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GRASSHOPPER PENSIONERS’ CLUB March 2011 Dear Fellow Member, Since I last wrote I have received quite a bunch of correspondence from you. The numbers for the AGM are around 40, so there is room for a few more if you would like to come. I need to know by 28 March. Springtime is here, and so the Spring Lunch is just around the corner. This will take place on Thursday 12 May 2011 at Barnsgate Manor Vineyard. The menu/application form is attached. Ann Williamson is organising this event and has told me that the closing date for booking is Friday 22 April. Those of you who have been to this lunch before can testify to the excellence of the food. The restaurant and its surroundings are perfect for a Grasshopper get together. If you live in the south east, you should certainly try to be there, and there will be many who come from a fair distance. In the interests of economy, car sharing is advised !
martins bank website This can be found at www.martinsbank.co.uk Mike Harris wrote:
I found the web site fascinating, as it brought back many memories of my 5 years on Merseyside.   I have been able to make a small contribution (a photo of the branch) to the Aintree branch page, which was my first real experience of the Bank, but in so many places there were faces I remembered - often reappearing in branch after branch.   I remember my Liverpool days best, as I was in a new environment, and moving around quite a lot, but I recognised a number of faces and names in London District as well, even though my only contacts were with Eltham Branch and Automation Department.   Currently, the only ex-Martins people with whom I still maintain contact are Kenneth Atkinson (Liverpool and London), Nick Cooper (Liverpool), Ron Henry (Isle of Man), and Roger Leonard (Liverpool Trustee Department). Jonathan Snowden is the guy who seems to be doing everything on the Martins web site - I gather it is entirely unofficial and a labour of love. He tells me it's an uphill task getting this archive together. As he says himself, "I am working on my own, in that the entire website, and that is every graphic and image, millions of lines of scanned text and every single page has been achieved from scratch by me. However, since the launch of the site a dedicated band of "followers" - naturally Martins staff - have volunteered all manner of information, suggestions and most importantly a correction service, so I do not feel that I am all alone! He admits that he hasn't yet managed to get to grips with Head Office or Liverpool District Office and all the different departments there (where again I will surely know lots of people). Don White sent me an extract from it about the opening of Elephant & Castle branch. This was originally published in the Martins Bank Magazine, Winter 1963. It is a well written piece featuring Ted Bartlett as the manager, full of “bubbling energy and enthusiasm”. I reported in the last newsletter that Ted died three years ago and the article and photos give a vivid description of the spirit he engendered.
new members I have had a couple of introductions, and sent out invitations to join our happy band, but so far they have not come back with the all important membership fee. Maybe this letter will jog their memories.
obituaries
		Ted Bartlett Tony Hooper wrote: When I started my career in 1953 at Hanover Square branch Ted Bartlett was working in Ledger Department as number 2 to a Mr Edwards. There were four machinists, Mrs Broadwater, Supervisor, Betty Baldock, