There are places I remember
November 2024
Clive Pinkham, a great grandson of William and Rebecca Pinkham has recently re-discovered some interesting photographs from the 1950s and ensured they found their way to the collection.
This photo was used in an advert in The News Chronicle - Pinkham Gloves Quality that's obvious.
The photographs had been discovered by Clive as a youngster in the office of Miss Bocking one of the administrators at the Witham factory and he was so taken by them that he asked if he could have them and they have been with him now for over sixty years and have lost none of their intrigue or magic.
The photographs, all of which have been taken by professional photographers show many of the different facets of post war growth and success in the company.
Clive said: “I remember being shown how to use the guillotine seen in the photo of the new cutting machines at Witham and I love the photo of the girl with the sewing machine, I feel just a piece of special magic in the photo. Amazing the way memories come back, it seems like only yesterday”.
Thought to be Jean Jones this, along with the sewing room photos and the three photos of the Witham and Stanley cutting rooms were taken in 1953 for the Government’s Central Office of Information to highlight the post war development in UK manufacturing.
It was a great honour for the company to be used and show cased as a leading glove manufacturer using modern machinery and production methods. A far cry from the Devon kitchen where it all began.
The main sewing room at the Witham factory in 1953. Some fifty machinists worked in this area. The large windows gave good daylight for the nimble work and the quality supervisor seen at the top of the picture in front of the window ensured all went to plan. The experienced machinists could sew up nearly two hundred gloves in a day.
These three photos show how production techniques developed. The first one shows fabric being folded ready to be cut out by hand. The two below show the company’s commitment to investing in state of the art machinery. The official quote for the Central Office of Information at the time explained ‘”Time taken in cutting material into ‘tranks’ has been considerably speeded up”. The top photo shows commencement of old method, i.e. folding the material over. The new machines could cut one hundred layers of fabric at a time.
Thought to be Michael Smith overseeing the commissioning of a state of the art glove cutting machine at the Witham factory. See the large guillotine at the back in front of the window.
Richard Pinkham on the left and factory manger David Pattison on the right admiring a similar machine at the Stanley factory
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