sight, Sheffield was bathed in a glow of early morning sunshine that glinted off the light mist that hung close to the ground seventy feet below. Office workers peered out of their windows at this reckless maniac working high above them. I'm sure there were bets being placed as to how long it would be before I plummeted to earth, but I didn't care. I was king of the world and now as I viewed my kingdom.

In that moment I realised I had conquered my own ghosts, my own fears. In my own small way I suppose I felt the same a Massai warrior does after he has just walked through a pride of hungry lions or an Aboriginal youth returning after spending weeks on walkabout in the Australian bush. The fact that I had, on my own, confronted my fear and beaten it had altered me. I suppose I had changed from a boy to a man. I look at some young lads today who do not have to face their own fears and as a result strut around with the cocky arrogance of a boy trapped in a man's body, a pitiful attempt to feel the way I felt that day in 1978. I have never needed to strut around doing the peacock bit. I have tested my own courage and I was moderately happy with the outcome. I didn't bottle it and I did not need spectators to be witness or to approve, I just needed to know myself. I've never told anyone about that day until now, because now I'm a middle-aged man and I don't have to prove myself anymore. I'm a has-been and I know it. I cannot do the things that once I did with ease but at least I do know something about myself that started as I looked out from the top of that monster pole in 1978.

I imagine men like Frankie went through the same "boy to man experience" sitting in his submarine as Hitler's depth charges attempted to make him another war casualty. That's probably why he was a better man than I will ever be, as my experience was quite tame in comparison to his. I respect him all the more because had I been put in that situation I don't know if I would have been found wanting in the bottle department. Luckily for me I was born in a different time to Frank, our paths crossed accidentally. I was from a generation who were not wrenched from their world as a boy to be thrust unwillingly into a man's world. My progress was easier.

Some years later Frank died. At his funeral a hundred or so yellow vans turned up to pay a final homage to a real hero. His family were choked that so many had turned up to remember our old friend. Due deference was paid to his old comrades from his wartime submarine days who proudly wore their old berets and medals. Old men who were now hunched, quiet figures that stood by an old friend's graveside in the early winter's chill. No doubt they remembered Frank the way they knew him, as a young man barely out of his teens with whom they had served and shared the joys and fears of a life they had not asked for and yet had joined them in a lifelong bond. As we drove in a long sweeping convey through Sheffield's city centre we passed Fitzalan Square. The length of the yellow convey had stopped the traffic and as we drove in silent tribute an old copper stood to attention and saluted the hearse.

Frank would have loved that.

 

Fitzalan Square, Sheffield circa 1913.

more old photos of Sheffield

Chapter Seven

Oops!

Over the years there were many foul ups and disasters that befell our intrepid heroes. Best of these was the time a certain Technical Officer was loading his van outside Police headquarters in Sheffield. At the time they were located on West Bar right in the city centre. Now this fellow had quite a lot of equipment to load up and so he pulled his van onto the wide pavement area outside the Police station's main entrance.

He duly completed the load up and pulled away in the direction of Maltravers Road. Unfortunately he had left behind his tool case. This looked like a large briefcase and it was now sitting rather suspiciously unattended right outside the main entrance of Sheffield's Police headquarters. Do remember this was in the late seventies when the IRA bomb campaign had made everyone, especially the Police, decidedly twitchy. Needless to say the suspect briefcase was soon spotted and a full bomb alert ensued. This was right in the middle of the evening rush hour and so created absolute chaos as roads were sealed off and the Bomb Squad arrived. After a quick recce a little mechanical robot was deployed to carry out a controlled explosion on the case. The contents of the tool case were examined and its hapless owner duly traced.

A very red faced Technical Officer was now known as "Tick-tock" by the lads as the piss taking knew no bounds. The poor man's life was a misery as open season was declared. Everyone had heard the story and as he made his way down any corridor he was treated to whispered "tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock" accompanied by people putting their fingers in their ears and crouching as if to anticipate an explosion. Poor guy, he never would live that one down. Some wag obtained an old tool-case identical to the one exploded by the bomb squad and burnt it with a blowlamp. This was duly mounted on a piece of polished wood and presented to him in front of the lads as a memento of his worst hour. Hats off to him he took it in good part. I was told that Tick-tock retired recently and was unfortunately reminded of this sorry saga at his leaving do.

