Web Page 3071 26th October 2023 First Picture: Traditional Match Box

Second Picture Match Factory

Third Picture: Swan Vestas

Fourth Picture: England’s Glory

Matches Bryant & May was a company created in the mid-19th century specifically to make matches. Their original Bryant & May Factory was located in Bow, London. They later opened other match factories in the United Kingdom and Australia, such as the Bryant & May Factory, Melbourne, and owned match factories in other parts of the world. The registered trade name Bryant & May still exists and it is owned by Swedish Match, as are many of the other registered trade names of the other, formerly independent, companies within the Bryant & May group. In 1861 Bryant relocated the business to a three-acre site, on Fairfield Road, Bow, East London. The building, an old candle factory, was demolished and a model factory was built in the mock-Venetian style popular at the time. The factory was heavily mechanised and included twenty-five steam engines to power the machinery. On nearby Bow Common, the company built a timber mill to make splints from imported Canadian pine. Bryant & May were aware of "phossy jaw". If a worker complained of having toothache, they were told to have the teeth removed immediately or be sacked. In the 1880s Bryant & May employed nearly 5,000 people, most of them female and Irish, or of Irish descent; by 1895 the figure was 2,000 of whom between 1,200 and 1,500 were women and girls. The workers were paid different rates for completing a ten-hour day, depending on the type of work undertaken.[ The frame-fillers were paid 1 shilling per 100 frames completed; the cutters received 23⁄4 d for three gross of boxes, and the packers got 1s 9d per 100 boxes wrapped up. Those under 14 years of-age received a weekly wage of 4s. Most workers were lucky if they took the full amounts home, as a series of fines were levied by the foremen, with the money deducted directly from wages. The fines included 3d for having an untidy workbench, talking or having dirty feet—many of the workers were bare-footed as shoes were too expensive; 5d was deducted for being late; and a shilling for having a burnt match on the workbench. The women and girls involved in boxing up the matches, they had to pay the boys who brought them the frames from the drying ovens, and had to supply their own glue and brushes. One girl who dropped a tray of matches was fined 6d The match boxes were made through domestic outwork under a sweating system. Such a system was preferred because the workers were not covered under the Factory Acts. Such workers received 21⁄4 to 21⁄2 d per gross of boxes. The workers had to provide glue and string from their own funds. In 1871 Robert Lowe, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, attempted to introduce a tax of 1⁄2 d per hundred matches. Match-making companies complained about the new levy and arranged a mass-meeting at Victoria Park, London on Sunday 23 April; 3,000 match workers attended, the majority of whom were from Bryant & May. It was resolved to march on the following day to the Houses of Parliament to present a petition. Several thousand match-makers set off from Bow Road in an orderly fashion[. The demonstration comprised mostly girls between the ages of thirteen and twenty, and were working classes. On the same day as the meeting in Victoria Park, Queen Victoria wrote to the prime minister, William Gladstone, to protest about the tax: it is difficult not to feel considerable doubt as to the wisdom of the proposed tax on matches ... [which] will be felt by all classes to whom matches have become a necessity of life. ... this tax which is intended should press on all equally will in fact only be severely felt by the poor which would be very wrong and most impolitic at the present moment. The day following the march, Robert Lowe announced in the House of Commons that the proposed tax was being withdrawn. Bryant and May was involved in three of the most divisive industrial episodes of the 19th century, the sweating of domestic out-workers, the wage "fines" that led to the London matchgirls strike of 1888 and the scandal of "phossy jaw". The strike won important improvements in working conditions and pay for the mostly female workforce working with the dangerous white phosphorus. The company rebuilt their Bow factory in 1909-1910, with many modern innovations including two tall towers housing water storage tanks for a sprinkler system. By 1911 it employed more than 2,000 female workers, the largest factory in London To protect its position Bryant & May merged with or took over its rivals. These were: Bell and Black, Swan Vestas]S. J. Moreland and Sons who sold matches under the trade name England's Glory. In the 1980s, factories in Gloucester and Glasgow closed leaving Liverpool as the last match factory in the UK. This continued until December 1994. The premises survive today as 'the Matchworks' (grade 2 listed building) and the Matchbox all using the existing buildings with renovations done by Urban Splash The British match brands continue to survive as brands of Swedish Match and are made outside the UK. Other parts of the merged company involved in shaving products survive, and still use the trade name Wilkinson Sword in Europe, and the Schick trade name elsewhere. However, the shaving products are made in Germany. Stay in Touch Peter gsseditor@gmail.com

