Out and Home.
Page 2
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
I had the privilege of seeing an entirely new model of char-a-bancs at Chehnsford during the past week. Mr. Thomas Clarkson would have desired to exhibit it at the Olympia Commercial Motor Show, but it has to be dispatched immediately to its destination at Barbadoes. It is, of course, a single decker, and between the floor and the chassis a commodious " boot " is arranged for luggage and mails. Barbadoes, I understand, has to contend with torrential rains, when as much as a six-inch rainfall is emptied out of the celestial blue in twice as many hours. The char-a-bancs is, therefore, well covered by easily-adjusted waterproof, fitted with celluloid windows. The driver, too, is well protected by a glass screen similar to those in use with ordinary pleasure cars. Mr. Clarkson promises something quite new for Olympia, and judging by the work in hand, I should say that this deserving pioneer is now on the good road to ultimate success.
A prominent figure always., but at the present moment after his conflict with another gigantic rubber firm, Mr. Fritz Poppe,of the Polack concern, looms yerâ– large. T have known numberless business Men of Teutonic origin, and they are singularly alike in certain respects. They come over into our country young old energetic ; they soon marry English wives; and then their entire time is taken up with their business and their homes. Mr. Frio: Poppe is just the same, and the popularity of the Polack tire in England is, in a large measure, due to the insistence and industry of this Frankfort gentleman, duly aided and abetted by his brother. He has a wonderful faculty for making and keeping friends. Ile is still a young man and has been in England since 1896, and it is a noteworthy fact that there are four brothers in his family whose total services in the rubber business amount to 86 years.
Motor manufacturers who require tools quickly have a very faint notion of the immense stock of second-hand lathes, dynamos, drilling machines, etc., stored by Thomas W. Ward, Limited, of Sheffield, at its various branches throughout the country. A monthly catalogue of second-hand tools is issued, and the one before MC shows that there are 2,5oo lots actually in stock. One does not realise the magnitude of this very quickly. Ward's buys up entire factories, T have heard, and even old warships. Altogether it is an extraordinary business, and anyone looking for a special teol quickly would do well to get the latest list.
I used to know a friend's house which was nick-named " India Rubber Cottage," because there seemed no limit to its accommodating qualities when hard pressed. During the recent R.A.C. Trials, Baldock was filled almost to bursting out at the side, and some of us had perforce to seek shelter at the Garden City, at Letchworth hard by, and very fortunate we were. There is a fine old hostelry there, called the Letchworth Hall Hotel (by the by, you must provide your own intoxicating liquors), and the present deponent revisited this spot on a recent Saturday, principally interested for the moment in
absorbing the fresh country air. I found that our railway bookstall friends, W. Ti. Smith and Sons, have a great book-binding factory there, and I saw a Dennis van, well loaded with books, starting off at a decent speed for London. I understand it makes a daily journey there. I heard also that a Foden wagon does most satisfactory work, making a similar journey several times a week for another firm, This motor transit must bring Letchworth very close to London, and manufacturers would do well to spare a day to run down there, and ask for Mr. Gaunt, the estate manager. They should look at the factories already erected, the, railway facilities, the electric lighting, and the more than excellent cottage and villa accommodation for employees, and judge for themselves its possibilities in their own particular seherne of life.
" THE EXTRACTOR."