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How many remember working at Ericsson's. I served my apprenticeship as a wood machinist from 1952 - 1958 in N2 department. The wood-mill as it was more commonly known as was one of the best equipped wood machining workshops in the area in the 1950's & 60's. It also provided the apprentice with one of the finest apprenticeships any young man could wish for, very comprehensive with the company taking a direct interest of the progress being made by its students. Ericsson's was, in my opinion one of the best employers in the area.

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I do remember serving my apprenticeship not a Erricsons though, As a Dental Tech 5 years of peepoor wages but i did pass the City & Guilds with distinction & to show their appreciation of a job well done i was sacked as now i cost too much 7 pounds 2/6 per week !congrats! !inthebin! !tanning! !rotfl!

So here i am unemployed thinking what am i going to do so i started repairing cars made 20 pounds first day smile2

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  • 8 months later...
  • 1 year later...

When I first started work at Thorns in 1967 (High Church St in New Basford) I believe it was affiliated with Ericssons, the name Bendix Ericssons was a bit of a giveaway! It then changed to Thorn Bendix and then to Thorn Automation Ltd. and that was all in the space of about 6 yrs.

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First job after leaving school was at Ericssons 1960. Did assembly line work until I turned 16 but did not get an apprenticeship there. Moved on to a small electrical contractor. Ericssons did seem to be a decent place to work though.

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  • 1 month later...

Hi when I first met my husband he worked at Plessey in C5 in the year of 1963/4 we used to go in Plessey club I played my first game of snooker there tut tut women playing snooker in the 60s.

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I did 24 years at Plessey. It had just become Plessey rather than Ericsson's the year before. I started in Y4 the press shop and ended up in Pollards Palace by the railway developing software for the new digital type of telephone exchanges then coming into service. I was made redundant with thousands of others and the then owners, Lord Weinstock of GEC at Coventry fiddled us out of our redundancy money and dragged it out in the courts for many years after.

One risque story........... They were having an open day and a friend of mine and I stood outside the doors of the building to welcome guests. Just then a large bird from the adjoining Attenborough Nature Reserve few right past us and sh*t all down the road as it went. My mate looked at me and said "Naw, I work for Plessey, I've been sh*t on by experts!"

Despite that, it was a good company to work for (pre GEC) and often whole familes and even generations would work there.

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I worked in C5 on 2000 type relays from1969-71.

It was a great place to be with some real characters..................

I remember Pat (Downes?) who sampled (tested) the relays to see if they were any good, this affected the piece rate and therefore the bonus to the workers on the line. When he was heard to utter the words "Rack 'em" a great cheer went up , they had passed muster!!

Needless to say he was known as Racker Downes!

I learnt a great deal whilst working there and as said earlier in this thread there were whole families that had worked there for generations and were justifiably proud of their endeavours.

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  • 5 months later...

All I can recalls is that he worked there for so long.I think his sister Georgina also worked there for a while. He suffered from some form of skin problem which inhibited his socialising to a great extent He did most of his drinking in the Beeston area but I did bump into him coming out of a pub on Derby hill some time back. Lost contact after1969 or thereabouts.

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  • 1 year later...

I did 24 years at Plessey started 4 Sept 1961...making sure I had the full school hols first...I started in C dept against the railway I remember Pollards Palace, C5 C6...C dept was upstairs above C10 after C dept I worked in C7 cables and Wyvern Ave Long Eaton too I escaped with my redundancy money before GEC took over

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