Another time a mate of mine called Tony had to knock an earth spike into the ground outside a customer's house. This was done when the Post Office still had party lines and consisted of a large metal spike that was driven with a lump hammer into the ground to obtain an earth. Unfortunately they often came into contact with more than just soil and clay. Electricity cables, gas and water pipes all fell victim to this practice.

Tony was at a large house and needed to drive in an earth spike in the garden outside the front window. Unfortunately he made the mistake of not recceing the house first. Had he done so he would have realised that the house was on a steep slope and had a garage in the basement. Tony started to bang the spike into the soil, which went well enough until it reached a depth of about eighteen inches whereupon things started to get very difficult. Tony assumed that he must have hit a rock and so kept banging the spike for all he was worth. Suddenly the earth spike dropped about two feet in one go. Strange thought Tony still not piecing it together. More vigorous hammering saw the spike mercifully beneath the soil.

It was then that Tony saw a rather upset customer hurriedly making his way up the drive. Finally arriving puffing the man explained the subtle nuances of his home's design and walked with Tony into his basement garage which was located right under where Tony had just despatched the earth spike. Ooops! As Tony peered into the garage he saw a familiar sight as the earth spike had come through the garage's ceiling and continued its unfortunate journey straight into the poor man's fridge freezer which stood as an innocent bystander now complete with Tony's spike sticking into its top.

The Post Office coughed up for a new fridge and repaired the damage to the garage. Tony's ego was not as easy to patch up especially when he was reminded of the unfortunate incident every time he obtained earth spikes from the stores. "Watch out for the fridge Tony," was a frequent advice on such occasions.

I suppose the frequency of these disasters was caused by an intrinsically dangerous occupation working in combination with an inexperienced workforce. Whatever the reason, the story of many a mishap was retold again and again around the depot. The latest catalogue of woe gave us all a good laugh until it was your turn of course. My tally of blunders consisted of two water pipes, a gas main and an electricity cable plus of course many near misses. Add to this the problems of vehicles to the mix and quite a series of difficulties was bound to follow.

It is now that I must introduce the illustrious Post Office Commer van. This vehicle was the contraption of choice during the late seventies and early eighties. Its handling characteristics were similar to a plate of warm jelly being pushed with a snooker cue. The vagaries of its steering were legendary amongst us poor unfortunates who had to wrestle with it on a daily basis. Add to this young, inexperienced drivers and mayhem was bound to follow, and follow it did. Many of the lads could not drive when they were recruited and so were given a driving course which consisted of a full time programme which lasted two weeks, assuming of course you survived that long. The words "crash course" were frowned upon.

These rookie pilots were then introduced to the evil Commer van with no additional training and guess what? Wreckage was towed in from all over Sheffield and accident reports fluttered like confetti. We had a particularly dreadful driving school graduate who nobody would ride with. He was as spectacular as Evil Caneivel as he menaced the roads around Sheffield. He was called "Jacko Jackson" by the lads and his antics were legendary. He had the driving technique of Frank Spencer on Speed and we all assumed he had bribed the driving test examiner in order to obtain a license.

One day Jacko arrived to cadge something from me. I was working on a row of shops in the Firvale area and I had parked my van on the pavement outside the shop I was working in. I had gone into the back of my van to look for something and as I crouched there I saw the unmistakable shape of Jacko's battle scarred van approaching me at an alarming speed. My mind did a quick calculation and I realised that Jacko's brakes were unlikely to arrest his van's arrival in time. I wasn't disappointed as Jacko steamed into the back of my van's open rear doors. The impact knocked me backwards on my arse and my neatly arranged collection of Yellow Pages and Telephone Directories landed in a heap right on top of me along with the contents of the racked shelves. I eventually escaped from the model Mount Fuji and glared at Jacko as I shouted something appropriate to the occasion in his direction. Another accident report.

Jacko calamities were too frequent and eventually the powers that be could stand it no more. Jacko was moved to a non-driving job and the whole of Sheffield breathed a collective sigh of relief. Jacko of course was not on his own in the bad driving stakes.

