When I were a lad

[Farside]

When I was at grammar school the local shop would sell you a Woodbine and two matches in a paper bag for 3d.

I remember the Penny Single. I think that was a Woodbine, too.

 

[Farside]

Sounds like the sewing room at Rover, apprentices would come out blushing

Jeez, I recall going into some sweatshop sewing places as a young lad. The reek of hormonal wimmens would knock you flat.

 

[graffian]

Sounds like the sewing room at Rover, apprentices would come out blushing

I had a job as a solderer, all alone in a room with 60 women.
And I got paid.

 

[500e]

Sounds like the sewing room at Rover, apprentices would come out blushing

Wills Tobacco Bristol

 

[The_Yellow_Ardvark]

Wills Tobacco Bristol

Up By HMS Flying Fox?

 

[redlig]

I had a job as a solderer, all alone in a room with 60 women.
And I got paid.

I spent 6 months at Perdio Radio in London during my apprenticeship and remember venturing into the coil winding dept. Full of nubile crumpet. On the wall was a very large calendar with girls names biro'd in the day spaces. I asked the guys in the radio Lab the meaning and got told " just don't chat up any girl if her name was on that week. They had found that the sweat on their fingers changed at certain times and made it impossible to maintain the spec required on the hF coils.
Much later when selling industrial clothing I got an order for Johnson & Johnson in Slough for all the women operators and was told it was part of my job to measure them all up for boiler suits and coats etc. One look at them and I bottled out , gave the chargehand the tape and said just call out the size and names.

 

[Blobber]

In the early 80s I used do do some work at a place in Wheathampstead, Hertfordshire where they made firemans helmets the proper old school cork with a canvas cover type, an old boy used to compress the cork to shape and a couple of really really old girls used to glue the canvas covers on, I swear they were high as kites all day and being 17ish they used to scare the sh*t out of me, im sure given half a chance they would have had me clothes off! place was called Helmets as well, shame properly skilled people but all gone now and I think its houses

 

[Chippie]

One vivid memory, my dad sent me to buy a gallon of petrol, local garage was a distance…Thornaby Road…..we lived on Havilland Road…
Anyway, he gave me a ten bob note and a gallon can….
Set off walking, got to the garage, filled up can, then to my horror discovered I’d lost the ten bob note en route…..OMG……
Fortunately he forgave me….

 

[julianthegypsy]

I got Embassy or Capstan Full Strength….

I would kill for a Capstan Full Strength!

 

[Chippie]

I would kill for a Capstan Full Strength!

Sorry, all gone…cough..cough..

 

[500e]

Up By HMS Flying Fox?

No1 factory Bedminster
Scary place even fo time served

 

[brewdexta]

An old colleague at BT in London used to work for W. D & H.O Wills of Woodbine fame. I asked him why he didn't smoke.

He said that he used to help sort out the tobacco leaf as it was unloaded from the wharf. The leaves were knotted on the stalk to hold the leaves together, usually with more tobacco leaves. The main leaves went into cigar and other tobacco products. The knotted bit was usually full of maggots and went straight into the machine making cigarettes.

Hence why he never smoked

 

[ajlelectronics]

Hence why he never smoked

I don't think that maggot remains would get him lung cancer as quickly as the tobacco though.

 

[JEZGUZ]

Went to Japan and discovered Golden Bat ciggies, on a par with Capstans I reckon.

 

[brightspark]

Went to Japan and discovered Golden Bat ciggies, on a par with Capstans I reckon.

i smoked capstan full strength and Senior service untipped and made the bingers in to rollies as well. smoking pure tar

 

[bricol]

An old colleague at BT in London used to work for W. D & H.O Wills of Woodbine fame. I asked him why he didn't smoke.

He said that he used to help sort out the tobacco leaf as it was unloaded from the wharf. The leaves were knotted on the stalk to hold the leaves together, usually with more tobacco leaves. The main leaves went into cigar and other tobacco products. The knotted bit was usually full of maggots and went straight into the machine making cigarettes.

Hence why he never smoked

We just had a very similar conversation this evening - back in 1991 ish I worked for Philip Morris - their engineering company rebuilding cigarette making and packing machines, as well as their own special purpose machines. Used machines used to be horrible - the things living in the tabacco stuck in the bottom and corners of the hoppers etc.

 

[Greeves246]

As an addendum to the Funny about the Goodyear Airship at Daytona, a couple of pics from 1984. One of my Goodyear sponsored hang glider at Barton aerodrome with the Goodyear Europa and one from the gondola .

 

[slim_boy_fat]

i smoked capstan full strength and Senior service untipped and made the bingers in to rollies as well. smoking pure tar

So did my Mum, 60 a day. Killed her in the end.

 

[julianthegypsy]

So did my Mum, 60 a day. Killed her in the end.

The thing with Capstan for me was they were an occasional treat. I never smoked more than a few of them in a day, like after lunch with a coffee. Certainly not like the rallies that were almost constantly on the go!

 

[James1979]

i smoked capstan full strength and Senior service untipped and made the bingers in to rollies as well. smoking pure tar

For the last 7 years of his life my dad was virtually completely paralysed. He lived in a care home for such folk.

One old biddy who was equally immobile smoked like a beagle. Problem was, she couldn’t be allowed fags unsupervised. I *think* it was to do with her dropping them and setting self on fire. It happens. Anyhow…..

They’d rigged up this god awful contraption with an ash tray on the arm of her chair and a piece of clear tube which went up to a bracket at about mouth height. Staff used to light a cigarette in the ashtray and she would puff away merrily then start squawking once it had run out. They’d change it, rinse and repeat.

That tube was absolutely minging. One of the girls reckoned they put a new one on every couple of days. I’ve never smoked, but if I were to consider it that tube was enough to put you right off!!!!