This young fella loves a night out in the truck ,been coming with me since he was three ten now he,s been all over the place, the boss thinks it fantastic that’s the benefit of working for a family firm
My Dad was a qualified engineer but drove for the family coal and haulage business , I was 3 weeks old, sat on my Mums lap when I first went in a lorry .
Me and my brother would regularly travel with Dad , the two of us sat on the passenger seat of a Fordson Thames tipper absolutely loving it .
I also remember my brother , somehow , knocking the ratchet brake off and the lorry rolling down the yard , me and my brother running from one side of the cab to the other , meeting in the middle as we tried to open the doors before my uncle jumped in and put the brakes on .
I was able to return the favour to Dad when I got my HGV in the mid 80s , fantastic days .
mick palmer:
My Dad was a qualified engineer but drove for the family coal and haulage business , I was 3 weeks old, sat on my Mums lap when I first went in a lorry .
Me and my brother would regularly travel with Dad , the two of us sat on the passenger seat of a Fordson Thames tipper absolutely loving it .
I also remember my brother , somehow , knocking the ratchet brake off and the lorry rolling down the yard , me and my brother running from one side of the cab to the other , meeting in the middle as we tried to open the doors before my uncle jumped in and put the brakes on .
I was able to return the favour to Dad when I got my HGV in the mid 80s , fantastic days .
A lot of the stuff that was about in my day still had the old ratchet hand brakes and it wasn’t unknown for them to let go if the engine was left running when you were out of the cab. They must have been pretty worn for that to happen.
it was dad’s thames traders for me mostly and usually london when i was 5 or 6 , several nights out waiting in the queue at london docks, even to the extent that mum had to apologise to the school once as i should have started but i was ‘stuck out with his dad in the lorry’ it was great for me as he had a contract delivering rosebud dolls so the deliveries were to toy shops as well as the docks , i came back from 1 trip with about 7 or 8 toy routemaster buses, and another i came back with a big aeroplane model kit. between the traders and his buses i never seemed to go anywhere in a car. years later and we’d gone up in the world to Ford d series and Bedford TK’s mostly, and it was odd days on locals as he’s got quite a few lorries by then on parcel work , but there was the odd memorable trip like finedon to newcastle in a 27mph leyland steer to recover one of the rigids and a night trunk change over at forton with one of his new Big J’s, when he binned off the parcels we were into mobile homes and south of france jobs, so i went with him in a TK i’d be about 18 or 19 , i took a week off from my job at ferrymasters to go and happy days he let me drive it empty back up the autoroute, a few years later and it was me taking him back down to frejus and it was yet another TK , but a drawbar with 2 of them on, plus 2 of our Ford D’s as well , right old sight 3 drawbars with 6 mobile homes. we had some good times , i miss him and he’s been gone nearly 40 years
tony
