GRANDPA's MEMORIES
	We were told that a prospector was reading a book titled “The Fortunes of Nigel” by Sir Walter Scott, when he discovered the reef of gold in the area.

On the 29th June 1935, in the town of Nigel, in the old Transvaal, Andrew Hilton Colley was born to Irene Maud Colley (nee Masters) and Thomas Colley.
	My earliest memory is of playing in the grounds of the block of flats where my aunt Eva and Uncle Wally Ogilvie were living. It was before I started school, so must have been when I was about four years old. I remember there was a carpet hanging on the fence, and I used it as a tent. The house next door was owned by a family named Zook, and their daughter, Beryl, was a friend of my cousin Irene (known as Neenie).
	The next memory is of the day we moved to Selbourn Avenue, Noycedale, in Nigel, and my mother introduced me to the maid who was cleaning the coal-fired stove. Her name was Katy, and she and her husband John, lived in the rooms at the back of the house. John worked on the Old Nigel Mine with my father.
	Mt father had been a soldier in the first world war and after the war it was some time before everyone was officially demobilised. Even then some 
	My older brothers, Neville and Bryan, both joined the army at the beginning of World War II, but I remember a whole group of youngsters playing cricket in the open field opposite our house, I could not have been much more than five, but I also played, and got a cricket ball in my face which gave me a black eye. I also remember Neville and Bryan putting a “Fairy cycle” together from parts they scavenged from the rubbish dump. They painted it blue and the first time I learnt to ride it I spent so much time riding round the block I was ill that night.
	About a year after I was born, my mother lost a child to pneumonia when the baby was only a few days old. My sister, Dawn, was born in 1940. My youngest brother, Malcolm, was born two years later, in 1942.
	I started school at the age of about 5½ years, attending the Nigel Dominican Convent. I was moved up from Grade 1 to Grade 2 at half-year. I will always be grateful to the good educational start I got at the convent. Those nuns certainly taught me to read and say my tables. Even the 0 times table, which engrained in ones mind that if you had nothing, even multiplying it by a thousand, you still had nothing.
	The grades came out of school earlier than the rest of the school, but we still had to wait for the later time when the busses came to take us home. I remember waiting in the school room for the bus, and a nun drawing pictures in my first reading book, an apple for 'A', and so on.
	When “scripture” lesson time came round those of us who were not Roman Catholics all came together in one classroom and one of the nuns would read bible stories, and other religious stories, to us. I remember being told a story about Mohammed, who had a cat which went to sleep on the sleeve of Muhammed's coat. So as not to disturb the cat, Muhammed cut the sleeve off the garment.

During the second world war white flour was not available. I think the government decided that we all had to eat brown bread as part of the war effort ? At any rate, the women were not going to accept that. I think every woman whose husband worked on the Ols Nigel Mine had a flour sieve manufactured in the carpentry shop on the mine. I remember seiving flour in the evenings, which we were told was illegal. My mother used to make bran scones from the bran, So nothing was wasted.

When I reached standard 3 I had to go to the English Medium Primary School, as the Convent didn't take boys after standard 3. Because of starting school at a younger age, plus doing grades 1 and 2 in one year, I was a couple of years younger than the rest of the children in my class, a fact which led to a certain amount of teasing and bullying.
	During my Standard four and five years at school I had both my tonsils and my appendix out. The appendix was (apparently) close to bursting by the time I had it out, and as I was pretty weak after the operation my father took me away for a holiday. We travelled by train to King Williams Town in the Cape, where my father had been brought up. I remember we stayed at the Masonic Hotel.
	After standard 5, I moved to the Junior High School, on the same premises, which were just opposite the Marais Shaft of the Old Nigel Mine. There was no High School in Nigel at that time. A number of my schoolmates either went to boarding school such as Potchefstroom High, or travelled through to Springs to Springs High School.
	Another memory I have is, while we were still living in Noycedale, accompanying my father, on the crossbar of his bike, going to the station where I was weighed on the luggage scales. My dad also bought me a choclate from the machine on the station. Quite a cumbersome machine compared to the modern vending machines.
	We did not have a refridgerator in those days. Just outside the back door was the “meat safe”. This consited of a cupboard made of a double layer of chicken wire. Between the two layers was coarse ash clinker. At the bottom of the cupboard was a tray filled with water. The clinker dipped into this and syphoned up as it evaporated. The evaporation cooled whatever was inside.
	I also started to go to church which was in the road just below ours. I became a server and joined the choir at some stage. The minister, Father G.A.P. Cooper had a long-lasting influence on me and I met up with him again when he was in Jo'burg.
	During the war years there was a flying base at Dunotter aerodrome, the Central Flying School, at which British airmen, as well as South Africans, were based. On a hill on the southern side of Nigel the airforce had erected targets, and the Harvards used to fly over our house on their way to shoot at the targets.
	Perhaps to counter the bullying, my father suggested I take up boxing. A trainer had started to teach in Nigel, using a small hall at the back of the Nigel bottling Company factory. The same hall was used by the scouts, which I joined. (2nd Nigel Troop)
	The boxing trainer had the name of Jimmy Voight. One of my classmates was surnamed Arthur , and his brother, Duncan, also trained with Jimmy Voight. Voight thought Duncan was good enough to be trained further, so concentrated on him. His name was changed, for boxing purposes, to Johnny, and Johnny Arthur went on to fight at the Olympics and then turned professional.
	Because my school did not have the last two matric years, it was decided to send me to Springs High. All those who did so used to travel through by bus, although on occasion I also rode through on my bicycle.
	One of my friends was given a bad time by one of the teachers at Springs High, so 'bunked' school, forging a letter to the headmaster to say he was ill and could not attend school. He did that for a about six months until one day the headmaster phoned his father to enquire as to the boy's progress. Then the whole story came out, including the facts about the bullying teacher. Nigel Junior High became Nigel High School through pressure from the parents, and we all left Springs High and went to the Nigel High.
	
Before the outbreak of the second World War, Nigel Municipality had started to construct a swimming bath., but had to stop when materials became scarce. The result was that we had nowhere to learn to swim. Some youngsters used to go down to the “Blesbok Spruit”, but after rain that became quite dangerous and a number of kids were drowned. The Nigel Mine had a small swimming pool adjacent to their single quarters accommodation, but it did not have a filter system and, as the pool was only drained and cleaned once a year, the water got pretty green and mucky. We could not swim in any of the mine dams because of the presence of Cyanide fro the gold extraction process. A couple of friend of mine built a tin canoe to sail on a dam which capsized. They couldn't swim, panicked and drowned although the water was only waist deep where the bodies were found.
	The mine at Dunotter had a much bigger swimming pool, the trouble was that it was some miles away and transport from Nigel was hard to come by. Some of us did, however, cycle there from time to time.
	The nearest area suitable for picnics at that time was Heidelberg Kloof, now part of the Suikersbosrand Nature Reserve. For a number of years we used to join with aunts and uncles and their families to spend Christmas Day there. It was on the far side of the town of Heidelberg, and about fifteen kilometers from Nigel. Quite a way for people in those days.
	On one such Christmas occasion, my father was on the back of a light delivery van driven by one of the other members of the family. The open van was loaded with all the requirements for the Christmas lunch, including a case of beer. The road leading to the picnic spot was very uneven and when the van hit a particularly bad spot, my dad fell off. So did the case of beer, right on top of my dad. It broke his back. He was in a steel corset for about a year.

I had a friend living in the town next to the fire station. His name was Lionel Dougherty and he was very interested in radio, building his own with vacuum radio tubes he bought and obtained from scrapped radios. This was in the days long before transistors. He interested me enough for me to learn to make my own crystal radio.
	I managed to get hold of a set of ex army earphones, which was the most difficult or expensive part. I also bought a crystal, set in a holder. These crystals were usually of Galena, a naturally occuring mineral of lead sulphide. The rest was made up wires scrounged from old car coils and a block of wood to mount it on.
 

Schoolmates, having seen mine, also wanted one and I ended up as the “expert”, making them and helping to string up the required aerials.
	On one occasion I ended up with quite severe heat stroke from working up on a roof in the hot sun.
	I read, in the “Popular Mechanics Magazine', about some army chaps who had made crystal radios using a safety razor blade as a crystal, and decided to make my own. I used a Gillette Blue blade for the crystal, and a safety pin for the 'cats-whisker' the thin wire connection to the crystal which was used for picking up the radio signal. I was trying it out in the back yard when my mother came out and asked me what I was doing. I had tuned in to the local radio station and offered her the earphones to hear the music. She insisted I must have a concealed wire connected to the family radio, as the bundle of wires she couls see could not be picking up radio signals.
	My mother used to read a lot and encouraged the children to do so. Dad usually only read the newspaper, although he also used to like reading items from the dictionary or encyclopedia. I was always given a book for my birthday.
	Our town library had a childrens section and an adult section and, generally, children were only allowed to borrow books from the childrens section. One day I went looking for a particular book my mother had mentioned, but it was in the adult section. I asked the librarian to let me borrow it and after making sure I could read and understand the book, she said I could book it out. After that I was free to use the adult section.

