A treat coming for those interested in recent industrial history of the area – many readers will have worked or had relatives that did, at the BRD factory in Aldridge – a huge, sprawling automotive component manufacturing company producing mainly vehicle crankshafts.
There are many warm memories of this place that employed thousands, and is now sadly lost; but the recollections are strong. Well, I’ve a treat coming in the next week, I won’t say yet what it is, but I’ll leave these two images with readers for debate and recollection.
David Hughes has previously written about the BRD company for the blog, Linda Mason has recorded with great love and fondness her memories of the great Aldridge factories. Many local people worked there and travelled daily on the works busses from local towns like Brownhills.
Like many large factories, the social life was almost as important as the job, and David Hughes last year supplied a 63 year old booklet from the Sports and Social Club associated with the factory which records many things – events, satirical poetry, hatched matched and dispatched – even an emigration. But also local history, a crossword and other stuff. It’s a wonderful thing. You can peruse it in the gallery at the foot of the post.
I’m hoping these pictures and David’s wonderful magazine will stir memories and debate in preparation for the treasure I have coming up – please do comment here, mail me on BrownhillsBob at Googlemail dot com or tug my coat on social media if you have anything to add.
You can click on any page in the gallery below for a full size version, or download the whole thing in searchable PDF form at this link here.
