MEMORIES OF LEEDS

by LILIAN DAILEY (Nee Dixon)

PART ONE - MYSELF

I was presented to the world on Easter Sunday, 27th March 1921. My mother had suffered a prolonged and difficult childbirth and as there was much concern about her, as often happened in those days, the family Doctor Adams baptised me and seeing it was Easter Day I was called Lily, a name I have never liked.

I grew into a sturdy child, quite plain judging by the early photographs, and not given to learning the refined pursuits, mainly needlework and knitting skills and general domesticity usually taught to little girls of my day. I was happy out of doors, poking spiders out of the walls surrounding our back yard, or playing pies-ball with the rougher element in our street and I most certainly did not deserve to be called Lily. That seemed to be a name given to all the barmaids I knew in later years and when I began work my employment cards had me down as Lilian and I was quite pleased, at least it was some slight improvement. Now at the age of 80 it doesn't seem to matter at all.

Lilian and her brother Alan at Scarborough

My brother Alan was born two and a half years later, another difficult confinement for my mother and he weighed in at about 11 pounds. I loved him to bits despite being envious of his lovely curly auburn hair - my mother sympathised with my straight, flyaway brown locks and said I must have been behind the door when hair was being given out. I survived the set-backs and enjoyed a very happy childhood as I have mentioned elsewhere in my meanderings.

When I reached the age of thirteen my parents stretched their finances to allow me to have piano lessons. I practised hard - the music teacher came to the house every Friday, unfortunately timed with the rush time occasioned in the shop just before the second house at the picture house. She insisted on singing along with my faltering fingers and Mick, the dog, threw back his head and joined in, much to the amusement or otherwise of the customers and the embarrassment of my parents. I thought I was doing quite well but didn't like the teacher who wielded a vicious ruler at any mistake and after about eight or nine weeks struggled to get through The Blue Bells of Scotland. The poor lady had a heart attack on her way home and as she subsequently died as a result of it, there was an end to my music lessons. There was equal sadness and relief I think.

My education at Junior School was carried out at All Saints' C.of E. school in Pontefract Lane and apart from the occasional hiccup in the form of Grandma Dixon it covered a most happy period. I swam in the successful school team and played Netball and American Ball in not very successful teams. Whenever the school teams competed the chant would go out from the children: "All Saints' and no sinners - they eats their teas before their dinners". Enthusiasm abounded and somewhere out there would be Uncle Tom, shouting and cheering with the rest. I didn't remember many Saints, just some great sinners.

When we girls reached the age of thirteen we attended courses in housewifery, cookery and laundry at nearby Victoria School, which boasted a terrace house on the edge of the playground. In these surroundings we were split into teams of six for each of these subjects, meant no doubt to equip us suitably for our adult lives, though I could never envisage living in an establishment which boasted eighteen helpers. It brings to mind the day I was in the Cookery team which was privileged to cook a lunch for the staff. We made a beef and vegetable stew and placed it in the oven to simmer gently, during which time the long whitewood preparation table was to be scrubbed with silver sand.

The six of us had a great time knocking the block of Sunlight soap about with our scrubbing brushes. One of the girls played 'goalie' and one of the others (not me, no, not I,) played a great Beckham bender and the block of soap whizzed off the table and shot into the vegetable stew. Our teacher was in the corner writing up her notes and we silently fished the soap out of the stew and carried on in our usual efficient way.

We were allowed home for lunch and hardly dared to return to school in the afternoon. Our terror delayed our return and 'Miss' was just inside the door waiting for us. She was very grave faced and told us to hold out our hands for the expected punishment, two strokes each. She then turned to us and asked if we knew what the punishment was for - we remained silent and she absolutely astounded us by giving us a lecture on punctuality, with no mention of the spoiled staff lunch. What had happened we were never to find out.