The Nigel Mine, common to most mines, had a single quarters for unmarried miners, a number of groups of houses termed 'married quarters, and a couple of hostels or 'compounds' for the labourers, most of whom came from elsewhere in South Africa, the Rodesias (now Zimbabwe and Zambia), Mocambique, or Nyasaland (now Malawi).
	In 1950 our family were living at 'Delgarno Crescent', a group of thirteen houses of married quarters, about eight kilometers from town. Directly South of us, between Delgarno Crescent and the Eastern part of town, was a mine dam, and to the East of that was a Compound for mine workers.
	On Saturday evenings they used to have an open air cinema at the compound. The films were usually comedies or cowboy films. A number of us boys used to ride the five kilometers on our bicycles to join the men in watching the films, and then race back home, in the dark, on our bicycles.
	Delgarno Crescent was a piece of ground about half a kilometer by half a kilometer. Basically rectangular in shape but with a diagonal piece sliced off on the western side past which ran the Nigel – Marievale road. Ten of the houses ran from the South Eastern corner westwards, then the road in front of the houses took a slight kink, there was a gap, and then the last three houses were built, and the road continued to where it met the Nigel-Marievale road at a T-junction. There was a bus service between Nigel to Marievale, with a bus-stop at the T-junction.
	The complex of Delgarno Crescent was surrounded by a low wire fence of common diamond mesh fencing. Just inside the fence there were three or four rows of Blue-gum trees running right round the complex except the Soth Western area which held a small plantation.
	The road running up from the Bus stop ran up to the Eastern-most house, number 1, and then after allownig for the exit at the South-Eastern corner, turned down behind the houses as a service road.
	Each of the houses had a Hawthorn hedge around it with the hedges between the houses being common to those houses on each side. The hedges were about two metres high, just above eye level, and had grown very thick.
	The older children often used to play outside until quite late, often till about nine o'clock when we had to be in. Mine police used to patrol the length of the houses at night, and were responsible for switching the street lights on in the evening and off in the morning. The switch for the street lights was on the pole at number 1, Delgarno Crescent. 
	One evening we decided to tease the watchman on duty and set one of our chaps on top of the hawthorn hedge at the bottom of the row of houses, one at about number six and one on the hedge at number 1. The rest climbed into Acorn trees which grew on the other side of the road. Everyone was equipped with torches.
	We waited till the watchman rounded the corner at number 12A, then the chap on top of the hedge down there flashed his torch. The chap at number 6 relayed the flash with his torch, and the chap at Number 1 switched off the lights and hid. 
	The watchman duly came running up and switched the lights on again and then hid to see if anyone came out. We were hidden and waited till he gave up and resumed his patrol. We waited till he got to the bottom of the houses and repeated the trick. This time we were sorry for him and after he had gone off again we went off to play elsewhere. He reported the incident and of course as there were so few of us our fathers knew we were all involved. They didn't take it too seriously but said we were not to make the watchman's job more difficult.
	The fact that we hid on top of the hedges was never revealed and we found it quite convenient to help ourselves to fruit from fruitrees near the hedges while the dogs in the area barked their heads off. The owners of the fruit trees never thought to look up when they came out to see what the dogs were barking at.
	My mother had always done her grocery shopping at the Indian shops at the bottom of Nigel.  After the war some things were difficult to get but my mother was well known at the Indian shops and they often found some item for her from under the counter. They also allowed her to buy on credit which helped my mother a lot as we were not that well off, although I never remember going hungry. There was always bread and syrup. I do not  remember, but was told about, an occasion when my father had broken his back and was bedridden for nearly a year. My mother had to go to work at a clothing factory. That year the only presents apart from some sweets and fruit, came from my Uncle Wally and Aunt Eva.
	Even when we were living at Delgarno Crescent my mother still shopped at the Indians and I remember her pushing the pram with Malcolm in it, the front of the pram let down so Dawn could sit there, and sometimes I would ride on the side. I had a wonderful mother and father.

In 1951 I was, as previously mentioned, a member of the 2nd Nigel Scout Troop. That year the Scouting movement held a Jamboree in Austria.
	The parents' committee of the Nigel Troop decided to raise funds to send a boy to the Jamboree, the boy to be chosen from the troop by a competition based on scouting knowledge. The competition was held about January and we all were given tests, such as first aid knowledge, badge work, and so on. I was fortunate to win the competition and a boy by the name of Douggie Bennett came second.
	The funds raised were actually in excess of the required amount to send one boy to Austria so the parents' committee offered to send Douggie if his parents could find the extra money to add to what they had. This they did, and Douggie and I started to prepare for the trip.
	To start with only boys with a minimum of the First Class Scout badge was acceptable to the South African organising Committee, so Douggie and I both had a lot of work to do as we had not really been interested in progressing in badge work up to that time. I was a Patrol leaders and Douggie was my Second. As soon as possible Douggie was made a Patrol Leader and we started working on badges and the First Class badge, culminating in the First Class Hike, which Douggie and I completed together. We were dropped off at Heidelberg Kloof to camp and were tested there on various scouting aspects by the District Commissioner. We then hiked across country to Nigel. It poured with rain most of the way, and we kept up our spirits by singing Scout songs, including “It ain't gonna rain no more, no more.”
	Although the funds had been raised to send me to Austria, my parents had to find the money to equip me with uniforms and other requirements. Douggie and I travelled by train to Johannesburg to purchase the requirements at the Scout Shop. A journey requiring two hours and a change of trains.
	Finally all was ready, all the Scout contingent of 80 scouts plus Scout Masters met in Johannesburg, and we set off for Cape Town by train.

On arrival in Cape Town we marched up to the Gardens above the Cathedral and were there individually given over to families of Cape Town Scouts. My family was a 'Coloured' family living fairly near the slopes of Table Mountain. This was an experience for me as these were the dim days of apartheid. Cape Town, at that time, was fairly liberal in its attitudes to apartheid, coloureds were allowed on the local trains and busses.
	After a day or so in Cape Town, being shown around by the Cape Town Scouts, we embarked on our ship, the Stirling Castle, for England. 

	The journey by the Castle Mail Ships took two weeks, stopping off at Las Palmas going there, and Madeira on the return journey to South Africa. It was a holiday in itself, although we had military style drill every day as well as Physical Training Exercises. We also had to wash and iron our uniforms. Amazing how quickly your shirt dried when held out the porthole. Flap, flap and it was dry. You had to be careful you held it tightly though. Ironing was done with an enamel mug filled with boiling water. Fairly successful.
	 Helping to make the journey more interesting was the fact that there were forty or so girls from Durban Girls School on the trip to England.
	During the voyage we crossed the equator and took part in a crossing-the-line ceremony. Lots of fun with Neptune coming aboard and the participants being “shaved” by the ships barber with lots of soap suds. There were also the usual shipboard games during the day and dancing and concerts in the evening.

On arrival in Southampton we disembarked and travelled to London by train. In London we were taken to a Scout Hall in the grounds of a church where we were to spend the night. It was dark when we got there so we didn't see much of the surrounding church grounds. 
	We were fed by Scout families bringing food in and then tried to settle down for the night. That night it was stiflingly hot and with eighty boys trying to find a place to sleep on a hard floor, some of us decided to pick up our blankets and move outside. There we found more comfortable sleeping places on ground which was easier to sleep on, and a convenient row of stones to lean our backs on, or use for pillows.
	In the morning we woke up to find our convenient stones were grave stones. In England most churches have a burial ground. 
	That morning scouts from the local troops arrived and we were taken to their houses for the few days we were to be in England before leaving for Austria. We were given a day to prepare ourselves before being inspected by Princess Elizabeth (as she then was) at Clarence House. She stopped and spoke to some of us as she passed.

	We crossed to France by Ferry and travelled by train, through Paris, to Salzberg in Austria, then on a narrow gauge train to Bad Ischl, in the Salzkammergut area. Beatiful mountains and lakes. The Camp Site was very nice, nestled in a valley. I don't know how many Scouts were camped there, but there were hundreds, from all over the world. We spent a large part of the time visiting the other scouts and exchanging badges and other momentos. Some of us had pieces of Springbok skin which we used in the exchanges.
	There were other formal functions and parades, and we spent some time visiting the local scenic sites as well as a trip by coach to visit the Grossglockner glacier.
All the scouts had brought extra badges of their troop and country to exchange. It was customary for scouts to sew badges they had collected, on their Camp Fire blanket. This was a blanket the scouts would put around their shoulders while sitting round the camp fire in the evenings, singing songs and telling stories. The scouts from the United States had been issued with packs of badges to exchange.
	While in Austria the U.S. Scouts had also been taken to ski and other activities. When they left Austria they abandoned all leftover and unwanted kit, including skis. They threw them down into the pit toilets!!!!

	When we returned to England we, mostly, went back to stay with the families who had hosted us on the way to Austria. The family I stayed with were surnamed 'Hook'. The son, a scout, wa named Colin, and they had a daughter named Doreen. Mr. and Mrs. Hood owned a grocery shop in Wembley High Street. They lived in a flat above the shop. Many years later I met up with the family again when they were living in South Rygate.
	We now had a week of free time when scouts could visit any family they had in England, or go sightseeing. One on the Scouters accompanying the South African contingent was actually the Scoutmaster from the 2nd Nigel troop.  He had an offer from the Scouter who was his host in London. The man offered to take him and a couple of scouts to Cornwall by car. Our scoutmaster contacted Douggie and I, as well as a scout from our District back home. He was a chap from the Heidelberg troop. His first name was Piet. 
	So we had a marvellous week going right down to Land's End before returning back to London, and then back to South Africa with the rest of the contingent, on board the “Carnavon Castle”.

