Hi Joe and Lister Friends, As some of you know, Joe and I hail from the same area----- Foleshill, Coventry. I naturally find his memories very evocative of of the things I experienced in my younger days. Thankyou so much for the insights into your apprenticeship days, Joe, and the mores and pecking order on the factory floor.You see, the greater part of my father's working life was in a factory, as a grinder. During the war he worked at the Rootes Group Factory at Ryton-upon-Dunsmore, and afterwards had a break away from this whilst factories were re-organising and retooling for their peacetime roles. He joined the Dunlop, on Holbrooks Lane, Foleshill, around 1951 or 1952, working at grinding or re-grinding aircraft disc brakes. He resisted any promotion, as he preferred his work on the shop floor as an operative, but he didn't require the chargehand to set up his jobs, as he could do that for himself. When a new type of machine was to be tried out, with a view to purchase, it was my father who was chosen to evaluate it, watched by "the big bosses". This much I knew, but to be able to enter and understand this environment---thankyou, Joe! I have now been able to share a little in that part of my father's life. A further thing of interest to me was in the interplay of relationships on the shop floor. My youngest son completed an engineering apprenticeship in New Zealand. At the time he said nothing to me, but some of the bullying apprentices endured at the hands of some of the senior workers, does not make for pleasant hearing. Thankfully, recent legislation has improved the rights of the individual. We owe such a lot to our blue-collared workers; the people with skills at their fingertips."Bits of paper", are overvalued in my opinion, at the expense of those that who are so inventive and skilled with their hands.Without them industry would grind to a standstill. ( Sorry about the "grind" it was unavoidable---not a pun). Joe, thankyou for the picture you "painted" of the massed multitude of cyclists leaving the factories at "knocking off " time. I can see myself, on the curbside, waiting to cross the Foleshill Rd., and standing---and standing there---as the relentless stream of cyclists, several abreast, poured by in each direction! It was well advised to be patient if you valued your skin! The number 20 buses were almost continuous, too, during the rush hour. Ah, those were the days, " when I wer gooing t' catch the buzz t' werk!" Regards, Muriel.