I had a mate called Pete whose second name was Dyal, an interestingly appropriate name for a telephone engineer. Pete was riding shotgun with another guy who managed to overturn their van. This was easier than it sounds due to the top-heavy nature of a vehicle with heavy ladders on top and a very narrow front wheel track. Commer van over-turns were alarmingly frequent. Luckily Pete and his erstwhile chauffeur were unscathed except that Pete had banged his head. After the van had stopped rolling it came to rest upside down. Pete and his mate were left dangling from the seat belts like Virgil Tracy in a spin drier. As they dangled Pete lost his bearings and pressed the seat belt release button. Biff! He banged his head as gravity overcame common sense. He climbed from the van rubbing his head and felt his clothes, which were wet through. He assumed that he had been covered by the contents of the windscreen washer bottle that was located on the inside bulk head just in front of his legs.

They returned to HQ and after deciding to take a spare van, went to their next job. During the afternoon Pete began to notice that his wet clothes were starting to fray and tear alarmingly easily. Big holes began to appear in his shirt and trousers along with a stinging sensation on his skin. He began to realise that the fluid was not water from the washer bottle at all but dilute acid from the battery that had been located behind his seat. By the time he got back to the depot he looked like Robinson Crusoe much to our amusement. He was grabbed and unceremoniously hosed down in the yard by his concerned chums.

Chapter Eight

Nice Try Mate

I heard a nice story which highlights a certain over-optomistic adventure concerning a T1 installer. A chap called Keith had an installation to do at a large steelworks in Sheffield. For reasons only known to him he had decided to span a dropwire off the apex of a large shed. When I say large I mean about 80 feet high. Of course there was one flaw in Keith's plan and that was that his ladders only extended about 30 feet. Undaunted, Keith noticed a large crane standing with its operator near-by and after a quick discussion Keith had a masterplan in mind. He went back to the Stores and booked-out a full safety harness. This device had straps over and under each arm and eye-watering crotch straps as well.

Our hero hurried back to the steelworks for a final briefing with his new crane operator pal. Keith instructed him to hook the wire coming from the crane's jib onto his newly acquired safety harness which conveniently had a hook located on the front. The fact that this broke every rule in every single rule book known to man completely passed Keith by. The dare-devil twosome were by now joined by a small crowd of interested observers who helped Keith as he was winched like Peter Pan up into the air.

Higher and higher he went until he was alongside the apex of the 80 foot shed. Unfortunately as soon as he tried to wriggle closer to the building the harness slipped and turned our intrepid hero upside down where he dangled in a now helpless pose. The onlookers gasped as they tried to avoid the small shower of screwdivers and coins that a moment before were in Keith's pockets. The crane driver lowered Keith to safety and relieved onlookers helped him to his feet....

Nice try!

Chapter Nine

Sorry Ladies!

Accidents involving the public were mercifully rare but one instance is a shining example of the phrase "What can go wrong, will go wrong, sooner or later".

One Saturday a guy nicknamed "Chopper" and his colleague George were working in an elegant department store in Sheffield. The building's top floor had an attic that was the route for all the cabling running the length of the shop.

Chopper and George were tasked to run some cable through this loftspace. The attic had a long metal walkway from one end to the other which had the ceiling tiles of the floor below right underneath it. All was going well until George made the mistake of leaning too far out over the walkway's handrail. Unfortunately he slipped and landed rear-end first onto the ceiling tiles below, which of course broke leaving George's backside jammed in the metal framework.

Chopper was by chance walking down the corridor on the floor below and as he approached the shop's rather elegant restaurant it's large polished wooden swing doors burst open and a crowd of demur ladies spilled out coughing and spluttering, closely followed by a large cloud of dust. As George's posterior had gone through the ceiling the impact had brought down years of dust and general rubbish that had collected above the ceiling.

Chopper pushed his way into the resturant to investigate the commotion and as he did he happened to look up to see George's fat arse beautifully framed by the ceiling's metal supports. Little old dears were helped away from the mayhem by the shop's staff who had arrived to view the carnage. The once elegant restaurant now looked like a apartment in Beirut. Eventually George was delicately removed to safety.

There were some strange incidents that befell our heroes over the years. I was talking to an engineer called Trevor from Doncaster one day many years ago. We had been working together at the Finningley airfield and over lunch he related his own tale of woe.