	On my return to Nigel, I had a problem. This was my final Matric year, and I had been away for three months. Before I went to Austria my teachers had said they thought I would be able to cope with the exams if I worked hard when I got back, but I had never been very keen on school, and I did not want to go back now. After much argument, it was decided I should be allowed to try to get a job.
	My brother, Bryan, worked as a draughtsman with a firm called Babcock and Wilcox, in Johannesburg. I had always been very keen on chemistry and my brother said that Babcocks were planning a new factory in Vereeniging, and a laboratory was part of the plans. He suggested that I apply for a junior job with Babcocks with the intention of going into the laboratory when it was built.
	I duly applied and was taken on as an office boy in Johannesburg. I lived with an Aunt Eva and Uncle Wally who had a flat in Rissik Mansions. Their daughter, Neenie, was working as a typist with “The Star”, and became engaged to, and later married, “Lucky” Raubenheimer.
	As an office boy my duties included opening the mail, distributing the mail to the various offices at Babcocks, and helping with the filing. The lady in charge of the office and I shared the office room with the telephone operator. The telephone switchboard was the old 'plug in and ring' type. I therefor also learned to operate the switchboard when the operator had to leave the office, and later took over once when she was on leave.
	After I had been there a while the company secretary called me in and said that the company had decided to offer me the opportunity to train as an engineer. This would entail being sent to the main factory at Renfrew, Scotland, as an apprentice. The apprenticeship would consist of, what was then known as, sandwich courses. This consisted of six months in the factory and six months at Technical College, for three years.
	As I was still only 16 years old I would have to have my father's permission. Now I struck a snag. My brother, Bryan, had started as an apprentice fitter and turner on the mines after returning fro Italy after World War II, to which he had run away from school. After working there for about a year he had found he did not like the work, and persuaded my father to buy him out of his apprenticeship. As an apprentice he had been to technical college and found he liked draughtmanship, hence his working for Babcock's in their drawing office. Now he came out against the idea of me going as an apprentice of any kind, and persuaded my father to refuse me permission. 
	South Africa had a sort of 'selection by chance' method of calling up trainees for active citizen force training and I was called up to join the Signals Corps. I went for the medical and was told I would receive instructions later for my initial training camp. This I received just after I moved to Vereeniging and had to get reassigned to the 2nd Anti-aircraft regiment in Vereeninging.
	The new factory was still at the drawingboard stage, so it was decided I should go into the drawing office as a junior draughtsman. This I did for about six months when the drawing office at the new factory was completed and the draughtsmen moved down there. I enjoyed the work as a draughtsman, and what I learnt there stood me in good stead later in life.
	After moving to Vereeninging I attended Friday evening drill sessions with the 2nd Ack-Ack until I went on my three-month basic training in Cape Town, at Youngsfield Aerodrome. We used to get leave over the week-ends although we had to be back in camp each night. Mostly the chaps used to go to the “Union Jack Club” for a beer – or two --- or three. 
	At that time the British Navy were based at Simonstown and some of their sailors would also go to the Union Jack Club. Inevitably a South African would bump a sailor, or vice versa, and a fight would break out. Everyone would be thrown out of the club and sit side-by-side on the pavement until allowed back in the club. Until it happened again.
	I remember on Permanent Force private based at Youngsfield. He was always in trouble, usually for arriving back in cap from a spree in town, roaring drunk. He would be “confined to barracks” for a period and given work to do in camp. He didn't mind. There were Radar truck in camp, like huge caravans with discs on top. While in camp they were covered with canvas tarpaulins which reached to the ground. The said private would crawl under the canvas and underneath the truck, and just sleep and read all day. The N.C.O.'s never could find him and we certainly didn't give his hiding place away.
	After my basic training camp I was trained as a signaller / radio operator. The military had a system whereby on one day everything would be in English, the next Afrikaans, and so on. Up to that time all radio work had been conducted in English, but it was decided that the signals operators had to operate the same as the rest of the army. My group was one of the first to be trained to operate in Afrikaans, including code work. Later, when we carried out manouvers with the Permanent Force, they had no Afrikaans trained operators, so I was seconded to the Permanent Force for a period.
	Once when out on manouvers I was at my radio, which was ex Russian Army by the way, when the radio-truck overturned. I was unhurt but had battery acid spilt over my boots. After returning to camp I was always being told off because my boots were not clean The trouble was that the acid had taken the surface off the boots so they would not shine up. The quartermaster stores would not replace the boots because they were still wearable. After that I was known as “Boots”.
	On one occasion we went out for gunnery training off the beach near the Cape Flats. An aeroplane towing a 'drouge' (I think it was called), would fly past over the sea, and the anti-aircraft gunners would try to shoot the drouge which was at the end of a long cable. All of a sudden the pilot radio'd down, “Tell those ********** that I'm pulling the drouge, not pushing it”. The puffs of bursting shells were in front of the plane.
	The group at Youngsfield were part of the South African Marines, and I was told I had permission to wear the S.A. Marines pocket badge. I still have mine. The Marines were discontinued, then revived, then discontinued. I don't know if they are still around.
	When the first work for the laboratory was commenced I would be called there by one of the engineers to learn to do the physical testing of steels for the boilers which Babcocks produced for Power Stations. This would happen once or twice a week, and the rest of the time I worked in the Drawing Office.
	However, this type of Laboratory was not what I had envisaged. I was interested in a chemistry laboratory, so, without saying anything to my brother, I applied for a job as a laboratory assistant with Dunswart Iron and Steel works in Benoni. After being interviewed I was accepted and changed jobs with my father's approval. My father appreciated my desire for chemical laboratory work in preference to a physical test laboratory.
	I did shift work at Dunswart, doing chemical analysis of steel, and working seven days a week with changing shifts and week-end off every three weeks or so. I lived in a boarding house in Benoni. I went home to my parents most week-end when I was off. Occasionally, however, a group of us would decide over the dinner table on a Friday evening, to go to Durban. One of the men had a car, so we would throw some clothes into case, pile into the car, and drive down to Durban. There we would sleep on the beach, swim all day, and return to Benoni on the Sunday afternoon. What was four hundred miles (about 640 kilometers), to us youngsters? We would take it in turns to drive.
	My cousin Ronnie Ellis was living at the same boarding house as I was and we had good times together. Ronnie was always in trouble with the hotel owner, however. On one occasion he was playing around on the lawn between the rooms. He had a golf stick and agolf ball. We warned him about the windows. “Put this ball through a window ? Nah.” Swing, click, crash., and Ronnie had to explain to the lady how he had broken a window.
	We used to give the owner a hard time, however. As an example, she tried to stop the shift workers from taking sugar from the table for the coffee at work. Everyone was given a jam jar with a given amount of sugar, which was to last us for a given period. The shift worker took his sugar away in a bag and the rest of us just collected all the jars together and made sure that there was the same amount of sugar in each jar by emptying a bit from each.
	It seemed that Ronnie attracted trouble of one sort or another. At one time three of us were boarding in a private house owned by Mrs. Hay. One evening we got home fairly late, Ronnie decided to make himself some coffee before bed. The rest of us went to our rooms. The next morning when we went to breakfast there was a cloud of smoke in the kitchen and a burnt smell. The night before, Ronnie went to make himself a sandwich but found the butter from the fridge was too hard. So, he put it in the oven of the coal fire which was always burning, and forgot about it. What a mess.
	It was not always his fault. One day we arrived home at the same time as Mrs Hay, who was carrying parcels. Being a gentleman, Ronnie leapt forward saying, “Allow me,” intending to open the gate and then take some parcels from her. Only as he opened the gate the gate handle broke off in his hands.
	Then there was the time when he broke a cup at breakfast. Just an accident. Being Saturday morning he told Mrs Hay he would buy her a new cup and saucer. While waiting for me to finish in the bathroom, Ronnie went to the lounge and played around with a T-square. It was about 40 cm. Long, and he balanced it on a finger. Crash, he broke the light fitting. So we had double reason to go shopping.

Staying at a boarding house in Benoni, we had a friend in a room next to Ronnie's. One evening the friend was preparing to go to a Dance while Ronnie and I were planning to go to the cinema. There was a communal bathroom at the end of the line of rooms in which we stayed and the friend went down to bath, leaving his roon door ajar. He had laid out his evening dress and everything he needed, on the bed. Ronnie slipped into his room and took his clothes out of his wardrobe and transferred them to his own room.
	The friend returned from his bath, got dressed and left to pick up his date for the dance, all unsuspecting. Ronnie and I went off to the cinema, believing we would be home before the friend so we could watch the fun when he got home lateand found his wardrobe empty. Big Joke. Only it backfired.
	When we got back from the film we found the place swarming with police. Ronnie waltzed in said, “What's the matter, have you lost your clothes ?” The police turned to him and asked him what he knew. “Oh, they're in my room,” said Ronnie. “The police turned to the friend and asked him if he was a friend of his. “No friend of mine,” was the reply, and Ronnie was taken off to jail.
	It turned out that the friend, on arriving at his date's house, and realised he had left the dance tickets in his jacket pocket, supposedly in his wardrobe, so had returned to the boarding house. On discovering the disappearance he had called the police. The friend and his date never got to the dance. When the police arrived they determined that the friend worked at the bank and the bank's keys were in the pocket of his missing clothes. So they called in the C.I.D.  They kept Ronnie in jail overnight to teach him a lesson.

By 1954 my father had been retired from the mines and the family had moved, first to a block of flats in Johannesburg where my father had a job as the superintendant, and then, after only a short time, to a plot at Naboomspruit, where an uncle and aunt on my Father's side,(Bill and Grace Hibbert) also had a plot.
	Dad had to go down to Johannesburg for a medical check-up, as he had Silicosis after working underground on the mines. I hitched a lift up to Naboomspruit in order to take him down in his car to Jo'burg.
	On the way down, in the neighbourhood of Warmbaths, but in the country, a large truck came towards us and I saw it veering onto our side of the road while still some way off. I pulled off the road and stopped. My Dad looked at me and said, “What's the matter.” THEN the truck veered over to where we would have been if we had carried on. I was shaken, but my Dad just said, “You saw it before it happened, you take after your mother.” My mother had the reputation of being a bit psychic, as had her mother before her.
	An uncle (Wally) bought a plot of ground near Stegi in Swaziland and my father and Uncle Bill decided to buy one each as well. They bought them through Wally and decided to go down and have a look at it and took me along. There were two very nice pieces of ground adjoining each other and seemed to have had a cattle Kraal on them as there was plenty of manure around. The countryside there was very beautiful, hilly but not too much, and the two plots were on a flattish piece of land about eight kilometers from Stegi.
	Nothing came of their plans to retire to the spot and a few years later I had some money saved up and bought my Dad's plot from him as an investment.

