Mackenzie Junner die in Hove nursing home
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G. MACKENZIE JUNNER, editor of Commercial Motor for 30 years, from 1929 to 1959, died in a Hove nursing home last Saturday at the age of 88.
Mr Mackenzie Junner ("Mac" to his colleagues) joined CM in 1913 from AEC and left for military service when war broke out on August 4, 1914, returning five years later. He landed in France 11 days after the outbreak of war, and, as a motorcyclist with the Army Service Corps, was almost captured twice by the Germans. For six months he wrote most of CNI's "Despatches from the Front", and was commissioned in the field as a workshop officer.
He was not the only journalist writing copy, censored by. the Press Bureau, for CM, but his hand can be seen in the following:
***** Paris, ** April, 1915. Using Local Repair Facilities in France.
When one realizes the number of vehicles under repair at one of the Mechanical Transport Depots on the Continent, the importance of the question of unit repairs commences to assume its proper proportions. It may be of interest at this point to mention that the Advanced M.T. Depot at ****** takes full advantage of the unique opportunities available in that city with regard to the repair and overhaul of engines, gearboxes and back axles. The older depot can and does receive considerable assistance from the personnel of the large motor manufactories in the neighbourhood; a constant stream of lorries loaded with units for repair is, as a matter of fact, continually running between the depot and these factories, a factor which materially augments the output of completed lorries.
Khaki-clad Works Managers.
Those who are familiar with the Continental motor factory would be somewhat surprised to find some of them under the supervision of khaki-clad British officers, while non-commissioned officers would be noticed pointing out, in excellent French, the way in which they require the practical work done. The Mobilized French Mechanic.
All the French mechanics are mobilized, a principle which might with advantage be adopted at home, and the mechanist pioupiou likes nothing better than to work at his trade with his English Allies, who in turn appreciate their unique opportunities of improving their knowledge and experience by working in firstclass French motor factories.
Where, however, the M.T. Depot forming the topic of these notes is concerned such facilities for obtaining help from independent firms are out of the question, as, not being situated in an engineering locality, the whole of the work from A to Z has of necessity to be executed by the staff of soldier-mechanics detailed to the Depot.
Fine Workshop Equipment.
Not the least noteworthy fact concerning the organization of the Mechanical Transport of our Army is that, here on active service in a foreign country, is to be found a workshop fully equipped with Army machinery which would do credit to an important manufacturer. The plant is, moreover, laid down and working satisfactorily, yet arranged in such a manner that in the event of receiving orders from Headquarters the whole of it could be dismantled, packed and crated ready for transportation in the space of a few hours.
Plant that can be Moved.
The machine shop at the thantier measures approximately 150 ft by 66 ft with ample light. The power to drive the machinery is derived from a three-cyclinder vertical Gardner engine running on paraffin and developing about 30bhp. This engine is coupled direct to a dynamo and forms a complete unit mounted on a base, all parts being numbered for facilitating the erection and reerection which may be necessary at a moment's warning.
Mr Junner was a colourful character to whom things always seemed to happen. Not long after rejoining CM as assistant editor he almost met his Waterloo at that station, when an opened train door swept him off the platform and carried him for 100 yards. He escaped with some loss of skin. Locking back on his career in an article for CM in 1965, Mac paid tribute to a fine engineer, the late Leslie H. Hounsfield, who designed and built the Trojan car about 1912. It was Mr Hounsfield, he said, who pulled him through three years of City and Guilds examinations in motor engineering, resulting in his winning the only silver medal in the final.
Among the personalities who knew Mr Mackenzie Junner as "Mac" was Lord Nuffield, whose early speeches, in many cases, included a tirade against the "wicked" steel magnates who charged him so much.
In the early 1930s Mac met Dr Rudolph Diesel in a Paris cafe to talk about the Linovar diesel engine. The professor let slip that he had been in Paris in 1916 — in a munitions factory, it turned out. He had never been interrogated, and the German espionage service had found his "reports" most useful. Mac himself had caught a spy during the war — a naturalised Briton.
Mac ranged far in his transport industry reporting. He was invited to see Edsel Ford dig the first sod at the new Ford works at Dagenham. Near him was a young boy, whom he was to meet again years later at The Savoy. was Henry Ford.
When the first Scamr articulated vehicle was 134 built, Mac was asked to VE he recalled in an article in "The immediate reaction that the pivot pin appeare be fragile. The assurance given that every stress been considered. It was some fatal accidents to dri. that proved my point."
Mr Mackenzie. Junner came involved in associa work, and although not father of the Road Haul Association, he was certa the marriage broker brought the parents togeti The Royal Commission Transport was sitting in 1 don under the chairmanshi Sir Arthur Grafi' Boscawen, but its efforts v frustrated by the lack of hi mation on the operation organisation of long-distE road haulage.
Mr Junner commissio E. B. Hutchinson; a lea( road transport authority investigate long-distance 1 lage for Commercial MI and the result was a suit alarming articles. The in mation that the Royal C mission needed was begin. to be amassed.
The next step was for Junner to arrange a lunc!. for a dozen influer hauliers, eight of whom ag to form a committee to co material for the Royal C mission. Thus the Long tance Road Haulage Corn tee of Inquiry was formed Mr Junner bowed out.
From that nucleus, the Distance Road Haul Association evolved in 1 Later it amalgamated with Short Distance Hauliers' . ance to become the first.F Haulage Association.
After the 1939/45 war, Junner was a prime MOVE the formation of the Insti of Road Transport Enginc which became his consun interest.
Mr Mackenzie Junne survived by his widow. TI
are no children. .