Firestyle Magazine: Issue 6 - Winter 2016

FIRE SERVICE RELATED
CWS Fire Station
a Time Capsule in Dudley
16
The workforce at the Alan Nuttall
Partnership in Dudley has opened
the doors on a long-locked room
to find the headquarters of an
old company fire brigade almost
perfectly preserved, more than half
a century after it stood down.
The story has been featured by the
BBC with the story being read by
over 80,000 people and the interest
has spread far and wide; into
Europe, the US and even Australia!
The huge National Works site, which
has belonged to the Alan Nuttall
Partnership Limited since 1986 –
some thirty years, has also been
home to these items which pre-date
Nuttalls, by some decades.
For those who may not know, the
factory was built in 1915, on the
instruction of David Lloyd George,
as a munitions factory for the First
World War. The manufacturing
continues on the site to this day,
although the products have
changed over the years, once
home to the infamous Bean Cars.
For several decades later it was to
the Co-operative Wholesale Society
(CWS) – Dudley Co-op.
The vintage equipment dates from
that period, when CWS had their
own works brigade 1934-1971
according to current research.
As Nuttalls celebrated their fiftieth
year in business in 2016, there had
been an ongoing hunt for historical
stories from around factory floor.
The 50 Years of Nuttalls campaign
has featured long standing
employees and celebrated our
fantastic past project work. The
story of the old Fire Station was
mentioned and the team couldn’t
resist the curiosity, so it was opened
up to take a look,and gain access
to the firefighters’ old station, which
has been mothballed behind a
padlocked door on the ground
floor since the 1950s.
“We’ve always known it was here,”
said Matt Hornblower, Operations
Director, “but this is such a large site,
there are little corners that no one
goes into. But recently we came in
and had a good look around, and
we still keep finding things. Anna
Bamford our marketing manager
was keen to follow up on the story
when I mentioned it to her and we
made our way across the site to
take a look. We were both in awe
of how wonderfully preserved the
room is, despite a bit of dust, there
are drinks, buckets of fire sand and
even a newspaper!”
The most impressive piece in there
is a pump trailer, powered by a
petrol or diesel engine. Still bright
red, with ‘CWS DUDLEY’ lettered
in gold on the front, it looks as
though all it needs is a bit of a
wipe-down. There is still air in its tyres
and just a few spots of oil on the
floor beneath. The documentation
which is still with it suggests it dates
from the 1950s, when the Co-op
had its own on-site fire brigade; a
necessity for factories as large as
this one, even once a national fire
service had been established.
The trailer pump still has its number
plate: RJ9012, which belongs to
the trailer and we have been
informed that this supports it being
from around 1934. They were part
of a limited run and each had a
consecutive number plate – right
up to 9,999. I wonder how many
are still around today?
Perhaps even more striking are
the uniform jackets and caps,
still hanging from hooks on the
green-painted walls. In some
cases the names of their wearers
are still chalked above them, as
if they walked out one day and
never came back. Names still in
evidence include I Silk, W. Price
and A Round.