In 1955 I was tired of shift work and applied for a job at East Rand Engineering. There the work consisted of analysing iron samples from the the Cupola furnaces, and non-ferrous analysis for the other part of the foundry. This was a five day week job working eight a.m. to five p.m. I still continued to live in Benoni, travelling to work by train.
	While still at Dunswart I had started studying through evening classes at the Witwatersrand Technical College in Johannesburg, studying Chemistry and Metallurgy. I also started to learn ballroom dancing at a studio in Benoni.
	After about six months at E.R.E. My old boss at Dunswart contacted me to offer me the job of Senior Chemist. This was a 'days only' job, again Monday to Friday, and would mean I would not have to travel. So, back I went to Dunswart.
	There were a couple of episodes I remember during this period. One was that I contracted Tick-bite fever after visiting my folk in Naboomspruit. Another took place while I was preparing chemical solutions for the shift workers. 
	Our work benches in the laboratory were concrete with a piece of conveyor belt on the top surface to protect the glassware. We used to store the large, Winchester Quart, bottles of Chemicals under the bench. On this particulat occasions I had to make up a solution of dilute Sulphuric Acide using concentrated Acid from a Winchester Quart. I swung the bottle from under the bench onto the bench, but did not lift it high enough, and the bottom of the bottle caught the edge of the concrete bench and broke. I had concentrated Sulphuric Acid all over my legs and feet. Fortunately the Chief Metallurgist heard the shouts, came out of his office a directed me to jump into the cooling pond just outside the laboratory. I was not badly burnt but my shoes were a write-off, most of the lower part of my laboratory coat was destroyed, and my socks, which were nylon, just disappeared.
	On another occasion I was putting a glass tube through a hole in a rubber stopper when the glass tube broke and jabbed my hand. Then there was the occasion when I was cleaning a platinum crucible with molten salts and threw the mixture into the sink without thinking. My hand was still over the sink when the molten salts hit some water and jumped right back onto my hand. I was quite badly burnt and had to have treatment to my hand. Such is life in a working laboratory when you get careless.
	During 1956 I passed my Advanced Technical Certificates III in Chemistry and Metallurgy at Wits. Tech. 
	There were a number of us from Dunswart Iron and Steel Works studying in the evenings at the Wits. Tech., and we used to travel through to the tech. by train. One of the chemists, named Ronny Senogles, had a small car. I think it was a Fiat Cub. Sometimes four of us would climb into this car to go through to the Tech. It was a bit cramped and the car struggled to get up a hill, but it flew down the other side. Some years later Ron went on to join Scientology full time, and became a senior man in the organisation.

At the beginning of 1957 a new Assistant Metallurgist started to work at Dunswart Iron and Steel Works. He was a Welshman out from Britain and had a degree in Metallurgy. In talks I had with him he said that without a degree I would not be accepted by any company as a metallurgist, no matter what Advanced Technical Certificates I had. That raised a number of problems. Firstly, I did not have my Matric. Secondly, although I might have overcome that, Wits. University courses in Metallurgy were those of Extraction metallurgy, designed to train mining metallurgists. Pretoria University had physical metallurgy courses, but they were all in Afrikaans. I thought I would have been able to make out as my schooling at Nigel High was bilingual, and in fact our chemistry classes had been in Afrikaans.
	However, the Matric problem was the major one and so the Assistant metallurgist suggested I go to England and study at a Technical College there for the Associateship of the Institute of Metallurgists. South Africa was still a member of the Commonwealth, and I would have no problems with going over there. No work permit was required and no visa. So I decided to go over, get a job in London, and study part time.
	My father was not very keen on my going away for three years or so, but as I was now 21 he gave in to the idea. I left South Africa from Cape Town and travelled by the Union Castle Line to Southampton and then up to London.
	On arrival in London I went looking for a residential hotel or boarding house, as I was used to in South Africa, but there were none that I could find.
On board ship going over there had been some representatives from the Overseas Visitors Club, and a number of the young people going over had joined. I had not because I had thought that, as I was going over to work I needed a more permanent accommodation. Now that I could not find anything, I decided to go to the club and at least get some further information through that.
	I duly found my way to Earl's Court, joined the club, and was directed to   accommodation, not at the club itself but not far away. Accommodation was available in rooms in tennement houses and I moved into one in Warrick Road.  It was a tiny room which had orginally been part of a passage which led to a balcony. Having the balcony was nice but it meant that I had a door at each end through which the draught used to whistle, especially in winter.
	I next set out to find a job. The labour office could not help me with the type of job I was looking for so I bought a newspaper and selected a couple of jobs from the advertisements. One was for a laboratory trainee in the aircraft industry, the other was for a laboratory in research in biochemistry at the Hammersmith hospital. My idea was that, if the Biochem. job came through first I would apply there and study for Associateship of the Royal Institute of Chemists; and if I got the job in the aircraft industry, I would study for Metallurgy. I hoped for the chemical bias but, in the event, I got the metallurgical job first.
	So I started work at D.Napier and Sons in Acton, working in the test laboratory and doing physical tests on metals for aircraft and other engines.
	Among other things, Napiers were specialists in surface hardening techniques such as case-hardening and nitriding. They did work on gears for Rolls Royce as well as small gears surface hardened for racing cars. My job, together with my friend Morris Carver, was to test the surface of these objects to ensure they were up to the required hardness. We also carried out other physical tests.
	About a year later I was moved to the research laboratory where I was reponsible for carrying out tests on materials to be used in the new aircraft being developed. Amongst other things I tested steel for a new aeroplane which became the English Electric “Lightning”, using a high frequency Vibraphore machine.
	On one occasion the Reseach engineers at Farnborough asked us to test some material for them. They also asked for the “tangent modulus” of the steel. The rest of the team in our laboratory knew nothing of this criteria, so I was sent to research it at the British Engineering Association library. This was in the days before computers as we know them. I eventually found the necessary formula for calculating the tangent modulus, but, to get accuracy, I had to use seven figure logarithm tables. Four figure was not accurate enough. So, I was sent of to the mathematics department to use a set which they had. In the end we determined we could have got a good enough figure by drawing an appropriate line on the tensile test graph.
	By now I had moved into private boarding in the Roehampton area in Greater London, arranged by Morris Carver who lived nearby. The Overseas Visitors Club atmosphere was impossible for a student, as the members of the Club were forever going to Spain or elsewhere between jobs as waiters etc, and then returning to party.
	The normal procedure with most firms employing trainees was to give them two afternoons a week off so they could go to college. That way they could attend four classes a week, two in the afternoon and two in the evening of the same days. As I was over twentyone Napiers would not give me the afternoons off, so I had to attend college on four evenings. But this meant I had to find a college which had the four classes I needed in the evening. For me it meant going to two different Colleges, Battersea College and Sir John Cass College in the city of London. 
	This was quite heavy going, as it not only meant travelling across London by Tube, but meant I also had to write up my notes and do other study over the weekends. I decided I needed to do something other than study, so, on Friday Evenings I started to go to the London Dance Institute to learn to dance. I eventually worked through the Bronze, Silver and Gold Diplomas in both ballroom dancing and Latin American.
	After a month or so in England I went to look up my hosts from the Scout Jamboree days. Mr. Hook was still running his grocers shop but Mrs Hook had died. Colin Hook had remained in the Scouts and was now a Rover Scout. The Daughter, Doreen was a receptionist with some company or other.
	I sometimes went out on a Saturday to the house they had moved to in South Ruislip and helped them garden. The ground had never been dug over before as it was a new area, and it was solid clay and turf. We dug up sods and heated them in a drum over a fire to make the soil usable.
	While at Dunswart I had worked with Frank Abbott, who came to London about a year after me with the intention of doing the same studies. He found employment at the British Iron and Steel Research Association. We used to see each other quite often, so it was that he told me there was a vacancy at BISRA for a laboratory Assistant
	I applied for the job and started work in the Refractories Department, working on high temperature resistant coatings. BISRA were prepared to give me the necessary afternoons off to go to college, which made life a lot easier. Also the people in Research never overworked themselves. We were expected to be at work by nine o'clock, the normal start time in England, but as long as we got there by tea-time nobody worried. I remember one winter getting to work and the chaps trying to find the warmest office “to hold a meeting”. Then, of course, we had to get away in time to watch our favourite program on the television.
	When Frank first came to England he had written to say he was coming and I met him when he arrived at the Overseas Visitors Club. That week-end I took him to see London. Now, I was used to walking around London, Frank had just spent two weeks on a ship sitting in a deck-chair every day with his feet up, drinking beer. I nearly killed him that first day.
	We often wandered around London together after that. Neither of us had much money but we managed to enjoy ourselves. We even found that it was possible to buy a pint of beer any time of a twentyfour hour day.
	The hours for pubs being allowed to sell drinks was laid down, but they tended to vary in different parts of London. This was so that the city man could buy his pint after leaving work at 4 p.m. Or the office worker could go to the pub after greeting his wife and kids at home, and so on. The workers at Covent Garden worked at night to load and unload fruit and vegetables as it came in, so the hours in that part of London were appropriate for them. So, if you were prepared to move around you could find a drink at any time of the day or night. I think we only tried it once, just for the fun of it.
	One winter while at BISRA I had to get something out of a steel cabinet which had a roll-up door. I bent down and pulled on the handle to raise the door – and my back went into spasm. The cold and the lifting movement, probably I was standing at a slight angle, and a nerve in my spine was pinched. I couldn't let anybody touch me, I was in such pain. One of the chaps was a part-time ambulance driver trained in trauma, and he managed to help me into his car and took me to hospital.
	I was laid off work and had to go for heat therapy every day for about two weeks. I would go to the hospital, have the treatment and physiotherapy, then go out in the cold to catch a bus home. Crazy. I recovered, but my back gave me trouble a few years later.

At about this time my father wrote to tell me someone was interested in buying the Stegi plot if I was willing to sell it. I thought I would be able to invest the money in England and told him to go ahead. I invested in Unit Trusts, which were a new thing at the time.

With my study evenings being easier I continued going to the London Dance Institute and, one evening, my instructer asked me if I would help out by joining some beginners in a group dancing session. The Institute used to have personal sessions with a teacher, and also group sessions so we could get used to other partners.
	I agreed, quite happily, and ended up dancing with a lovely girl dressed in black. I thought she might be a recent widow, but she told me her father had recently died. We started talking over coffee -------- and the rest is history, as she became my lovely wife. 

	As I wrote earlier, when I decided to go to England, South Africa was still in the Commonwealth. Furthermore, Britain had a call-up system for the Army and I was in the age group liable for call-up. I wrote to the appropriate authorities in England, told them of my reason for going to England, and asked for exemption. They wrote, granting me exemption for three years and told me to keep them informed of any address changes, which I did. Now they wrote to me, telling me that the three years were up and that I should produce my return ticket to South Africa, or come for a medical. I went out and bought my ticket. 
	Due to the fact that I had to spread my studies when I was working at Napiers, although I had passed all the exams I had written, I did not get the chance to write the final exam. Shades of my Matric exams.
	Other complications as well. Bee-Ann and I had being seeing each other quite often. I had been down to meet her mother in Devon and help her to sell up her home so she could move to London to be with Bee-Ann. Now we had a new twist. Bee-Ann said she would go with me to South Africa, Bee-Ann's mother stated she was not going to be left behind, so Bee-Ann and I got engaged and made the necessary bookings to all go out to South Africa together.
	
