Dear Sir
Wow - was I surprised to see a picture of my father staring back at me from last week's edition of the Welwyn Times!
Jack Spencer appears in the photo at the bottom of page 14 - on the far right. Unfortunately he died back in 1984, sad - because he would have loved to have seen this article.
I can remember when I was at school - at first his job was to drive the "printing blocks?" (I am guessing here !) up to Banbury where the paper used to be printed. During the holidays I used to go with him and we used to spend the day walking around the shops, or out in the country collecting blackberries, waiting for the printing to finish so that we could load up the van and return to Welwyn Garden. The machine used to print the paper was enormous. I guess as a small child I was overwhelmed - it was so big it was constructed in a hole in the floor and reached the ceiling. It made so much noise that I was more than a little afraid of the beast. I can remember once we got back to WGC, the paper had to be assembled by "interleavers". My mother used to help out when there was a hold-up and Dad got back particularly late. When Welwyn Times got their own printing machine, Dad was made a "machine minder's assistant", but I think he rather enjoyed a reputation for being a "Jack of all trades"!
I recognise a few people in the picture, but cannot put names to them. I remember Joe and Hetty Martin and Joe Dormer .
Wendy Brownsell (née Spencer)
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