Co-op Lad

Another of my Dads sayings was " Gerrit right or yoll never gerron!"

Could be interesting. Dave Wallace is still in touch with quite a few people including Andy Shenton the joiner. Dave used to do all the plumbing work for Alan Roadley who sadly passed away last year. Can you remember Dons last name (the other store man)?

My dad use to say "Yer mown't do that!" and "Its black over Bills Mothers"

Just looking at the photo of Co-op House jogged my memory. If you look at the roof and the NCS sign the room under that used to house the equipment that supplied the vacuum to the tubes that ran to each department so that payments could be sent to a central point and receipts and change sent back to the customer. At Co-op House Long Eaton this equipment was in the basement I believe, as I only came across remnants of it.

What a great picture of the Elizabethan Rooms. At Christmas time Santa's Grotto was Located on the balcony area which surrounds the main floor. The Grotto was famous throughout the area for the animated displays and the queues to see Santa were enormous. The Co-op House Display Department started work on the Grotto in late September due to the amount of work required and of course our electrical maintenance guys were always involved.

When the Meadows clearance was taking place in the 1970,s we built a large wooden temporary store until the shopping centre was completed and then we fitted out the new Co-op Supermarket and demolished the wooden one. I don,t recall us ever doing this type of thing again.

As a Co-op electrician I used to work a Saturday at Co-p House every 5th week on standby duties during the 70s and 80s, so I knew the place inside out. During that period and of course the decades before it was always very busy. At Christmas the store would be full to bursting with customers making maintenance extremely difficult. It was a great store and the staff were like one big family. My brother was manager of the Bank and his wife Sally worked in the Chemists department. I still occasionally see Ted Perfect also. The images from Ged Ling are great and go to show what a great store it w

I worked with Tony Morrell for many years. He left the Co-op when his health deteriorated and I believe he then went to work at the City Council.

I still see Dave Wallace who is still a good friend of Geoff. Dave and Geoff installed our central heating.

Obviously I did as you were my apprentice.

Last saw Chalky (John White) about 8 years ago, he was still working as an electrician. When Ron White married he moved to a flat in Heanor.