	Our bookings made, tickets bought, passports and other papers finally in order, Bee-Ann and her mother met me at the train station to travel to Southampton to catch the Castle Liner mail boat to South Africa towards the end of October 1960.
	On arriving at the docks there seemed to be lots of fire engines around. It turned out that there had been a fire on board the ship we were to travel on. A good start !!!
	The weather turned nasty on the first night at sea, with the boat rolling around sufficiently to cause the loss of a large amount of the beer on board through breakages. Bee-Ann and her mother, who shared a cabin, took to their bunks, and hardly left them for the entire voyage of two weeks.
	As mentioned before, it was customary to stop at Madeira on the way to England, and Las Palmas on the way back. We went to Madeira first, as we had spare parts for the engines of a vessel which had broken down at Madeira.
	We were not at Madeira for very long, but long enough for some of the passengers to buy lots of Madeira wine. We then sailed on to dock at Las Palmas. A chap at our table, the evening we sailed, had got quite merry with lots of Madeira wine. We never saw him again after that evening. The chap with whom he shared a cabin said that the missing man had said he was going to take a blanket and sleep on deck. The theory was that he had leaned on the railing of the side of the ship, fallen asleep, and fallen overboard.

	A few days later we were seated in the lounge of the ship having a drink when the ship suddenly went quiet. No sound of the engines. Some ships officers who were seated at a table near us, quietly got up and left. We drifted for about four hours before we got going again.
	Because of the extra stop at Madeira, plus the engine stoppage, meant we were behind schedule, so to make up time, the Captain took us close across the western corner of Senegal and Gambia, to cut across down to the South African Cape. We were able to lean over the side of the ship and shout to the people on shore. We were assured the sea was very deep close to the shore.
	I visited Bee-Ann and her mother in their cabin from time to time, offering to bring their meals to them (Which was emphatically refused). Bee-Ann managed to get on deck occasionally but I don't think her mother surfaced much.

We reached Cape Town at the beginning of November.
	The arrival of the Mail Ship in Cape Town was usually timed for about 5 to 6 o'clock in the morning, and passengers would get up early to catch their first sight of Table mountain. On this occasion the ship only got to Cape Town about mid-day. By the time we disembarked the Customs and Immigration personnel had been waiting for our arrival for hours and were not particularly inclined to be helpful.
	When we made our bookings before leaving England, I had arranged to pick up a hire car in Cape Town. This turned out to be very fortunate, as the chap who brought the hire car to the docks was very helpful, assisting us to find our luggage, guiding us very quickly through Customs, and so on. He then recommended a hotel and settled us in, as it was too late in the day to leave Cape Town.
	That evening Bee-Ann and I walked down Adderley Street to the entrance of the old Railway Station where there were fruit sellers. As we walked along Bee-Ann said to me, “Listen to that”. I couldn't hear anything except the usual street and city noises. This continued for a while until I realised that she was listening to the sound of the crickets. To me they were just part of the background noise, but she was not familiar with the noise.
	We duly bought some fruit and returned to the hotel where we found Bee-Ann's mother in bed with the blankets over her head. This was South Africa soon after Sharpville and she had been told in England that she was going out to a blood-bath. While we were out buying fruit she had heard shouts and yells and, on looking out of the window, had seen people capering around a fire with a person tied to a pole in the fire. She was sure her last days had come.
	I looked out of the window at an open field across the way, and sure enough, there were the people and the fire.  ---- Only I recognised the scene. It was 5th of November, Guy Fawkes night.

The next morning we filled the petrol tank for our journey, and as I listened to the “pomp-jockeys”, joking around in their typical Capey fashion, I knew I was back in South Africa.
	We had planned to travel up to stay with my family in Pretoria, but instead of going straight up we travelled along the Garden Route to Oudshoorn. There we visited the Cango Caves and an ostrich farm. We have a photograph of Bee-Ann riding an ostrich.
	From Oudshoorn we went over the Swartberg Pass, up through Bloemfontein, and so on up to Pretoria. Whenever we stopped for a meal I indulged in lots of Fruit Salad, something I had missed in England. Bee-Ann and her mother loved the abundance of Avocado Pears which were a luxury in England.

We reached Pretoria in the evening and Bee-Ann and her mother insisted on finding a rest-room at a petrol filling station in order to brush up before meeting my family. It was dark by the time we drove along the streets looking for my mother's house. It was very difficult to see the house numbers, but as we passed one house I saw my brother 'Mac' through one of the lit windows. We stopped and ------ there we were. The family opened their arms, and, we were all one family.

We had planned to have our wedding as soon as possible after reaching South Africa, but we first had to find a church and a minister. We also had to start looking for a job, both Bee-Ann and I.

Our first step was to get Bee-Ann registered with the South African Nursing Association. We thought this might havesome difficulties as the Association had brought in certain conditions  because of the fact that South Africa was no longer part of the Commonwealth. South Africahad declared itself a Republic and left the Commonwealth.
	However, when we went to the Associations office in Pretoria, the registrar said she had heard the name 'Ridgway' before, and, on looking up her records, said that Bee-Ann was already registered. Further, because she was regitered before the change of conditions, she would not have to comply with the new rules and regulations.
	It turned out that, some years before, Bee-Ann and her friend Lamorna, had thought of going out to do nursing in Australia or South Africa, and so had sent their qualifications out and regitered. The idea had not come to fruition but the registration still held.
	So Bee-Ann joined a Nursing Services Organisation. Her first assignment was at the Pretoria General Hospital, where most people were Afrikaans speaking!!!
	We decided to get married as soon after Christmas as possible and then move to Johannesburg, where Bee-Ann would have more opportunity for Special Nursing and I would probably have more possibilities of work.
	I applied for, and got, a job with Avesta, a firm manufacturing drill steels for the mines. But they were based in Krugersdorp, so we planned to get accommodation in Johannesburg, convenient for Bee-Ann, and I would travel to Krugersdorp by train.
	My parents were living in a large house in Capital Park in Pretoria, and the decision was to have the wedding reception at the house. As I had not been in South Africa for a few years, and had moved around before that, the reception would only really consist of family.
	The minister at St. Hilda's Church in Gezina agreed to marry us, and so Bee-Ann and I “tied the knot” on 18th March 1961.
	There seemed to be all sorts of plans to make sure that the hotel we were to stay at during our honeymoon knew we were newly-weds, and so we told everyone we were going by train to the Cape. We asked my brother-in-law, Faan Van Vuuren, to take us to Germiston Station to catch the train after the wedding reception.
	We set off from Pretoria and on the way told Faan not to go to Germiston, but drop us off at the airport. We caught a plane to Durban, where we had booked in to the Eden Rock Hotel.
	When we arrived at the hotel in a taxi from the airport in Durban, there were crowds of people around the hotel. They peered through the windows of the taxis at us and even took some photographs. We were not the celebrities they were expecting though, they were Cliff Richards and the Shadows who had sneaked in the back way.
	We had dinner at the hotel that evening and decided we wanted to go dancing. Not being in full season, the hotel did not have a dance that evening and it was suggested we go to the Edward hotel up along the beach front for a dance.
	After taking our table at the dance at the Edward, we were told that out entrance tickets for the dance included dinner. So we had two dinners that evening, and there were at least three courses.
	We had a lovely honeymoon in Durban, although Bee-Ann was severely sun-burnt before we left to go back to Pretoria. Her English skin was not used to South African sun.

We then took up residence at a residential hotel named Kero Court in at the lower end of Hillbrow towards the railway line. Bee-Ann's mother also moving there. Bee-Ann and I started work, me travelling through to Krugersdorp by train to Avesta, and Bee-Ann doing specialling nursing through a nursing agency.
	Bee-Ann and I only stayed at the residential hotel for a short while before renting a flat in a building at the corner of Caroline and Quartz streets. Bee-Ann'smother stayed on at Kero Court, in fact she was asked to become staff supervisor there and stayed for quite a while.
	Our flat was a one-bedroomed bachelor flat with a diningroom/lounge, bathroom, kitchen, and a balcony. I think it was on the second floor, overlooking Caroline street.
It had built-in bedroom cupboards, wall to wall carpet in the lounge, and a sort of divider between the lounge and dining room.
	Bee-Ann's mother gave us a lounge sweet for a wedding present, and we bought a bed and a fridge along with crockery and cutlery. Beyond that we used boxes to put things on.
	Most of this was after a couple of months with some income. We also bought an upright parrafin stove and had our first entertainment of the family with a cheese fondue on the parrafin stove and everyone sitting on cushions on the floor in the lounge.
	There were a number of hospitals in the Hillbrow area, which is why we chose to stay there. Although the nursing agency sent Bee-Ann to a number of private houses to nurse, she gradually became more inclined to accept calls to the hospitals, the Johannesburg General, the Children's Hospital, and the Florence Nightingale Nursing Home. I think there were a couple of other Nursing Homes there as well.
	The Florence started to specialise in heart surgery, this was in the days before the total heart transplant, and Bee-ann was sent there for post-op. care. Eventually, she basically became part of the team as she became experienced in their work. Before she left she was presented with a small enamel badge with a gold heart positioned in the centre. But really, that is part of her story, although I had to stand waiting for her to come off duty, or have her called out to give someone an injection. That was part of my story.
	While still living at Stefan Court, we saved up and bought our first car. An Austin Mini. Brand new, “out of the box”. So a couple of chaps from Avesta, who also lived in Jo'burg, joined me in a “lift-club” through to Krugersdorp.

Bee-Ann and I tried to attend church services at the Cathedal in Johannesburg, as that was our nearest Anglican Church, but we found the place too big and cold. We therefore used to spend our Sunday mornings, when Bee-Ann was not on duty, walking down to the shops to buy a Sunday paper and then go to a corner restaurant for breakfast.