< Web Page 3069 19th October 2023 First Picture: In Arden House

Second Picture Bill Simpson

Third Picture: Radio Times cover

Fourth Picture: Dr Finlay and Janet

Dr Finlay’s Casebook When I was a teenager my parents would not miss a particular programme on a Sunday evening, Dr Finey’s Casebook. The popular series was set in the 1920s in a pre-NHS medical practice in the fictional Scottish town of Tannochbrae (the series was actually filmed in the Highland town of Callander). The series – debuting on the BBC on 16 August 1962 – restored the dignity of the medical profession after Dr Kildare. Compared to the feverish activity of Kildare, Tannochbrae was in a permanent state of anaesthesia. The basic concept for the series was based on the characters and settings created by the writer A.J. Cronin in a number of short stories based on his own experiences as a doctor. The residents of Arden House were the crusty Dr Angus Cameron (Andrew Cruickshank), a confirmed bachelor who loved chess, was prone to asthma and was the type of old-fashioned doctor who intimidated patients into recovery; ‘young’ Dr Alan Finlay (Bill Simpson), who never looked a day under 40; and no-nonsense housekeeper Janet MacPherson – played to stiff Presbyterian perfection by Barbara Mullen. The series was put together in just five weeks to fill a gap in the schedules. Andrew Cruikshank said; “It was very rushed at first and nobody ever noticed that Dr Cameron’s room at Arden House didn’t have a window”. Bill Simpson was plucked from reading the news with Scottish ITV in Glasgow. Like Dr Finlay, he was an ex-farmer and hailed from the Ayrshire fishing village of Dunure, almost an exact replica of Tannochbrae. The BBC took great pains to maintain period detail in the series and there was a surprisingly large amount of location footage, clearly shot in rural Scotland. This helped create a realistic setting for the stories as well as provide a sense of isolation. The little town of Tannochbrae – in truth, not much more than a village – had a 26-bed cottage hospital, with the Lanark Infirmary nearby, and an ambulance obtainable from the police station or neighbouring Knoxhill. Among its active population, Tannochbrae numbered a good few workers from the colliery and shipyard not far away and – being near the Clyde and a pleasant loch – it attracted businessmen who commuted from their offices in Glasgow. The daily medical needs of a sleepy lowland community between the wars proved hugely successful with viewers and Dr Finlay’s Casebook was a Sunday evening must for millions of viewers during the 1960s. During the final season, the inhabitants of the Arden House surgery also appeared on radio, where they carried on dispensing common sense and rubbing ointment for a further seven years. The show made stars of the dapper Bill Simpson, veteran actor Andrew Cruickshank and Barbara Mullen. One person, however, did take exception to the odious little Dr Snoddy (Eric Woodburn). When the programme finally ended at the start of the 1970s, a Dr Desmond Reilly told a London conference of medical officers; “Dr Snoddy should be in horror movies. Over the years, he has been seen to bungle cases or to be an obstructionist. The best thing to happen for the good name of public health has been the dropping of the series”. ITV revived Doctor Finlay in 1993 with Ian Bannen, Annette Crosbie and David Rintoul playing the parts of Doctor Cameron, Janet and Doctor Finlay and, in 2001, John Gordon Sinclair took on the title role in new adaptations of Cronin’s stories for BBC Radio 4. Stay in touch Peter gsseditor@gmail.com

