Fred Tate
Fred was born in Hebburn, County Durham on 20 October 1926. He grew up in Wallsend because his father came across to work as a pitman in the G-Pit at Swan Hunter. The family lived in Laurel Street, Wallsend.
After leaving school at fourteen in 1940, Fred got a job at Swan Hunter as an office boy. He stayed there until he was twenty-one and then went to sea with the Merchant Navy. After a year at sea he worked at Parsons Marine for eight years. After that, Fred went to Wallsend Slipway Company which had been taken over by Swan Hunter. Fred worked at Swan Hunter until 1985 when he took redundancy and retired.
Fred talks about his experiences at Swan Hunter and living in Wallsend during the Second World War.
Fred was interviewed by Alex Magin on 23 February 2007. The interview took place at Segedunum Roman Fort, Baths and Museum and lasted for 46 minutes.
Fred Tate's Memories
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Transcript
I always remember that the men respected the women and I liked that y’know if any man used bad language when there was a woman around – he got wrong off the other men like! I think some of the women could use the language better than what the men could like, but that didn’t count!
Were there a lot of women working at the yard?
There was quite a few – the main ones, as a group, there was about 6 of them were what we called the slavvys. And these optimum davits I’m talking about they used to be fitted out on the quayside and tested with big weights to make sure they could take the weight of the boat and that and they brought a trade inspector there to see that everything was ok. When they were all tested these ladies used to come along – do the first initial paint work and then the painters afterwards the painters would come along and do the job, finish it off. But women cleaners, odd women working welding – some of them were welding! I remember 2 young lassies from Hebburn, one was a coloured lassie and her boots were the heaviest part of her! The two of them used to…they were funny – one was a little thin lassie and the other was a big lass and I think them both – their boots were the heaviest part of them! But they would good what we call takers – they would get a job and you would hold it up and they would put a little spot of welding on when that was ok, the welder, which would be a man would come along and do a full weld on the job. But they were good! And burners, there was lady burners and they had a very steady hand when they were good at good circles and that. Aye there was quite a few women. In the fitting shop there was only one – I remember I’ll never forget her name of course because they called her Tait as well, but her name was Tait – Jean Tait! She used to use the mechanical saw, and her little mate, Betty she worked in the little fitting shop and she worked on the saw in there. And one girl worked in the blacksmiths – her name was Alma and she used to come down and chat with Jean and Betty, that was just the three of them, that was all the females that was in the group I was in like.