My work at Avesta consisted of doing chemical analysis  of steels received for manufacture, preparation of microscope samples, as well as temperature check of the furnaces used for heat treatment and brazing. Tungsten Carbide tips were brazed into the prepared steel rods. Avesta also had a teast mine where it tested various components after manufacture, and this testing was part of the laboratory responsibilities. My immediate superior was a Greek chap named Paul, and we reported to the Technical Director, Daan Ericson. The company was Swedish owned.
	We also had a laboratory assistant to help with the analysis, and two labourers who cut steel samples and kept the laboratory clean.
	About a year later Paul left to work as a marketing representative for a steel company and I became Chief Metallurgist.
	On one occasion we had a large order for Australia which, after case-hardening, was found to be under specification in hardness. This meant that the threads on the parts used for drilling would wear very quickly. The problem consisted of the fact that after carburizing a batch of parts known as lugshanks, they had not hardened up in the heat treatment oil quench.
	The company managers were in a quandry, as trying to manufacture from scratch would take at least two weeks, and the consignment was due in a couple of days.
	On examination of a sample under the microscope I found that some of the structure had not changed to the hard form. I knew, however, that we might overcome this by sub-zero treatment. I put this to the Management. How to get this treatment carried out wasthe next question. We knew of no company in South Africa who had the equipment.
	What we hit on was using dry ice. A solid form of carbon dioxide used by ice-cream companies.
	We made arrangements for me to take the lugshanks on a light delivery truck to an ice-cream company in Germiston. On arrival, much to the amazement of the ice-cream manufacture employees, we packed the lugshanks in alternate layers with dry ice into two of the large ice-cream shipping containers which had been placed on the L.D.V. Sealed them, and set off back to Krugersdorp.
	The L.D.V. was loaded to the extent that we thought the front wheels might lift off. Fortunately the weight of the engine, myself anf two labourers in the front cab was sufficient to hold it down, but we had to drive through Johannesburg and were afraid we would be stopped by a traffic inspector. Luckily they all seemed to be occupied elsewhere.
	We had to do it this way as time was of the essence. The steel had to be taken down to a sub-zero temperature and then, as soon as possible, tempered at a normal tempering temperature to avoid brittleness.
	This was all carried out, the samples which accompanied the treatment all showed correct structure under the microscope and the steel was now at the correct hardness specification. The consignment was shipped on time.
	In 1964 I was approached by a firm making cast iron castings to join them as Chief Mettalurgist. The name of the company was F & M and my job included ordering the sand and chemicals for the mouldings, as well as analysing and testing incoming materials and outgoing castings.
	I did this for about nine months but I found the job a terrific strain for a number of reasons, including the fact that the management would not let me get sufficient stocks in, but then blamed me when there was a delay in supply of stock and the furnaces or moulding shop ran out of material.
	I developed severe headaches and Bee-Ann made me see a doctor, who sent me on to see a specialist. They feared I might have some dreaded “-lurgy”, and decided I needed to be X-Rays and have a lumbar puncture to check the spinal fluid.
	I had been told all sorts of stories about Lumbar Punctures so, the evening before I was to go into hospital, I was too restless to stay at home, so took Bee-Ann out to dinner . We had a bottle of wine between us at dinner, and decided to go to the cinema. We saw “Georgie Girl” and laughed at the most inappropriate times, so that we had all the other cinema patrons staring at us. It was a good bottle of wine.
	The next day I had the Lumbar Puncture. It was carried out by a Nerve Specialist who really knew his job and I only felt a small prick when he anaethetised the area before hand. Then I had to go for X-Rays. I think the Lumbar Puncture had lowered the pressure in my spine and I had a terrible headache. The girl who took the X-Rays was not sympathetic and just told me to move here and move there.
	That night they kept me in the hospital. A nurse came round and gave me some tablets. Out of curiosity I asked her what they were for. “Never mind, just take the pillies.” was her abrupt reply. I have never been enamoured by medical staff, and this confirmed my view. I dumped the tablets, which were probably pain killers, and told her to go away.
	The doctors had written me off work and when I went in to give the medical letter to the management at F & M, they were not pleased. I realised the firm was not for me and tendered my resignation. I think they had intended to find a reason to fire me but were wary because of the doctors letter. I saved them the trouble, but lost out on some pay.
	Dawn contacted us and suggested we come up to Naboom for a week or so to recover from the headaches, which we did. The doctors report on the tests carried out said I did not have anything serious and my headaches were probably due to stress.

I went to Avesta on my return to Johannesburg to ask them for a reference. I hadn't got one when I moved to F & M, but now I would need one if I applied for work elsewhere. Instead, Avesta offered me my old job back.

Meanwhile Bee-Ann and I had managed to save up and we decided it was time to start a Family and see about having a house instead of living in a flat.
	Wendy was born in Johannesburg on the 24th October, 1964, and we bought a plot of ground at Steynsvlei, an area of agricultural plots just north of Krugersdorp.
	We drew up plans for a house, put down deposits for building and gave the developer the money to take transfer. Building started and proceeded to roof height. We also paid for electricity connections to ESCOM, as we were outside the urban limits. In the mean time we rented a house in Krugersdorp so that I would be nearer work and the construction of our new house.
	I planted over a hundred fruit trees on the plot and bought a Rotovator to start tilling the soil for vegetable gardens.

Paul Christy, my ex-superior at Avesta, was working for a steel supplier, specialising in tool steels. Paul used to recommend Avesta as someone who could heat-treat the tool steels as we had the equipment and knowhow. 
	One day Paul suggested that he and I should open a heat-treament company. He would supply the customers through his contacts; in other words he would be the marketing manager and I would be the technical manager. We kept on working for the firms we were with and hired a young chap to run the plant. We hired a small factory which already had a suitable furnace and we were in business. I supplied the young chap with the information he needed whenever work came in. It didn't really work out as it needed me on the spot and the business was not making enough money to support me. It was only just brining in enough for the young chap and a labourer. We closed it down and Paul bought my shares of the company and used the company for other business he was doing.
A couple of years later Paul and one of his brothers opened a restaurant in Johannesburg, his brother being a qualified chef.
Avesta now decided to manufacture motorcar parts for the fledgling motor industry in South Africa, as we were familiar with some of the techniques required. In order to do this Ford and Mercedes, two of the companies we would be working with, insisted we develop a proper Qualty Control System. So Avesta employed an engineer to get it going. After some time things seemed to be in a mess, so it was arranged for a consultant from Stanford University in America to come out and go through all our manufacturing and control systems.
	After he made his report to the Avesta management I was called into the Director's Office, where I was told that my department was fully approved as I had drawn up operating instructions for everything we did, and we were carrying them out as required.
	Then they told me that the Quality Control Manager had been asked to leave and I was offered the job on the consultants recommendation. I protested that I knew nothing about “Quality Control”, but they told me the Stanford Consultant would tell what was involved.
	When I reported to the Consultant in his office he informed me he was leaving for the airport within the hour to return to America. He gave me two books and said if I read them both I would be all right. They were “Quality Control” by Juran, and “How to win friends and influence people”. Then he shook hands and left.

My first job, I was told by the Director, was to fire the Chief Inspecter as he had been so influenced by the Quality Control Manager that he was thoroughly disliked in the factory. I called the man in and told him that I suggested he look for another job, because of the dislike, which he was well aware of.  I then gave him a couple of days paid leave and sent him off, a very unhappy man. About three weeks later he came back to see me and thank me as he now had a job that he was enjoying.

We now appointed a new Chief Inspector, Dave Tasker. He was a young married chap recently immigrated from England, where he had served an apprenticeship as a toolmaker with Ford Motor Company.

	Meanwhile things started to go wrong with our house plans. It turned out that the developer had taken monies intended for building various houses at Steynsvlei and speculated on other building projects. The building market collapsed, and his company went bankrupt.  An arrangement was made to put us up in a house which had been built for the directors of the company, as our house should have been completed by this time. Also he had not arranged for the transfer of property to us, although we had paid the necessary fees up front. He had used the money in his schemes.
	On consulting our lawyers it turned out that the developer owed thousands to the banks and we were told that when the case was finalised we would probably only get a cent for every hundred Rand owed us. The developer disappeared and we understand he went to Austyralia. The only money we ever got back was the money we had paid to ESCOM as that had not been handled by the developer. 
	In passing we should record that our neighbous were Graham and Marjorie Bain. At the time he was a director of a company making asbestos products.

We decided that it was time we started going to church again as we particularly wanted to bring our children up knowing the Church and Christianity.
	One Sunday evening we left Wendy with 'Grandma', Bee-Ann's mother who was visiting at the time, and went in to church in Krugersdorp. The Rector, Canon Heath, came to us as we sat in the pews before the service and welcomed us. After the service he enquired if we had any family and when we told him about Wendy, enquired if she was baptised. When we told him that she was not, he suggested we bring her along to church to morning services, and duly baptised her. He was a lovely man and we ended up attending bible studies with a group at his house. His wife was also very nice. She didn't like people to act too “Pi” (very pious). At the time there was an assistant at the church whose surname was 'Sohn”,so, being a priest he was called “Father Sohn”, which often drew the extra –and Holy Ghost.
 When he left the new assistant was Father Patrick Glover.

Back at Avesta we set to work to re-organise the Quality Control, but we found that there were all sorts of overlaps. To start with we found that part of the high rejection rate of manufactured parts, as well as excessive down-time on the machines in the factory, was that machines were run until they broke down. As they got to that stage, so products would be turned out that were out of specification. We discussed it with the workshop foreman and the works manager and set about installing a preventative maintenance program. Of course I could not have done that without the knowledge Dave brought to the department.

Next, while talking to the Tool Room Foreman, he complained about the excessive amount of tools they had to produce for the lathes. We therefore had a look at the drawings and found that when a piece of equipment was ordered from us which we had not produced before, the sales men would bring in a sample of what was required, the drawing office would draw the required drawing for manufacture, but the was no standardisation of radii or other dimensions.
	Dave and I discussed the matter with the Technical Director, our boss, and the result was that we were told to take responsibility for the drawing office and revise all product drawings. This took a while but we got there, and the toolroom chaps could reduce their tool manufacture by more than half.
	Then I started to look at other aspects of the manufacture. To do this I would watch each step in the process of heat-treatment, brazing and other processes, and drew up manuals of procedure for every little thing. The result was we could spot when somewhen was deviating from correct procedure and correct it before we had rejects down the line.
	The Technical Director was keen to keep up-to-date on manufacturing procedures so the company used to order technical magazines for him. I persuaded him to pass them on to us and we used to have discussion groups with all the staff of Quality Control, which included the laboratory, inspectors and drawing office, to keep our people up to date, even if we never used the techniques mentioned.
	Through this I found out about the American Society for Quality Control, which I joined, getting their monthly magazine. That was in 1966. During the same year I tool a Diploma Course in Industrial Management by  correspondence through the International Correspondence College.
	Then my boss noticed an advert in the Quality Control Magazine about a conference to be held in Stockholm, and decided to send me. In addition I would go to England for the company and also firms in Sweden, Germany, and Italy to see how they carried out Quality Control.

