John West:
I subbed off Pritchett’s a fair bit in the early seventies.I had two yellow Mastiffs and brother Andy drove the other one. The business was run by a fearsome lady from the West London depot, whose name I can’t remember, but it wasn’t Pritchett. Her son ran the maintenance garage and I can remember his embarassment when a black lad who worked there called him ‘pinky’. Well he was wearing a pink shirt. I met him again when he became fleet engineer at Crescent/Sealand in Dammam. The night security guard was called Ted. Everyone called him ‘Fried Tucky’ Ted because of his resemblance to a certain Colonel Sanders. Ted would try and keep you talking late into the night for company if you were sleeping in the yard.Bill Spragg was the boss at Ashton in Makerfield at the time. I didn’t have much to do with the warehousing side, except to load Cadbury’s chocolate sometimes. I understand that Pritchetts had stored oranges and chocolate next to each other and were a long time paying off the claim against them for orange flavoured chocolate.
My dad always amused Andy and me because he always called Bill Spragg ‘John Snagg’, after the wartime radio announcer. ‘That John Snagg’s been on the phone, can you call him back.’ No Dad, Bill Spragg! Now I annoy my daughter in the same way by getting names wrong or not remembering them. Such is life!
Bill had a Mercedes diesel which sounded like a tank. He also allegedly had an affair with his secretary and was allegedly dismissed for fiddling the warehouse contents. I wouldn’t know if either things were true.
I remember a total of four guys in the traffic office, but names are harder to remember. A big pleasant bloke, another lad with glasses, who left to join North West Freighters. Another guy who I think was called Fred and finally (I think) Arthur Wilson, who had been a driver. I thought Arthur had a Big J, Eddie? I was following him up the A702 when he jacknifed on black ice just before Biggar. I think he pulled his thumb out of joint on the spinning wheel. Arthur wouldn’t go on strike for higher pay when the other lads did, and was rewarded with the job in the traffic office. I have to say, there was no resentment from the drivers towards Andy and me, they knew I’d go bust if we didn’t carry on working.
There was a very pretty ■■■■■■■ reception, only about 17. Very naive. Arthur almost had her convinced that part of the job was to go to bed with the traffic manager.
I have an image of you in my mind Eddie, but it may be the wrong one. Did you have a couple of young children at the time? You need to find someone to scan the photos for you. Once they are digitalised, they’re pretty easy to upload here. I’m sorry, I don’t have a single photo from those days.
I think I would have to see photos to remember Bob Horrocks. I remember one of the lads who had a Foden - he’s the one who said ‘get thissen a Fodden lad’ to me, his would be an S40, with the comfortable seat with armrests. I think it had a ■■■■■■■ 220 in it? He also told me the tale of doing a flier home unit only on an earlier job, but forgetting that it was market day, and going for his unit at 7.00am to find it in the centre of the now erected stalls! Difficult phone call, end of job.
He had a memory of playing in the street where he lived as a kid. it was a steep hill with traffic lights at the top. fooling around with his friends, he fell into the road, right under the rear wheels of an eight wheeler, his pullover got caught and he was staring up at the tyre tread. He said he was lucky the driver was a professional and didn’t roll back slightly when he set off again. But I can’t remember his name!
Another lad had one of the Mercs. Again, can’t remember his name. He kept the Merc shining like new, was always smartly dressed and would f*** anything that moved. He wouldn’t swear though!
I’d forgotten the Ratcliffes, Barry. They also started building 40’ box vans which they leased to Pritchetts. One of them was constructed from 2 single axle 20’ vans, and looked very odd with old signwriting that of course didn’t match. I seem to remember it was christened ‘the Charlie Cairoli’ trailer.
Other local hauliers were NMT (they’re mentioned on a thread here somewhere) and a firm with red and white trucks who were unusual in that they had a fleet of tautliners which were rare at the time. I was friends with one of their drivers. He was quite ‘hippy’ like with very long hair. He was a chum of Roy Woods from the Move.
John