With the approach of the usual leaving age for leaving Junior School my parents decided that I should spend the next year at the North Leeds Commercial College which was situated in Louis Street, a rather dilapidated old residence, with three large rooms downstairs, one for shorthand, one for typing, and one for book-keeping lessons, where I would be taught all aspects of office work. Surprisingly enough I enjoyed the shorthand and did well, even reaching a point where I would buy the weekly Pitman shorthand magazine of short stories, which I read avidly. As for the typing, that was not so enjoyable as any pupil making more than one error had to bend over the machine, head on hands on the platen, whereupon the Principal, Mr. Hodgson, would slap or thump the offender on the back. Nevertheless, it has to be said to his credit that he really was a most able teacher of Pitman's shorthand, and nobody left his establishment without a qualification of some sort no matter how long it took.

When I left I had no difficulty in obtaining a job in the Insurance Department of The Yorkshire Electricity Company in Park Place - nice offices and nice people. After a couple of years I was looking for more money and applied for a job at Harding Rhodes Ltd., a textile and tachometer manufacturers, and to my parents' satisfaction was offered the post of shorthand typist to Mr. Rhodes (we were not described as Secretaries in those days) at £5.00 per week which was the icing on the cake, in fact I think more than my father earned. So, it was decided I should have a new dress - a neat brown affair with a hand crocheted peter-pan collar. Nobody asked me whether I liked it or not, but I suppose it made me look more efficient than I really was. I liked the work and though at first I went in trepidation to take letters from Mr. Rhodes (Mr. Billy to the older workers) I soon got used to his ways and his dry sense of humour. The firm was represented worldwide in the textile accessories market and he often travelled abroad. When visiting our branches in France, Belgium or Italy even, he would send scribbled notes in French for me to type and send on to customers. My French was non-existent and his writing was mostly unreadable but somehow I managed not to get the sack and worked for him until my marriage.

The Managing Director of the Company was a retired Lieut. Colonel whose grandfather, Colonel Harding , was responsible for providing the statue of the Black Prince in the City Square, I understand, in the hope of gaining a knighthood which never materialised.

Our Chairman and Managing Director came into the Company after the first World War, and brought with him some grateful workers from his Battalion at a time when jobs were hard to get. He was as irascible as he was irrational - he would sack, almost without reason, a trustworthy employee in the works yard and half an hour later be seen handing out five shillings to some work dodger with an order to go and buy some decent shoes. He would chat quite harmlessly to some of the young girls on his morning walk round the Works and many a half-crown fell into the pocket of any of them showing a bit of leg or an undone blouse. He would similarly chat for a few minutes to telephone receptionists when making telephone calls to other firms and our own telephonist enjoyed a listen in whenever possible.

That came to a sorry end when one of the Old Man's favourites came up behind her and looked over her shoulder - whereupon she panicked and nervously rolled the platen on her typewriter, catching the ends of the man's tie firmly wound on the roller. In tears she ran from the room leaving him a prisoner in full view of the General Office.

The Chairman's ex-Batman in the Army, a lovely man, one Mr. Saville, was the Old Man's personal assistant - he could type with two fingers faster than any of us in the Office and rarely made a mistake. It was a blessing that he had the patience of a saint. If for any reason Mr. Saville was not available, then I would be called to bring my notepad and pencil and sit by the large desk waiting for the Old Man to collect his thoughts followed by a quick paragraph and a further ten minutes of deep thought. Sometimes he would reach out for a book, usually on historical battles staged during the Wars of the Roses, and order his chauffeur to take him to look at an old battlefield. I don't know whether he expected me to be still sitting there on his return, but I very often got a lesson in strategy on the battlefield.

Harding Rhodes, Leeds

The Chairman and Board room staff were extremely proud of the imposing factory, the tower itself being a copy of the famous Campanile in Florence and had expensive real gold windows shining out over the city. Our other joint Chairman, Mr. Sykes, was of a different ilk - very well respected by all the workers. He was firm but very fair and gentlemanly in all his dealings. His son, Mr. Hal Sykes, was very like his father and later was to follow a distinguished career in the Army.