At that time some countries were refusing imports from South Africa because of apartheid, but a central African wanted our drill bits. So we manufactured the steel drill bits and sent them to England. There a small company had been set up to braze the tips, box them, and send them to the African country.
	We had also made an agreement with Anglo American whereby they would set up a company in Zambia, which now had independence, where we would supply the expertise in heat treatment for the drill steels they would manufacture. We had already installed special modern equipment in Krugersdorp for case hardening an Anglo's wanted the same equipment installed. This was done but they were having trouble and I was asked to call in to Ndola on my way to England to make an assessment of the situation.
	On arrival in Ndola I was settled into a hotel and spent a couple of days at the new factory. I discovered that the new carburising equipment was too sophisticated for the people in Zambia, and they had no technicians qualified to maintain the electronic equipment. My recommendation was that they revert to the old method of packing the parts in charcoal and heating in a furnace to carburise. Maintaining a furnace would probably be within their capabilities.
	An interesting sidelight was that they were not allowed to fire anyone. There were four operators to a lathe, one to put the piece into the machine, one to operate the electric switches, one to move the wheel that took the piece forward, and one to check the piece for size afterwards. 	
	When I was in Sweden a month later I noticed that one operator operated four automatic lathes.
	The factory manager said he just what had to be done, then went home in the evening and did tatting to relax.

	Leaving Zambia, I was supposed to fly to Nairobi with East African Airways where I would then board the Jo'burg – Heathrow flight. At the Ndola airport we were told that our flight was delayed. It never arrived. Around four o'clock a flight came in from Tanganyika and we were told to board it. The crew were supposed to go off duty as they had flown all day, but were told to take us to Nairobi via Dar es Salaam.
	We finally took off. The air conditioning was not working properly. The two stewardesses took the only two blankets on board, settled down on some seats at the front, and went to sleep. The toilets were overflowing and there was no water. There was a woman on the flight with a small baby and one of the passengers had a bottle of water which he gave her.
	When we arrived at Dar es Salaam and the door opened, we found ourselves perspiring but with feet that were still frozen.
	We duly took off again for Nairobi, but on arrival there I found that the London bound flight had already left and that I would have to stay until mid-day the next day. This was about 11.30 at night.
	When we reached the customs officer he told me that, for my own safety, he could not allow me to go in to the hotel in Nairobi. I had a South African passport, and South Africans were not popular at that time.
	But the area we were in was the local airport building, so I would have to be taken to the International Lounge to spend the next twelve hours. So a police escort was called to take me there. When I got there my luggage was not there, so ---- the escort was called to take me back to identify my luggage and take it to the International lounge.
	The last flight having taken off, quiet descended on the lounge and I settled down to try to sleep. That was not to be, because now the cleaners came in with their vacuum cleaners and polishers to clean the lounge for the next day. At six o'clock the first flight landed.
	I finally got to England to find that because I had not arrived the night before, my room had been given to someone else. However I was finally booked into another room and managed to contact the London Office to tell them where I was.
	Avesta wasa subsidiary of the Johnson Group in Sweden, and the London factory was called Johnson's, London. I spent a few days with them and also visited Bee-Ann's friend, Lamorna , who was living close to London. Then I left for Sweden.
	
In Sweden the Johnson Company had its headquarters in Stockhlom, and the had booked accommodation for me at a hotel in the suburbs. For the next week I attended the Quality Control Conference in Stockholm, which consisted of addresses by top Q.C. Authorities in the morning, discussion groups in the afternoon, and then dinner in the late evening. Through the discussion groups I met Juran and Fiegenbaum, both authors of Quality Control books, as well as a number of others whom I could Quiz about learning something about this field I had been landed in. At the time there were no courses one could take, certainly not in South Africa.
	On one day the conference organisers had arranged for all delegates to be taken out on a boat on the Archipelago. We landed on one of the islands where we were “attacked” by Viking warriors. All good fun.
	On the final evening we had a banquet in the Town Hall where we were welcomed by the Mayor.  There must have been about 150 people at the banquet. 

I next moved on to the town of Avesta, after which our South African company was named, and vistited the Tungsten Carbide Factory and Steelworks. Just about the whole town was owned by Johnsons.
	I then returned to Stockholm and went to the Johnsons head office. One of the Directors had been the Managing Director at Avesta South Africa and been promoted to head office the previous year, so I knew him quite well. He told me that arrangements had been made for me to go to the SKF ballbearing factory and other factories around Sweden. Johnsons had their own travel agency and I was told to go down and collect my air tickets from them.  However, the Swedish Airways were on strike and so when I got to the travel agency I was told there were no tickets for me. Back I went to the Director at Head Office. He picked up the phone and told the manager at the travel agency that he WOULD find transport for me. 
	When I got back to the travel agency arrangements had been made for me to fly on small aircraft. These were businessmen's 'breakfast runs'. So off I went at dawn the next morning. 
	The next week consisted of flying to a town where I would be picked up by someone from the relevant company, shown round the factory, taken out to lunch, on to another factory, taken out to dinner, returning to my arranged accommodation near midnight, wrote up my report and notes, and woken at five the next morning to catch a flight to the next town on the list. The Swedes loved taking me out because they got fancy meals and drinks at company expense.
	At the end of the week I was exhausted but Johnsons had made arrangements for me to go by train to Dalecarlia in central Sweden, Northwest of Stockholm.
The Dalecarlian Horse – the symbol of Sweden 
The real Dalecarlian horse - the symbol of Sweden - is manufactured in only one place on Earth, in the little village Nusnäs by the Lake Siljan in Dalecarlia Sweden, not far from Mora.










Dalecarlia was really a very beautiful place, the hotel was the base for winter sports in winter and family holidays in summer. When I was there I was practically the only one on holiday.

Back in Stockholm I was supposed to go to Volkswagen in Germany, but Lufthansa were on strike so it was decided I would skip that part of my trip and go direct to Italy where I was due to visit a factory who had claimed to be able to make the special thread gauges we required for our drill steels.
	I flew to Milan and then took a train to Turin. I had been booked into a hotel there and the next day was met at the hotel and taken to the factory. They had a good set-up and showed me samples of what they could produce, as well as showing me their Quality Control Department.
	For lunch I was taken to a restaurant which was one of the most fancy I have ever been to. There was a different waiter for every course, all with white gloves and perfectly choreographed movements. It was really something special. The next day I left to fly to Rome to catch my flight home to South Africa. When I went to pay my bill at the hotel I was told it had already been paid. That company certainly wanted our orders.
	Of course I then found that Alitalia Airways was now also on strike, so I had to catch a train to Rome. On arriving there I had, of course, missed my flight to South Africa. The lass at the BOAC desk told me there were no empty seats until the next week. This was a marvellous opportunity to see Rrome at the company's expense, but I was now just wanting to get home. Bee-Ann was pregnant with Martin, for one thing, and I had been away from home for about three months. I therefore sat down on the BOAC desk and said I would wait there until there was a vacancy. A cancellation was found, and I left that evening.
	Back in South Africa, Bee-Ann's mother and my mother had both gone to stay with Bee-Ann because of her pregnancy with the idea of looking after her. They both got 'flu or something and took to their beds. In addition, at some stage the fireplace in the lounge collapsed. Bee-Ann coped, but I think she was pleased to see me come home.

The Italian firm got the order for the thread gauges and for about three years the agent for the Italian Company sent me a special Cake each Christmas.
A Gugelhupf or Gugelhopf is a southern German, Austrian, Swiss and Alsatian term for a marble cake or Bundt cake. The part "Gugel-" is a corruption of the Middle High German word Kugel ("ball" or "globe"). The part "-hupf" relates to the verb "hüpfen" (jump) and is a reference to the cake surface going up while being baked.

 
Avesta was now able to produce equipment with threads to very close tolerances, Which meant less wear during usage, which in turn meant the equipment lasted longer. Our next problem arose when some steels were carburised too much, so that there was too much growth on the threads so they were over sized.
	In our reading, the Technical Director and I had come across a reference to an article about 'electro-chemical machining', sort of like reverse plating of steel, taking off instead of adding on. We were only talking about micro-millimetres.
	We found out through Wits. University that the library at the Modderfontein Dynamite factory had copies of the magazine mentioned in our reference. I phoned them, went to Modderfontein and obtained a photostat of the article.
	From the article we constructed a electro-chemicle maching bath which the engineers just looked at and shook their heads as it was just a conglomeration of batteries, wires, and a bath of acid solution. The clamps for contact were vice-grips.
	But after a few trials we were able to elecro-chemically machine the very small amount of metal away to bring the components back into specification. I believe we were the first to use the technique in South Africa.

When I was talking to the Director in Stockholm, he told me two things which influenced my decisions after returning to South Africa.
	First of all, I had asked him why, every time we seemed to be doing well at Avesta S.A. Johnsons would send in “experts” who would reorganise us so that we had to battle to make a profit. He asked me if I had noticed that we had always been sent old equipment which we had to virtually rebuild. Avesta S.A. was a tax arrangement for the home company, and although they didn't want us to make big losses, they didn't want us to make profits.
	Secondly, he told me that Johnsons were planning to eventually sell Avesta S.A. To a competitor.

About 1967, I thought I would like to change jobs in order to get some financial experience. I thought (mistakenly as it turned out), that joining a firm of Insurance brokers might be the answer. Just before I left Avesta, my boss, the Technical Director, told me he was being moved by Johnsons to one of their companies in South America, and that I was being offered the job of Technical Manager. I could not take his place as Technical Director as I was not Swedish.
	Remembering what the Johnson's Director had told me I was not sure what my prospects would be if the competitor took over. They had an operating company in South Africa and would have their own Technical men. I therefore decided to make the break and move into Insurance to a company named Manufacturers Life, which had said they would put me through a training course.
	
