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New Van and Expansion of Bakery Business Towards the end of 1947 dad bought out a small bakery in Raunds which extended his delivery rounds to include Raunds and Stanwick and out to Hargrave, Covington and Ringstead. This required him to buy a new and larger delivery van, with registration number EBD 925. His business motto was "Quality Tells, Quality Sells", and was painted on the two back doors. Quality Tells on the left hand door and Quality Sells on the right. W.Allan Baker and Grocer was on the side panels of the van, the Baker and Grocer being in a curve above his name.
In addition to the above he had to have the oven thoroughly renovated, the fire bricks in the floor were all uneven, those directly in line with the fire box had crumbled to the stage where they were sticking up in the air making it dangerous to put the bread tins into the oven. Major works like this required the oven fire to be extinguished and the oven to cool down so that the maintenance man could get into the oven to carry out repairs.
This was carried out during the second week of September when the fire was put out and the fire box emptied, the oven and fire box doors left open to help it to cool. It took three days for it to sufficiently cool so that the floor could be worked on. Dad engaged a company from Wellingborough to carry out the work. The man who arrived was short and wiry and needed to be to get into the oven. He set up a table directly in front of and against the oven door, with fire bricks, mortar and everything else he needed to carry out the repairs.
It was fascinating to see how he went about getting into the oven, he had left enough room on the table so that he could lay lengthways, and then wriggled his way in. There was not enough room between the floor and the ceiling for him to kneel or squat, barely enough for him to turn over; so all floor work was carried out laying on his stomach, if the ceiling need any work he would roll onto his back. His materials were dragged on a tray into and out of the oven. Took him three days to renovate the entire oven, he couldn't spend more than an hour at a time inside because the oven was still quite warm.
Whilst this work was in progress mum and dad took the opportunity to have a bit of a holiday in Eastbourne for the week, mum had arranged for Betty Odell to look after the shop. Dad arranged for a baker friend in Higham Ferrers to bake bread for him so that his customers were not without bread whilst the oven was being renovated. He had told them what was going to happen, and that Ted Eady and I would picking the bread up and delivering it to our customers. As far as I am aware we never had any complaints, obviously we must have done everything right.
On the Friday before they were due back I received a postcard (image below left) with instructions for me to light the oven fire and make the dough for the bread. I was only 12½, but had the responsibility for carrying this out.
Alms House With the war over there was no need for the emergency food supplies to be kept in the top Alms house, the last time they were used was during the blizzards of 1947. The Alms house was emptied during the spring of 1948 and as far as I recall was never occupied, remaining empty certainly up to the time we left in 1951.
Cars The ban on the use of private vehicles was lifted at the beginning of 1948, but petrol was still strictly rationed. In the image (below right) the car shown belonged to Mr Farrar who lived in Farrows Yard [Pokas Cottages], it had been up on blocks during the war. There was just enough room for him to drive his car through the arch; I used to get a lift from him as far as Higham Ferrers when I started work. |
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Bakery expansion 1948 |
