Men Who Make Transport-24
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Jess( Delicate
HE roots of Jesse Delicate are firmly embedded in Aston, Birmingham, although he has been a resident of Coventry for the past 25 years. It was in 1935 that he came to the city of Leofric and that lady on the horse as assistant to the transport manager of Courtaulds, Ltd. With the exception of the war years, he has been with the company ever since and today controls the transport arrangements of some 20 factories.
Neither Jesse nor Delicate is the most common of names. Possibly that explains why he is known to his friends as Jerry and to one of the directors in his early days with Courtaulds as Mr. Delephone, a name scarcely less probable.
Although little affluence gilded his youth, he enjoyed his schooldays at King Edward VI Grammar School in Birmingham. Thereafter, he went for a few months to the General Electric Co., where it was made clear to him that his talents did not lie in the direction of draughtsmanship. On his mother's advice he then joined the railway as a clerk in various offices and incurred her displeasure (" you've forfeited your pension ") when he left three years later.
It seemed to young Delicate that in the railway service, many years were going to pass before dead men's shoes became his: industry clearly offered better opportunities. So he went to Tubes. Ltd., as a transport clerk, and there, under the direction of Mr. G. A. Dawes, he learned a great deal in a short five years. By 1935, he felt confident to tackle more responsible work. Three openings became available to him, but Courtaulds went so far as to make their offer by telegram. Having added four tactful years 'to his true age of 24, he moved to Coventry and better things.
He married in 1936 and today has a son reading law at Keble College, Oxford. In 1940 he joined a Light AntiAircraft regiment of the Royal Artillery (he had already served four years in the Territorial Army) and did his overseas soldiering in North Africa, Sicily and Italy.
On his release, Mr. Delicate returned to Courtaulds and, after a few months, succeeded to the throne of the transport manager. They were exceedingly busy days of expansion, increased production and factory development all over the country. Imports of the basic raw material of the company, wood-pulp, grew annually and the transport problem with it. Most of the imports are handled by rail, but in its processed state, the textiles and yarns from the various factories are delivered by road.
The quantities dealt with in Mr. Delicate's office average about 4,000 tons per week and nearly 90 per cent. of the total is carried in hired transport. Although each factory has a transport depot manager and maintenance facilities for the company fleet, accounts, contracts and policy are all in the province of the Coventry head office. Speed of deliveries—the aim is a 24-hour service—and the packaging of yarn in a manner acceptable to the mills are problems that are satisfactorily solved only by the use of road transport.
It might be thought that the general transport manager of so vast an undertaking might have little time for pursuits outside his office. In the case of Jerry Delicate, such is not the case, although it must be said that many of his spare-time occupations arise directly from the nature of his work.
A Full Life He is a member of the Institute of Transport, the adviser on transport matters to Coventry Chamber of Commerce and vice-chairman of the transport committee of the Association of British Chambers of Commerce. He is a national vice-chairman and chairman of the Coventry Area of the Traders' Road Transport Association and represents the interests of commerce on the West Midland Transport Users' Consultative Committee. He is also a member of the Institute of Export.
Nor are his interests purely professional. He is a member of the Coventry Conservative Association and is sitting for the second time on the Socialist-dominated city council. His voice is also well known in deliberations connected with the Lorry Driver of the Year Competition.
At 48, Jerry Delicate has a great deal of energy and the happy knack of persuading people that things have got to be done. He is a fluent and amusing conversationalist and his interests are by no means confined to matters of transport. Cheerfully voluble, cigarette-smoking and hospitable, he will discuss knowledgeably such diverse matters as the architecture of Coventry's new cathedral, the present position of Germany, American business methods and urban traffic problems. He strikes one as a man without illusions about theories or people and he has all the directness of thought and expression that one looks for in a man with responsibilities. He also has that human warmth which is perhaps typical of the Midlander.