Web Page 3067 12th October 2023 First Picture: Barbara Moore

Second Picture Arrival in Cornwall

Third Picture: On the road

Fourth Picture: Walking in America Dr Barbara Moore Dr. Barbara Moore, was born Anna Cherkasova (Russian: Анна Черкасова;) on the 22nd December 1903 and died on 14th May 1977). She was a Russian-born British engineer who attempted to gain celebrity status in the early 1960s for her long-distance walking and promotion of questionable health fads. Dr. Moore was among the first generation of Soviet female engineers after the Russian Revolution. In 1932, she became the Soviet Union's long-distance motorcycle champion. She immigrated to Great Britain in 1939, marrying an art teacher, Harry Moore, however they later separated. At times she also used the name Barbara Moore-Pataleewa. In December 1959, she walked from Edinburgh to London. In early 1960, she hit the headlines when she walked from John o'Groats to Land's End in 23 she was 56 years of age at the time. After her journey, a few months later in 1960, Billy Butlin launched the End-to-End Challenge, also making national news headlines and 715 people left John O’Groats. But with little preparation, only 138 reached the other end. But this started the great publicity surrounding this route which has been tackled in many strange ways since. She then undertook an 86-day, 3,387-mile walk from San Francisco to New York City, where she arrived on 6th July 1960. She was a vegetarian and a breatharian, believing it is possible for people to survive without food. She walked with only a supply of nuts, honey, raw fruit and vegetable juice for nourishment. I have no idea why she was a Doctor but she was always referred to as Doctor. She was always a vegetarian and also a breatharian, claiming that it was possible to survive without food! In November 1944 the then-new Vegan Society held its first meeting, at the Attic Club, 144 High Holborn, London. Those in attendance were Donald Watson, Elsie B. Shrigley, Fay K. Henderson, Alfred Hy Haffenden, Paul Spencer and Bernard Drake, with Dr Moore as an observer. She was convinced that most people could live to be 200 years old by abstaining from smoking, drinking alcohol and sex. She claimed she had cured herself of leukemia by way of a special diet she had developed. To test her health theories, she planned to build a laboratory next door to her home in Frimley. She was soon drawn into a lengthy legal battle over a sewer and access roads for a nearby housing estate. She spent years and most of her life savings fighting her case, but ultimately lost in the High Court of Justice. She was jailed for contempt of court after she refused to accept the ruling. She died in a London hospital on 14th May 1977, bankrupt and near starvation because of her refusal to eat. Christopher writes:- Your article on ice cream brought back wonderful memories of Dagostino’s in Guildhall Square where after swimming in the City baths we would sit and eat our ice cream reeking of chlorine. Stay in touch Peter gsseditor@gmail.com