I duly joined Manufacturers Life under a manager/trainer named Geoff. Mann. He was very good to me and after a couple of weeks training, sent me to start going out to customers. Manufacturers Life did not do door-to-door selling as did the Old Mutual. They operated on a system of referrals to business men.
	After a while I realised that insurance selling was not for me, although I had made some sales. So I went to an employment agency and gave them my C.V.

Not long after the employment agency arranged for me to go for an interview with the personnel manager of SAPPI, the papermakers. Although I told them I had no knowledge of papermaking, they said they would teach me enough if I would go to their Tugela Mill and help organise a Quality Control Department.
	Martin was about two years old by this time and we were living in the rented house in Krugersdorp. At about this time he fell ill and we had to take him to the doctor.
	All arrangements were made to move to Zululand, the removal van arrived and loaded our furniture, and we were supposed to travel down and arrive about the same time as our furniture arrived at Mandini, the site of the Tugela Mill. The doctor told us that we should not travel with Martin for at least 24 hours. He had Croup.
	Our furniture had gone. We only had an empty house to sleep in. Fortunately our nextdoor neighbour offered to put us up for the night and we could stay for the 24 hours.
	When we got to Mandini and reported to the personnel Department we were told that our house was undergoing renovations and that we would be temporarily housed in a flat. We drove to the flat, where the Furniture had already been taken, and found that all our goods had been unloaded into a two-bedroomed flat. The removal people starting against the far wall and unloading till they got to the door. Beds, wheelbarrows, the fridge. And so on, was just stacked so one had to climb over everything to get inside.
	I returned to the Personnel Department and told them the story, also that my son was ill. They made arrangements for us to stay at the mill single-quarters and eat at the mess until I could sort things out in the flat. The family were installed in a room and Martin was rigged up with a kettle giving him steam so as to ease his breathing.
	We then moved to the flat for a couple of weeks until the house was ready. Bee-Ann had a rough time from the other women in the adjoining flats, as they knew we were going to be moving to a house and they were to stay in the flats owing to their husbands' positions at the mill.

	Initially I started work as a learner inspector on shift work. I did this for about six months before being promoted to assistant quality control officer. I worked under a chap who had a BSc. Degree but who was more interested in running a skeet club that doing much work in Quality Control. However, we started to organise some statistical quality analysis, both of the test laboratory and the inspectors' work.
	After about another six months I asked the management if they could not move me to another department as I was terribly bored. As I did not have a chemical degree and was the best qualified in quality control methods, the management moved the Quality Control Manager to the Pulp Mill and put me in charge of Quality Control.
	We employed a chap with an MSc. in statistics who I hoped would be able to develop our statistical analysis side of the quality control, but that never really happened.
	An interesting occurrence was when the government told SAPPi that it had to employ Zulus, in preference to Indians, in its mill at Mandini, because we were within Zululand. This posed a problem for our paper test laboratory as, in general, we had employed matriculated Indians who had science and mathematicsas martic. subjects.  The Zulus who had matric. Usually had not taken those subjects. Their matric subjects were usually English, Afrikaans, Zulu, and subjects such as history and political science.
	I went to the Zululand University to find out whether it might be possible to  find university drop-outs with the required subjects, but found that they had difficulty with the same problem. Science and Maths were not Zulu school options. The university had, in fact, started bridging courses in those subjects and were trying to encourage students in the subjects.
	We therefore started a program of selection of employees for both the laboratory and inspection staff, followed by classes in arithmatic, maths. basic chemistry, and so on, depending on where they were going to be employed in the department. Soon we had zulu inspectors who could use four-figure logarithmic tables to calculate standard deviations and other statistical computations.
	Then the white inspectors asked if there was any possibility of having some tuition for them. We devised classes on pulp and papermaking, paper conversion to other products such as boxes, and so on, including visits to manufacturers in Durban.

When we had moved to Mandini, Canon Heath had written to the Anglican priest in Stanger to let him know I was coming. Actually Mandini came under the parish of Gingindhlovu, but we never-the-less got drawn into the church down there. I became a chapel warden and we attended services which were held in the Roman Catholic Church in Mandini as the Anglicans did not have a building there. I also started doing their monthly church magazine. 
	I also returned to Scouting and became, at first the Assistant Scoutmaster, then Venturer Adviser, and eventually District Commissioner for Northern Zululand.
	Arising from that, I took a correspondence course in journalism and, to keep me company, Bee-Ann took a course in short-story writing. I sent a couple of stories concerning the scouts in Mandini to a local newspaper, which were accepted and printed.

Bee-Ann also joined the Women's Institute, taking part in fruit bottling and other competitions and winning prizes. She also took part in drama productions. Wendy used to accompany he to meetings of the W.I. And just sit quietly at he feet, playing with her doll. Some of the ladies did not think that was normal behaviour for a young child. Wendy had just been told that she could go if she was quiet, so she was.
	Wendy also went to a sort of creche or Sunday School at one time. One day she walked out of the door and fell over a small dog which was lying there. The dog, startled, bit he on the face.
	I also started doing some woodwork and needed a workbench. I noticed some empty packing cases outside the mill carpenters office and asked if I could have them. The packing boxeswere of thich wood for some steel rolls that had been imported from Sweden, so were of lovely wood and a couple of metres long. The Chief carpenter wanted to know what I wanted them for and when I showed him the plans for a workbench in a magazine, said he would arrange to have the wood sent to me. A week later he told me he was sending the wood. It duly arrived, already made into a lovely workbench.

One year Wendy was quite ill and after she was over the worst the mill manager suggested we take a holiday. He arranged for us to make use of a cottage in one of the SAPPI forests near Howick. It was used by personnel who had to visit the area from one of the other forests or mills, and also by the Directors as a weekend retreat. The cottage was serviced, including a cook, we just had supply our own food. We had a lovely couple of weeks, although Martin managed to fall into the river at the Karkloof falls which were nearby.

From time to time I was required to go to head office in Johannesburg to make a report on the quality trends, as well as visits to customers when there were quality problems.

One day the Mill Manager called me in to his office and told me I was wanted at Head Office. I enquired as to when I was wanted and he told me, “Tomorrow, and permanently”.
	It turned out that the Quality Control Manager at head office had been promoted to Mill Manager at the Adamas Mill in Port Elizabeth. Due to the existing Mill Manager leaving soon, the management wanted a overlap so the newly appointed man could work with the old manager for at least a month. They also wanted me to have an overlap with the man I was replacing. I flew to Johannesburg the next day, leaving Bee-Ann to start the business of packing to move.
	I must say SAPPI were as good as they could be in helping Bee-Ann, giving her packing boxes, paper for wrapping, felt material, and so on. They told me to find a house or two for Bee-Ann to view and then flew her up to be with me to go round to have a look at what was available. We stayed at a hotel in Johannesburg for a week, all at company expense. When our furniture was moved, that was also at company expense.
	As it happened, my mother owned a house in Springs and she had moved, I think to stay with my sister. At any rate she offered to sell us the house for the price she had paid for it many years before. This was our saving grace as we were still suffering the financial loss of our savings through the house in Krugersdorp. While at Mandini we had stayed in company accommodation.
	When I reported for work at Head Office I was told that one of my duties would be to lecture in basic papermaking to apprentices in the paper converting industry at Wits. Technical College. I was taken down to the Tech., introduced to the headmaster and told I could start the next term. Nobody asked me for any qualifications as I had been put forward by SAPPI as being the man to do the job. I still didn't even have a Matric.
 I managed to stay one lecture ahead of the students, and they all did fairly well in the exams.

While at SAPPI I joined the Junior Chamber of Commerce and they used to have periodic talks on subjects like the Stock Exchange and general management subjects. I had completed a correspondence course in Industrial Management and now took  correspondence courses for the Institute of Management, including Law and Accounting.

It was the early days of Computers, when the computers were housed in large air conditioned buildings.  Union Corporation Mining Group, of which SAPPI was a subsidiary company, had such a computer at Springs, and the Quality Control Manager and I made use of it in developing automatic controls for the paper machines. However, the main use for computers by most companies was for accounting, and the programmers did not know Fortran, which was necessary for scientific work. So we had to do our own programming, put everything into Fortran language, give it to typists who would then type the program onto punched cards, which we would then run on the machine. To learn more I took a correspondence course with the Engineering College of South Africa in Computer Programming. 

At SAPPI we had been using a FACIT calculating machine and logarithmic table to do our statistical calculations. Now the first commercially available electronic calculators became available. They were about the size of a small suitcase. Then we even got a desk computer.

In 1976 I decided I needed to try to take a degree course and UNISA accepted me on the basis of a “older persons” program they had. I can't remember what it was officially called. I took a B.A. Course, studying Biblical Studies, Philosophy and History.

While I was at SAPPI head office Anglo American decided to start making paper and I was involved with some of the early discussions they had with SAPPI.

Then SAPPI got a new set of Directors who decided to split the company into three, a pulp company, paper company, and a timber company. The there was to be a holding company in Johannesburg but the old head office was to close, as well as the Research and Development Department situated at Springs. Gradually the staff of the Head Office were reduced, some going to work at one of the mills, some were given early retirement. My assistant went to work for Mondi, the new Anglo American Paper mill in Durban.
	I was told that they would try to find a place for me in the new structure but as I had a senior position it was quite difficult. In the end I got a bit tired of waiting and went to my friend at the employment agency and asked him to find a job for me.

I got a job with a firm called ATRON, which manufactured batteries. I worked for the for about a year but the company who owned ATRON proved to be impossible and all the senior management left eventually, including the General Manager.

A firm called PEMCO were hoping to manufacture equipment for the military and consequently had to set up a Quality Control System. I went to work for them on the day they were interviewed by Armscor and had to tell them what I would be setting up, including manuals of procedure and other controls. PEMCO got the contract to do welding of equipment, something they were already very good at. They were already building shipping containers, large truck bodies for the open cast mines, and bodies for Datsun. Now they became expert at welding armour plate as well.
	I set up the quality control to the requirements of ARMSCOR and then went on to develop operating systems for the whole company.