Dave Pearson
31st March 2012
At the tender age of 15 in 1958, Dave Pearson joined Pressed Steel and started a career in the automotive business which was to run for a glorious fifty-three years and twenty-one days. Originally offered a position as a toolmaker’s apprentice he couldn’t wait to complete the extra school term required and took up an immediate position as a timekeeper.
Pressed Steel, which later became Pressed Steel Fisher may not sound like any automotive company around today. However when you discover the brands manufactured at the Cowley plant you begin to realise what a significant and busy place it was. Rolls Royce, Rover 90, Van den Plas, Singer, Wolsey, Riley, Sunbeam Alpine, Hillman Minx, the ‘frog-eyed’ Sprite, the Morris Oxford Farina and the MGB were all manufactured at this location.
On top of this impressive list, the site was also responsible for the Jaguar Mark II and S Type sub assembly. Plus spares for Comma Vans, the Humber Super Snipe and Presscold Fridges!
The Cowley site was responsible for the ‘body and white,’ which meant the panel fabrication and assembly prior to the paint shop. The cars manufactured all had different destinations from this point. The Rolls Royce’s were shipped out to Crew, the Rover’s to Coventry and the Morris’s went to the paint shop on site before crossing the road to the then Morris Motors plant for their trim and completion.
As you can probably imagine with this variety of manufacturing and the labour intensive working practices of the day, the place was a hive of activity. Employing 32 thousand people across Pressed Steel Fisher and Morris Motors it was the place to work; only twenty years after the end of the war jobs were generally low paid and hard to come by.
“I was one of the youngest at the plant, so I had to do all the running around, originally I was a time keeper. This meant I had to collect all the time cards from the Glenhill Brooke Time Recorder and hand copy the hours worked everyday manually to a wages ledger. This was very time consuming and required a huge team of people to ensure that by lunchtime every Friday the wages were ready to be handed out.
The pay structure meant that at 15 years you earned one third of ‘a mans wage’, at 18 this was increased to seven ninths and, finally at 21, you were classed as a man and were therefore on the wage you job role and responsibility dictated. My starting wage of £2/15/6d (Two pounds, 15 shillings and sixpence."
"In 1959, the Mini was introduced and it was the swinging sixties. I soon figured out the way to earn more was to get on the jobs which paid ‘piece work’. So I changed jobs and went into the labour pool where I got more involved in the manufacturing process.
"With the average age of those around me of about 50, I was the youngest by a long way so got all the physical jobs. I’d be inside a Jaguar grinding out spot welds as a welder was above me, showering me with sparks. I had 6 minutes in a car before I had to move on to the next one. Doing the job was exhausting but it paid well.
"My memories of those times were of all the people, many families worked at the site. I worked there with my two brothers who had left their trades because the money was so good. The conditions weren’t so good though. The smog from the welding, grinding and general production haze meant you could hardly see the other side of the building you were working in.
"The ‘press shop’ was the biggest in Europe at the time. The pressing process was so dangerous it was common to see people with fingers missing. Two people even died, there’s still a commemorative bench marking this sad event. Lead poisoning was also real threat and every six months you had to have a blood test. I had lead poisoning twice during this period.
"By this time I was working on the Rover P6 and it was the best paid job in the place. I landed myself a job on the line and at twenty I was on £34 a week with piece work. Which sounds great but the industrial relations at the time meant we were always ‘walking out’ in protest over something or other. Longbridge had ‘Red Robbo,’ and Cowley had Alan Thornett, aka ‘the mole.’
"In 1968 we became British Leyland and during the next decade the British car industry was fully nationalised. 1986 British Leyland were renamed as Rover Group and then the MG Rover Group.
"During my time here at Cowley I’ve seen a serious fire and a major flood. I’m the only person to work here on both the original Mini launch in 1959 and the new Mini launch in 2001. It’s remarkable the change in the industry. Standing here today, the investment made by BMW and the modern processes used have seen my final years at Cowley under the management team at Rudolph and Hellmann Automotive. They have been a really caring company to work for during my final years here. It’s great to see the UK manufacturing once again going from strength to strength.
"I’ll miss the camaraderie of working here but I’m looking forward to spending more time with my lovely wife, Barbara."
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