Trevor had been having trouble with his knee cartilages for a while and one day while he was at the top of a telephone pole in the countryside outside Doncaster, his troublesome knees both locked solid. He stood there thirty feet in the air not able to move, as it is impossible to climb down from a pole without bending your knees. As much as he tried his poor knees wouldn't budge and so he stood there for a time wondering what to do. Luckily he had his linesman's telephone with him, so he clipped onto a line and rang his control in Sheffield and explained his plight to his sniggering Distribution Officer (D.O.). As he talked he could overhear his D.O. calling other members of staff over to tell them the story accompanied by the sound of much hilarity as the episode was flashed around the office. Finally the D.O. said he would have to contact the Fire Brigade in order to get poor old Trevor from his uncomfortable perch. Trevor agreed and resigned himself to wait for the Fire Brigade's arrival.

At last Trevor saw a large vehicle weaving its way up the lane towards him. Great thought Trevor the good old Fire Brigade are coming and I will soon be rescued. Unfortunately for Trevor the approaching truck was not the Fire Brigade at all. The D.O. thought that Trevor's predicament was so funny that he had alerted Calendar News as well as the Fire Service and guess what, Calendar News arrived first. Their vehicle pulled up alongside the hapless Trevor and after the crew had dismounted and set up their TV camera, they began an impromptu interview with the stranded telephone engineer. They told him that his plight was going to be transmitted on the evening news programme, which at that moment was not what Trevor wanted to hear. It was embarrassing enough to have to face the lads back at the depot without being the star of the news programme that night.

Eventually the Fire Brigade arrived and of course the brave fireman thought Trevor's plight was quite whimsical as well. They had only brought one fire engine with them and because Trevor is quite a large chap they didn't fancy man-handling him and his locked legs down a ladder.

They sent for a Simon platform which duly arrived after several hundred more feet of film had been exposed and many fireman interviews done. Shots of the stricken Trevor were now safely in the can guaranteeing he would have a very embarrassing time. Trevor was eventually saved by the still sniggering fireman and taken to hospital. He recovered physically but the piss-taking that followed his appearance on Calendar News knew no bounds. For the next few months poor old Trevor could not walk down the corridors at work without his chums doing a Douglas Bader imitation.

Chapter Eleven

Always Appreciate The Gravity Of The Situation

Here's a story that we could file under the mishaps and accidents section. An old friend of mine called Reg was working with a couple of colleagues on the old Kelvin flats in Sheffield. These flats were ten storey blocks of some notoriety and have since been demolished. This was about thirty years ago and the cabling inside the building had fallen into disrepair and was in need of a complete overhaul.

To this end Reg and the boys had been despatched to run new cabling throughout the building starting with the main distribution points, one of which was located on each floor. This meant that Reg and Co. had to run a large heavy cable from the roof area down the main riser. The riser was a shaft that ran the whole ten storeys from the roof to the basement. The idea was to take a cable trailer, which had a large cable drum on it, to the roof and run the cable off down the riser shaft to the floors below. Reg decided to take the cable end down the riser shaft himself.

He duly began to climb down the ladder that extended the whole way down to the basement. This ladder was bolted to the wall and as Reg looked down there was nothing between him and the basement floor ten storeys below. He held on to the cable and began his descent. As he pulled the cable down, the trailer on the roof allowed the large cable drum to rotate and feed off the cable. Unfortunately they had forgotten to put tension on the brake mechanism in order to stop the drum freewheeling. As Reg climbed further and further down the shaft the weight of the cable already drawn from the drum began to increase to a point where the cable hanging loose down the shaft exceeded the weight remaining on the drum.

Reg's mates, who were on the roof watching the cable drum slowly turn, began to notice that its rotational speed had started to increase faster and faster. By the time they had sussed out the physics responsible for this phenomena it was too late as the cable drum was by now whizzing round at an alarming rate. Poor old Reg was half way down the shaft and was quickly overtaken by the errant cable flying past him at high speed. All he could do was hang onto the ladder for grim death and wait trying to avoid the thick heavy cable as best he could. Eventually the end of the cable flew off the drum and very adroitly clipped Reg's helmeted head as it sped by on its way to the basement.

Reg and Co. went to the basement and opened the door to find about a kilometre of cable sitting on the floor like the world's largest plate of spaghetti.

