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I remember typing pools...

Steve Bridger

I remember my first day at work. The summer of 1981. County Hall. The smell of polished corridors and trolleys laden three-feet high with leaver arch files and buff folders. I opened a door and there it was: The Typing Pool. Page 3 of The Sun were always plastered on the walls of the printing unit whenever I was asked to make errands. We still had a few discussion threads on that topic in the early days here - in 2004!


And I've seen Made in Dagenham, the movie!


I only mention this as the CIPD published a report called Work Audit today, a fascinating look at how the world of work has changed
in Britain since 1952.


I thought we could share our own compelling vignettes of social history comparing changes in the way we work.


What do you reckon?


Steve

  • Ah yes, Clare....the hole in the paper.  And the brush thing at the end of those pencil erasers.   And did you have to do that thing in exams where, if the document you were typing had a table in it, you typed your horizontal lines then you had to take the paper out of the typewrite, turn it round 90 degrees, line it up correctly so you could type your vertical lines.....with no space between where the lines joined.  Cheats way (when not in exam situation) was to type the horizontal lines and then do the vertical lines with black biro and ruler :)  And as for having to retype the whole document if your boss changed his (unlikely her) mind re perhaps one sentence.....grrrr

    On a serious note, guess we can all see now that the typing pool was a waste of money when peeps can do their own typing, but I guess also there was some anti-feeling at the time, doing people out of their jobs etc.  We have similar today- online banking has resulted in a reduction of workforce (can't remember when I  last spoke to someone over the counter in a bank) and as for self-checkout in the supermarkets....still a long way to go with that, but it will be the norm in the future, and people will still groan about technology doing people out of jobs.  But where would we be without technology?   Any Luddites out there?

    (Steve...are you aiming for a record high of posts on a thread?  Think you might achive on this.)

  • Just waiting for this community page to be further embraced by technology when we can 'like' posts.....and when I can go back and correct a spelling mistake *achieve*

  • Ahh... tip-pex (or should I say 'correction fluid', as Blue Peter would probably say). I used to get through a lot of that. The 'brush' used to fray and leave high ridges on application forms and the like. (I believe these have now been replaced by dabber thingimys (technically speaking).

    @Sandra - that will happen in the next iteration. Definitely. I'm making the case :)

    Steve 

  • @Nicky- I was having a similar chat with my kids re homework recently. My stories of 'going off and looking it up in a book' were completely alien to the Google generation.

    I am enjoying the memories of typewriters and holes in paper- I can feel the lingering frustration! In my last job (barely 5 years ago) I used to deal with a company that had no email, an antiquated fax machine, and still wrote invoices out by hand. Going to their site was like stepping back 20 years. Sort of comforting, in an odd way!

  • I worked for a family run department store when I was a student and it always reminded me of Grace Brothers.


     It was the only place I have every worked which gave you a set 15 min tea break in the morning and afternoon and an hour for lunch! It was also the only place I have worked where people were refered to as Mr or Miss/Mrs whatever. This was in 2005!


     


     

  • I've just had a memory of Dymo-taped name badges hit me square between the eyes...

  • What a great thread which made me smile :) 


    Unfortunately I am in the camp with the correcting rubbers/Tippex, manual typewriters and I remember the typing pools too.  How things have changed ....

  • Started my first "real" job in 2002 so not so much of a technological impact, although I did "answer" the fax machine once or twice - full corporate greeting and all!


    On a slightly different note - after moving to the Middle East in 2008 it took me AGES to get used to a Sun-Thu working week! Some of my family still haven't got used to it and will call me in the middle of the day on Sunday for a nice chat :)

  • Tea ladies or 'Trolley Dollys' as they were referred to in the pre-PC world - the afternoon round included cakes as well.


    That was 37 years ago - and my current Company still has them (minus the cakes!).

  • Early in January, on Radio 4, there was a one week series of 15 minute interviews, with return visits, of public figures who had their first jobs as paper boys and paper girls. (I've tried finding a link via the BBC iPlayer, but no success on this yet. I'll post the link if there's a podcast.)

    It was a fascinating piece of social history, and it was also remarkable learning of the impact that this early experience of work on all 5 people, and the development of a work ethic and feelings of independence. The interviewer also had a paper round by the way.

    I often say that my first job was as a deck cadet at sea, forgetting about my 7-day a week paper round (where I earned more than a cadet, which paid about 13 pence per day to start off with! ).

    My most vivid memory as a paper boy was, one summer evening, reading the South Wales Echo and seeing that the husband at one of the houses on my round had been arrested for murdering his wife! His newspaper delivery hadn't been cancelled - I wonder why!