T05 – Summary – Ramsbottom Heritage Society

T05 Mr Harry Archerly

Work conditions in Ramsbottom and Prestwich

Recorded 1987/88

Length 00:47:02

The conversation involves two speakers discussing local history and personal experiences in Ramsbottom and Prestwich.
Speaker 1 shares memories of engineering, local disasters, and wartime experiences.
They reflect on changes in work conditions and community life over the years.
The discussion touches on the impact of wars, the importance of unions, and the evolution of building standards.
Personal anecdotes highlight family life, community values, and the contrast between past and present societal norms.

🧒 Early Life and Schooling

Born and raised near Prestwich, on the border with Salford, the speaker attended a local elementary school and described schooling as strict and scripture-based.
He mentions churchyard lessons, inspectors quizzing children on Bible knowledge, and having to “earn” further education himself.
He left school at age 13 and began work immediately.

⚙️ Early Employment and Industrial Work

His first job was in a bleach works (chemical plant) handling caustic soda, steam, and bleaching chemicals—a dangerous, physically demanding environment.
He describes poor safety standards, long hours (6 am – 5:30 pm, and half-days Saturday), and starting wages of 11 shillings and 6 pence per week.
He later worked in private service for a wealthy Greek employer named Dimitriadi, near Cheetham Hill, referencing the Greek church between Prestwich and Manchester.
Over the years he took on many jobs—in mills, engineering, garages, and large construction firms like McAlpine’s, Lanes, Cox, Carlisle, and others—showing the varied, manual labor common in early 20th-century industrial life.

🏭 Industrial and Engineering Memories

He recalls Bury and Ramsbottom as cotton and engineering towns, naming Ratliff and Ramsbottom’s mills as major employers.
Worked on major projects such as Lewis’s department store, Marks & Spencer, Aitchcroft (Agecroft) Power Station, and Piccadilly developments in Manchester.
He vividly describes technical incidents, e.g., near disasters at power plants due to pressure boiler explosions and the introduction of safety valves.

💣 Wartime Experiences

He remembers both World Wars:
- In WWI, he was a child; he recalls the propaganda (“Kitchener—Your Country Needs You”) and losing a brother.
- In WWII, he served himself—over 40 years old at enlistment—eventually stationed in Belgium near the Fresnes district (calling it “our HQ”).
- He describes the Manchester Blitz (1941), rationing, and local bomb shelters.
- He expresses ambivalence about postwar attitudes, criticizing the way war memories are “kept up too much” but acknowledging the suffering, especially of Jews in the Holocaust.

🏘️ Community and Social Life

He recalls Prestwich as “The Village”, surrounded by farmland, with close-knit families and hardworking women who “could look after themselves.”
Talks about Sunday School parades (Whit Walks), cinema visits (the Ambassador), and local pubs like the Woolpack.
King George V and Queen Mary’s visit to the area in the 1930s is remembered; he links it possibly to the opening of the East Lancashire Road.
He notes the contrast between old and modern building standards, lamenting how “they don’t build like that today.”

👷 Attitudes to Work, Society, and Change

Praises strong work ethic and the rise of trade unions, saying “they knew what they couldn’t do without unions.”
Criticizes modern life for being less disciplined, less caring, and morally looser, contrasting it with “when people were strict but kind.”
Expresses disappointment with Britain’s postwar decline, saying he’s “no longer proud to be an Englishman,” and that if he were young, he’d emigrate to Canada or Australia.

🩺 Health and Old Age

He suffers from severe arthritis, diagnosed in the 1960s, which “has ruled my life for over 20 years.”
Feels neglected by the medical system and unappreciated by the country he served: “You do your best, you serve your country, and that’s what you get.”

❤️ Personal Reflections

Speaks tenderly about his parents (lived into their 80s), his happy upbringing despite poverty, and deep family love:

“There was more love then than there is now — you had to be loved to exist.”

Remembers working-class solidarity, discipline, and self-reliance as the moral foundations of his generation.
Ends reflecting on the changes in youth, morality, and community, nostalgic yet realistic about hardship and loss.

🧾 Overall Themes

T05 – Summary