Chapter Twelve

"Chocks Away Chaps"

Reg's other most embarrassing moment came at RAF Finningley, near Doncaster. Every year the RAF had an open weekend by way of an airshow and for this they required a lot of telephone lines to be installed for temporary use while the show was on. Of course this was regarded as a plum job for us and it was a great treat to be allowed to go there to do this work because you could get a sneak preview of the airshow. Most years the Red Arrows displayed there.

One particular year Reg had been selected to work at RAF Finningley and he and the other lads were having a whale of a time looking at the dozens of aircraft that were being flown in for the show. Planes from all over the world made their way to the airbase arriving the week before the airshow commenced.

Now there are very strict rules that apply when driving a vehicle on an airfield and one day Reg found out why. He was driving his lorry around the base using the access roads that criss-cross the airfield. Unfortunately Reg got slightly lost as he made his way round the base. Reg innocently tootled along without a care in the world until a RAF Land Rover screeched in front of him. The Land Rover had lots of flags attached to it and was obviously very important. It had a large sign on the back that said in very loud angry words "FOLLOW ME!" together with RAF personnel in the back who gestured widly as they pointed at the sign.

Reg had strayed onto the main runway and because of this RAF Finningley had ground to halt as aircraft were stacked in the skies above awaiting his removal. Reg very sheepishly slithered along behind the FOLLOW ME! wagon until he reached safety and he was then given a ticking off from a very fierce looking RAF Sergeant who graphically pointed out Reg's blunder.

Chapter 13

Going Loco At The Sheffield Show!

In 1979 I was asked to help Graham and Dougie with a job at the Sheffield Show which was to be held in Hillsborough Park next to Sheffield Wednesday's ground. As a fanatical Blades (Sheffield United) fan I had mixed feelings about being so close to a place known by Blades supporters as "The Pig Stye".

That year three radio stations had booked space at the show to do outside broadcasts live from the grounds. Radio One, Radio Sheffield and Radio Hallam all turned up with their outside broadcast units so that they could transmit live over the weekend of the show. To facilitate this the Post Office Telephones had been asked to provide several telephone lines as well as control circuits. Control circuits were private lines that connected the radio stations' on-site technicians with their studios back at their respective head-quarters. These circuits were vital to the radio people as without this direct contact with their base the broadcasts could not take place. Graham and I were charged with installing these important lines during the two weeks running up to the show. We knew the importance of these vital lines especially as three radio stations were involved.

Graham and I ran cable through the park to the locations required by the radio people. This was done by running 20 pair aerial cable through the trees that lined the roads along the park's perimeter. This was no problem as these lines were only temporarilly needed for the duration of the show. We completed the work in good time and handed over the circuits to the radio stations. We were then free to look around the show as the build up started and more and more people arrived to set up their displays. We had to stay at the show grounds in case any problems arose that needed urgent attention.

The show was due to open on the Saturday and on Friday afternoon Graham and I were enjoying ice lollies as we watched people arriving. There was quite a commotion by the main entrance as a large lorry with an old steam locomotive on the back slowly made its way onto the grounds. The lorry and locomotive were very high and because of this and our knowledge that we had just erected our telephone cables through the park we dashed across to stop the lorry and its crew. There were about six or seven railway enthusiasts accompanying the steam loco and this party seemed to be led by a man who was on top of the lorry. Graham shouted to him to be careful and told him about our cables. The thought of them being dragged down now didn't bear thinking about particularly as the radio outside broadcasts people were using their control circuits to carry out final checks prior to going live the next day.

The man on top of the lorry assured us that he had done this operation many times before and he knew all about the wires. Graham and I turned and walked away and we had got about fifty yards when our attention was grabbed by much shouting of the word "WO!" We hardly dared look and we turned slowly around to see the steam locomotive buried into the trees and the two severed ends of our cable resting on the ground. We ran towards the mayhem and I grabbed Graham just before his fist collided with the prat who had been on top of the lorry.

We were soon surrounded by BBC technicians who informed us that they had just "Lost London". "Do you think this is anything to do with it?" said Graham pointing at the severed cables. The loco man had by now made a strategic withdrawal and legged it across the park to get away from Graham.