The other Director was, as I have mentioned, Mr. Rhodes and Mr. Baher, a brilliant Engineer, was in charge of the Counter/Tachometer. He was a huge man of German origin. His spectacles were always on the top of his forehead - little wonder he had to search for things amongst the huge pile of papers completely hiding the top of his desk. Each of these official directors were allotted a shorthand typist/assistant - Margaret, a special friend to me, Alice, Jean, Sylvia and myself., all of them from middle class families and from private schools, with one exception - me. We had two Company Secretaries, Mr. Swift (who used to treat us to lunch sometimes at the Jubilee pub near the Town Hall) and Mr. McColl, plus two men in charge of wages and accounts. It was a standing joke that the office safe contained one ledger and two pints of beer from the 'Drum & Monkey'.

The period before the War found the firm very busy - we were not paid overtime but every afternoon found us rushing to get our correspondence finished as it was expected that the letters would be posted on the day they were dictated, even if it meant taking them to the General Post Office on the way home. With the advent of the War, the export side of the business was less busy and the Counter Shop & Tachometer Department became very much a part of the War effort. The younger men in the Office were called up for Service in the Forces and were replaced by female staff.

Tower Works got off quite lightly in the few air raids on Leeds, but on the night of the big one, when Leeds Station and the neighbouring Engineering works were targeted, there were direct hits on Harding Rhodes and Crabtree's, next door . The roof, walls and windows near my desk were reduced to a pile of rubble during the Friday night raid and some of us turned in to review the situation on the Saturday morning. We were asked to rescue what papers we could and for this purpose I went straight to the deep file drawer in my desk which was just a heap of dust and rubble. We were all expected during the War to re-use paper, envelopes, paper clips, rubber bands and anything at all in short supply. I pushed some of the rubble to one side and picked up what I thought was a very fine rubber band. To my horror it was the tail of a very large rat I was picking up. Strange that about a year ago (2000 or 2001) there was a picture in the Yorkshire Post of a wall which had collapsed that day onto a car, showing the exact spot where the bomb had fallen all those years ago, the wall and windows having been rebuilt.

Quite some time later one of the directors introduced us to a new member of staff, Miss Edwina, a smart and sophisticated young lady. She was friendly in a detached sort of way. She wore a beautiful diamond ring and informed us that her fiancee was an officer serving in the North African desert campaign. Sadly, she had news that he had been killed in action, and we all grieved for her.

Edwina confided bravely that she would take life by the scruff of the neck and get all she could out of her own living. Soon she made a move into the outer office, placing her desk opposite the Board Room door and thus catching the eye of any of the more important visitors. The Chairman was rather taken by her and she soon had her own office with a sign at the foot of the twisting iron stair leading to it - Welfare Officer. Quite a lot of the workers in the factory were brought in by train from local mining areas and were glad of the work even on very low rates of pay, but with the prospect of being sacked when they became of an age when they needed full pay. Edwina was sympathetic to their problems and was often on the workshop floor discussing them, but never were workers to be seen climbing the iron stair to her office.

It was some time later when we girls met a new recruit to the Work force - Mrs. Dulcie Yelland who took charge of one of the departments on the Works floor, a woman of strong character and morals, likeable and popular. She was appalled by the conditions endured by the workers, as we had been, and it was not long before she took her complaints to the top. How the Old Man hated her guts, but Dulcie stood her ground until we all had better toilet facilities; a separate room was provided for staff and workers to have their sandwiches (free from the attendant rats and mice).

She rallied many of the workers into joining a Trades Union and by then even the so-called Welfare Department functioned more efficiently. By the time Dulcie left the firm, much had been achieved and the Chairman's sigh of relief was very evident. When ultimately the Chairman's wife passed away, he married Edwina and they resided in the large mansion on his estate. He was becoming frail though still forceful. Mr. Saville had retired and a new and younger personal assistant took over, who had much to do for the Old Man. Edwina cared for him for many a long year but, by an unbelievable turn of circumstance, on the very day of his funeral Edwina suffered a heart attack and died sitting at her dressing table.

Lilian Dailey (nee Dixon)

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