Web Page 3065 5th October 2023 First Picture: Walls sign

Web Page 3063 28th September 2023 First Picture: Young Bill Owen

Second Picture with Norah Batty

Third Picture: This is your life

Fourth Picture: Compos grave

Bill Owen. The career of Bill Owen was an extreme example of how vast television fame in one role - in his case the incorrigibly scruffy Compo, in Last Of The Summer Wine - can wipe out in the public mind a whole lifetime of quite different achievement. As a Christmas show, Last of The Summer Wine once enjoyed higher ratings than Gone With the Wind. Compo had to reply to old ladies who fancied him, and to open fetes. As a stunt, a tabloid newspaper took the disreputable character for lunch at the Savoy. The series ran for more than two decades, and the real Bill Owen virtually disappeared. Yet as a stalwart player for the radical Unity theatre, he was at ease in Bernard Shaw and was cast by Lindsay Anderson in the first production of David Storey's In Celebration, The Contractor and The March On Russia, the latter being revived at the National in the 1990s. He was George in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, finding inspiration for the necessary domestic venom just before opening night after a row with his wife. In the 1950s, and later, he directed a number of plays. Though a contract film actor for Rank for several years, Bill Owen failed to find a niche in that over-full stable, where height and looks were the tools of preferment. He composed the lyrics for 75 songs, recorded by Cliff Richard and other popular singers, wrote one-act plays for boys’ clubs and was arts adviser to the National Association of Boys Clubs, for which he was made an MBE in 1976. Once called by Gene Kelly a born dancer, he wrote musical plays and appeared in others, including The Threepenny Opera, as Mack the Knife. Radical causes were always close to his heart: he had been born to working-class parents in Acton Green, west London, and fashioned by family history into a firm mistrust of fat cats - especially American fat cats - and any form of pretension. This mind-set stood him in good stead in playing the foul-mouthed, dirty, smelly and nihilistic Compo - once, with his woolly hat, dirty wellies and holed trousers tied up with string, voted the scruffiest character on television. Bill Owen was an intelligence and energy at odds with a working-class rut and he remained all his life a somewhat isolated figure, never fitting anywhere except in performance, and in causes. He made few childhood friends, and his view of actors - usually middle-class - was such that only two of them became friends. He rose socially, once owning an old Rolls Royce, which he would leave outside the Unity theatre near King's Cross. But sentimentality did not spread easily outside the boundaries of people of his origins, a fact that ultimately helped end his marriage to a wife from a well-off family. It was a copy of The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, that classic story of capitalist chicanery and abuse of the working class, given him on his 14th birthday by his father, that first articulated his radical leanings. With another boy as The It Kids: A Song In Harmony, he won a talent competition at a local cinema. Falling in love with an actress in Acton Co-operative Players - amateurs, but specialists in Shaw and Galsworthy - involved him in serious theatre. As a 20-year-old, he appeared in Cambridge repertory. It was going to a Warner holiday camp in Devon in 1936, when he was drawn into entertaining the campers, that led to Dovercourt Warner's offering him a job the following year. The fact that his parents' lodger was associated with Unity theatre, with a pipeline to all the progressive writers of the period, drew him there. He got a part in Colony, a play dealing with the oppression of trade unionism on West Indian plantations, but the outbreak of war intervened, and he found himself an officer in the Pioneer Corps, forming concert parties. His spell as an officer was predictably short. One of his NCOs lost a foot after a grenade exploded, which caused Bill a breakdown that led to his discharge. After going back to Unity, he took over from Alfie Bass as Gunner Cohen in Mr Balfry. When the war ended, his unhappy military experience came in useful when he appeared as Nobby Clarke in The Way To The Stars, his first feature film, which was to lead to a contract with Rank studios but no great parts: he complained that they didn't know what to do with him. He was in the first Soviet play to be performed abroad after the war, The Russian Question, about the way British and American journalists had put hostile questions to the Russians after west and east forces invading Germany had met at the Elbe. He appeared as a cockney plumber in the Victorian social comedy Caste, later rewriting it as a musical premiered at the Theatre Royal, Windsor. Often his line in scatological, devilish comedy offended the rose-tinted spectacles of the time. When he played Touchstone in As You Like It on a US tour, it was not without shouting at the director that he intended to do it his way - which included squeezing a female member of the cast on the inner thigh. The Boston Record commented that he played Touchstone "like the manly wiseacre he is, rather than the uppity-voiced daffodil you usually see". In Britain, he did not have to fight so hard. He appeared in the grim play about the exploitation of boxers, The Square Ring, and then in the film version with Basil Dearden directing. Peter Rogers recruited him as a corporal in the first of the Carry On films, Carry On Sergeant. In the early 1970s, Bill Owen received from the BBC a copy of the script of Last of The Summer Wine - as a single slot for Comedy Playhouse. It had helped that he had played a Yorkshireman in Storey's In Celebration. Realising it was unique, he accepted at once. He had also played Thelma’s father in Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads. The three out-of-work Yorkshiremen, now whiling away their retirement as best they could in a Yorkshire village, became more real than reality. The location village, Holmfirth, became a tourist shrine. More than 11 million people watched each episode. For Bill it led to a gap of 21 years in other television work, but the public loved it. His domestic life was not untroubled. The fact that his first wife, Edith Stevenson, offered him £1,000 so that for a year they could be seen in places where he might make fashionable professional contacts, and he indignantly refused, was a pointer to the difficulties that would end the marriage in 1964. They had one son. His second marriage was to Kathleen O' Donoghue, who survives him, with his son and stepdaughter. William John Owen Rowbotham (Bill Owen), actor, director and writer, born March 14, 1914; died July 12, 1999. Stay in touch Peter gsseditor@gmail.com

Web Page 30961 21st September 2023 First Picture: Young Max Jaffa