I remember that . . .

'I was so pleased to see your photograph of Penarth Dock Engineers workforce (Penarth Times, June 19), sent in by Mr Chick.

Unfortunately, I had just finished a night shift on that occasion, so myself and others on my shift lost out on the chance of posterity!

Sadly when this picture was taken, the heyday of Penarth Dock Engineers was coming to a close.

Baileys of Cardiff had taken over, which wasn't a bad thing, as they took several of the workforce to work over Cardiff S. H. E. - Special Heavy Engineering.

Prior to taking over the Dock, Penarth Engineers was under the receivers, not that it wasn't doing well - we had plenty of work from the Steel Company of Wales, building gantrys, for Consett and working on-site - repairs for Newport Steelworks and jobs for Cardiff Steel Works.

We had one of the biggest lathes in the country, which catered for turbines and huge rollers from steelworks.

There was a gang of welders and helpers traveled all over Wales and England, including S.C.O.W. Lydney paper mills.

One time we had to repair a saw at Lydney (where they made the Mosquito plane wings), built in 1934.

Unfortunately, our company was a consortium of three companies and all the profit had to be channeled in to save Penrads, an ailing member of the group.

Our boss tried a new approach, making parts and arms for containers lorries. But, unfortunately, the resources weren't enough to get a big enough production line to cater for it. So, in Naval terms, we went down with all guns blazing.

Some of the boys were Nick Gabrileno, Tony Hayes and brother on nights, Mike. Also Vince Coles, Wilf Lowman (never swore in ten years), Syd Baker (used to work at Fownes Forge), Pat Donovan, Gren O'Brien, Stuart Full and my father Den (Danny Gibbs - worked at pontoon and PDE), but had moved to Raydon Smith Shipping.

And not forgetting Jean Keiler, and our special girl Lyn Gill, who amongst other duties, handed out our wages on a Friday!'

John Michael Gibbs
Plassey Street
Penarth