Graham and I quickly got the two ends of the cable together and hastily reconnected everything, all of which worked first time. The show went ahead and Radio One, Radio Sheffield and Radio Hallam did their broadcasts. We never did see loco man again!

 

Chapter 14

Echoes From The Past.

 

Working in people's homes gives you a great insight into their lives. You get to meet a great cross-section of people, some good, some bad, most interesting. I'll always remember working in an old chap's house at Firth Park, Sheffield.

In the late seventies it was still quite common to see old men who were amputees. This was due to the war as many men lost arms and legs during the conflict. One such man was an old chap whose telephone I fitted in 1978. He lived alone and it was obvious that he was very lonely and isolated. He was very talkative and kept me enthralled with some of his stories of when he was younger. He'd lost both legs in an explosion during the war and was now virtually house-bound. He explained that his daughter was going to pay for his phone installation as he could not afford it on his war-pension. He'd also recently lost his wife who had died earlier that year.

The poor chap looked rather lost and alone. It was just coming up to my lunch-break and as I'd finished the job I made my preparations to leave. Then the old man handed me his scrapbook with cuttings and photos, which he had got from the side-board. The pictures were mainly of his wartime days and he gave me a running commentary about his old mates and the good times they'd had. It was then that I came to an old newspaper cutting about a soldier who had won the Military Medal at Arnham. I realised that the stout-chested Para in the accompanying photo was none other than the old chap whose house I was in. He told me that he had been injured a few weeks after the photo had been taken. I spent my lunch break listening to the old man and looking at his photos. At that moment I realised that everyone has a story to tell that often comes as a surprise.

I left the old chap alone again and I realised the painful truth that I was probably the only person he'd talked to all week. As I filled in his job's paperwork I accidentally ticked the box that meant that all his installation existed and he'd therefore get his phone for free.

In the years since that incident I've often thought about that poor, lonely old man....... A forgotten hero. It seems our world has an unjust sense of priorities and a distorted view of what is important in life. I like to think that that old man changed my values. For that and for fighting to give me a chance to enjoy a free life I thank him. God bless you.

When A "Commer" Goes Full-Stop.

My thanks to Peter Hurst from Preston for reminding me about a funny quirk that Commer vans had. No-one knows why, but if you were travelling down a steep hill, say in third or fourth gear, and you switched off the ignition without depressing the clutch, when you switched the ignition back on again you could concoct and enormous explosion as the engine backfired.

I remember once that one of the lads managed to blow off the entire rear section of his exhaust system by doing this trick. Being so hilly, Sheffield was perfect for this little party piece. It was also funny because pedestrians would nearly crap themselves because the noise was so deafening.......Happy days!

 

The evil Commer van

 

Chapter 15

Craig- "Lord Of The Rings"

 

Whenever a new lad started on our staff it was viewed as an excellent opportunity to have a laugh, and many a wind-up ensued because of this. One such new boy was a lad called Craig. He had worked for the Post Office for a number of years but he came to our staff as a TO In Training. Poor old Craig didn't quite know what to make of his new eccentric colleagues as we were a bit of a wild bunch compared to the blokes he'd already worked with. After he'd had the usual crucifixion on our Dexion racking….this was where the victim was tie wrapped to the shelves with cable ties in a suitable Christ-like pose, Craig fell for one of my practical jokes.

One day while Craig was unpacking some equipment he found a woman's engagement ring in the box with all the stuff. Obviously the ring belonged to a member of the factory's staff who had probably lost it while packing the equipment. Craig rang the factory to report his find and sure enough the factory manager rang back to confirm that one of his ladies was missing just such a ring. Unfortunately Craig made the mistake of telling us the whole story and I figured this was too good an opportunity to miss.

The next day our workshop received a telephone call asking for Craig. He duly said "Hello," and a man told him that he was the transport manager of the factory and that they conveniently had a driver in Sheffield and he would call in to collect the ring. Craig confirmed that he would wait with the ring for the driver's arrival. Of course, the transport manager was in fact me, putting-on a southern accent ringing from the stores downstairs. Craig waited and waited and finally another call came in….this time from the cockney driver who told Craig that he was at Eldon House in the centre of Sheffield and could Craig bring the ring to the security office there? Craig agreed and set off in the direction of Eldon House clutching the ring . Of course, the cockney driver was in fact me again down in the stores.

