A column of reminiscences from Bendaton's oldest man, Alfred Buggery.

“Life in the Factory”

In them days The Factory was at the heart of Bendaton. In fact, it WAS the heart of Bendaton. An extremely dangerous and smelly heart, more of an arse in that respect, but nevertheless it pumped the monetary blood around the village and stopped us from dying in agony. Most of my school mates joined the factory’s workforce when they were eleven. I remember the day as if it were only sixty eight years ago. We were in Mr Wipe’s classroom and a large oil stained man came in and had a quiet word with the school master. Mr Wipe turned to us in due course and said, I’ve never forgotten these words, “I’ve got some good news for you boys. Tomorrow’s test is postponed.” We cheered as Mr Wipe’s tests were right difficult. If you got less than eight out of ten he’d beat you with an oriental bondage stick until you were sorry. “Oh” he added when we’d got our euphoria out of our systems, “you’ve all got to turn up for work at The Factory at six am.”

Luckily for me my father had decided I should learn a trade rather than go down the route of working in The Factory from the age of eleven until I died from rotted lungs on or around my sixtieth birthday. So he saved up all the money he didn’t spend on essentials, necessities and frivolous luxuries and enrolled me in violin school. I were a dab hand with a bow if I do say so myself but it was not meant to be. I failed the examination at the end of the first year and were sent packing. There was no alternative but to apply for a job at The Factory. I’d no sooner posted my letter to the foreman than I were told to report to the big gates at five the next day where I’d be met and taken to my Machine.

It were a hard life – report for work at six, ten minutes for lunch if the foreman could spare us and then back to The Machine until eight that evening. Then we’d all go round to the old Elk and Bush (before it were hit by that wayward yacht and was rebuilt ten feet further south just in case) for a jar or two of ale and a game of bridge. Having joined a year later I was treated with contempt by my old school friends. It took them years before they’d treat me as an equal. They had an extra year’s grime on their faces and I knew it. Even doing the odd double shift (especially during the summer of 1955 when you’ll recall they experimented with the twenty eight hour day to try and get the economy back on its feet after the war) I couldn’t get the respect that my ingrained dirt deserved.

I was at a pretty low ebb until the annual Christmas party (held in March when The Machine broke down and the foreman decided that having the Christmas party nine months earlier was cheaper than sending everyone home) when I entertained them with some carols played on my trusty violin. I caught the ear of the manager of The Factory and he offered me the job of Executive Vice President of Managerial Strategies and Corporate Empowerment and I got off the shop floor and into my own little office. It were still dirty work but at least it were now a white collar that were getting dirty rather than a blue one.

They closed The Factory in 1976 after the market for whatever it produced collapsed utterly under the strain of cheap imports, the three day week, a run on the pound and my unfortunate decision to sell half the workforce and replace them with monkeys. With hindsight I would’ve only sold a quarter of the workforce as we found it right difficult to get enough qualified monkeys. We had to make do with rubbish in key positions and that were a recipe for disaster. Oh well, you live and learn but I’m living proof that you don’t do them equally.