When I arrived back in our workshop and all the lads were creased -up laughing as we watched poor old Craig driving out of the gates. I got on the phone and rang the security man at Eldon House. I told him that I was the cockney driver and the story about Craig's imminent arrival with the ring. I told the security man that I was now at the Parkway depot and could he please ask Craig to meet me there? The security man diligently agreed and duly passed-on the message to Craig when he arrived. Poor old Craig duly made his way to the Parkway depot where he was told by the gateman that the driver was now at Maltravers Road and could he go there with the ring? Craig still didn't twig and made his weary way back to Maltravers Road where, of course, his journey began about an hour before. To complete the gag I told the lads that I would go into the toilets and sit in trap 3 with the door locked.

I told my confederates to usher Craig into the bogs and tell him that his lorry driver was ensconced within. Unbelievably, Craig arrived at the conveniences and shouted in "Is there a driver from S and E Labs here?"

I shouted back in my best cockney "Yes mate!"

Craig announced "I've got the ring for you," to which I responded "Great , shove it under the door mate."

Sure enough a jiffy bag complete with ring appeared under the door. I was apoplectic safely hidden behind the door. After a suitable interlude I went back in to our workshop where Craig was now regailing the story of his chase around Sheffield looking for the lorry driver. All the lads knew the truth but no-one let on. I sent the ring to the factory by post and some days later told Craig what had really happened. To my astonishment he didn't believe me and said " I talked to the driver myself….he was a cockney." I spoke to him in my cockney voice but he still didn't believe me.

Poor old Craig….Lord Of The Rings.

 

 

Chatsworth Revisited- The Last Strawberries of Summer

 

During the 1980s the Conservative government led by Mrs. Thatcher decided that state industries should be sold off into the private sector. Unfortunately this included The Post Office Telephones, which by then had been re-named British Telecom. The organisation I had joined in 1977 had changed dramatically and I found myself like a guest at a party who had out-stayed his welcome.

I could go on at length about the changes at that time but I can best illustrate my views by relating the following story. The Telephone Manager in Sheffield retired and a write-up appeared in our staff newspaper. This chap had started as a telegram boy at the age of fourteen. He had then worked his way up through every level of the job to his final post as Telephone Manager having experienced first hand every strata of the Post Office Telephones. He was replaced by a University whiz-kid who had worked as the British Telecom board's pet poodle in London.

This was typical of the attitude of the time. Suddenly, the respected old guard had gone and in came the bullying flash boys whose smart-alec attitude was that we mere working class employees were surplus to requirements. They reckoned that they could train a chimp to do our job and gleefully told us so. Management openly called us "spear carriers." They were then surprised that our loyalty flagged.

I became disillusioned about my working life and I felt that the values I believed in were now unpopular. Public service was out and profit centres were in. I didn't want to sing from a hymn sheet nor did I care what the latest buzzwords were. Of course these changes were repeated throughout Britain in almost every industry as Thatcherism's grip grew ever stronger. I felt that I had to move on. It wasn't me that had changed it was the rest of the country. I stood still and the roundabout moved on.

And so in October 1987 I left. I didn't say goodbye because it wasn't me that had changed it was the working environment. Many people who I thought were my friends joined in with the hymn sheet brigade thinking that this would protect them….it didn't. They went the same way as me, either voluntarily or with a ungracious shove. I'm glad I left when I did as it gave me the opportunity to start my own business in the telecommunications industry. Because this was my own business I could work the way I wanted to and the rest of the world be damned. Perhaps I'm a bit of a dinosaur who thinks he knows best. Perhaps the corporate hymn sheet singers are correct and I am in error….. I think not.

Everywhere I go people complain to me about the corporate call-centres that are now de rigeur for all large businesses. Their Armani-suited minders gather endless statistics about their enterprises except the one that matters…..the opinion of their customers. This, it appears, is irrelevant and market penetration, product recognition etc, etc, are all that matters. Everyone is "addressing issues" or "striving to meet customer driven targets." The problem is no-one is listening. The simple human-to-human contact that the sterile corporations are so afraid of never happens. Maybe they are scared of what they may hear.

**********

The Last Strawberries Of Summer.

My most treasured and final memory of The Post Office Telephones occurred in the mid-eighties shortly before I left British Telecom. My friend Alan Westeney and I were temporarily assigned to the Monarch staff who were carrying out extensive work at Chatsworth House near Sheffield. Each morning throughout that winter and early spring Alan and I would make our way to Chatsworth to join the Monarch lads. We were installing external extensions to the farms, offices and outbuildings, which were scattered throughout the estate. We also worked in the house itself which was a wonderful experience.

 

The Little Bridge And Chatsworth House In Winter (Peter Hanna)

Chatsworth is a marvellous place and is a popular visit for everyone who lives in Sheffield. Every day Alan and I struggled out in the snow and ice to the estate and as we drove over the little bridge that leads to the house we always sang the "Brideshead Revisited" theme music. The estate in winter was breath-taking in its beauty. Deep snow covered the house and grounds and the deer came right up to the house looking for food. As we drove up the little lane the deer would crowd both sides of the road in their search for the feed that the staff put out for them. Most visitors never see this and it was a rare privilege to share this experience with these proud, wild creatures.

 

The Little Bridge To Chatsworth House (Peter Hanna)

That winter we worked on through the snow which was particularly heavy that year. A few weeks later we saw the river in full-flow as the snow melted. Alan and I had a fantastic time with the Monarch lads who were always a good laugh particularly Ian "Chopper" Axe. I'll always remember those days at Chatsworth with Alan. In many ways this was my final swan song. It was the sweet taste of the last strawberries of summer. Dark clouds were on the horizon for me and I was tired....the debilitating tiredness of a broken, weary man. My life was a turmoil of unhappiness both professionally and personally. I needed to make changes to both areas of my life….and I did, eventually. I had to move on to new pastures and escape into fresh air.

 

The Majestic Beauty Of Chatsworth House And The River (Peter Hanna)

More of Peter's Chatsworth Pictures

 

I look back now, some eighteen years later to my departure from a job I once loved so much. I treasure the memories of so many good friends. Sadly, many are no longer with us but I remember my mates as good, honest, working class blokes. Of the thousands of laughs and adventures we had I have recounted just a few in these pages. I cannot do these men justice nor can I portray that time in the late 1970s when the British working class enjoyed respect and life for ordinary people was sweeter than it is now. Those halcyon days were soon gone and will never come again.

I'll end as I began; I dedicate these words to those old comrades who have passed away in the intervening years, especially to the late Malcolm White whom I was proud to call my friend, a lost soul we all dearly miss. Also, these words are in memory of my old mates who are no longer with us, Reg Dingley, Dougie Johnson and Frankie Bough, good men who touched my life.

Me? I have a thousand and one treasured memories of those days and the men I shared so many good times with in my youth. For the rest of my life I'll always remember them with love and respect...... for in that time and that place we surely were "Buzby's Boys."

 

The End

 

Author's Note: (If this were a film you'd now be hearing Eddie and the Hot Rods "Do Anything You Wonna Do"

See yer!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Press Play

 

Warning: This site contains scenes depicting very dodgy hairstyles and fashion sense. Not suitable for those of a nervous disposition.

Bob's Telephone Site.

Comprehensive site, a must if you are interested in seventies/eighties/nineties telephone equipment. All the info is here about Post Office/BT telephone systems. Seen a plan 107 lately?...you will on this site. Complete guide to UK telecomms.

www.ukonline.co.uk

The Telecommunications Heritage Group

Website dedicated to the history of the British telecommunications industry.

Highly recommended site.

www.thg.org.uk

Post Office Vehicle Club.

Great site for classic vehicle buffs. Many pictures to bring back happy memories.

Post Office Vehicle Club

Sam's great archive of old telephones both UK and Dutch.

A very interesting site.

Sam Hallas collection

Telephones Uk website

Mike Fletcher's fanatastic site dedicated to the history of telephones. Extensive equipment lists and photographs of telephones and telephone systems. Essential for anyone interested in telecommunications history.

The Festiniog Railway

For anyone with a craving to re-live life on Strowger Exchanges and 13 miles of open wire pole route.

An old Sheffield bus like the ones I tried to avoid whilst working with Dropwire No. 6.

more old photos of Sheffield

These images are courtesy of BT.com click here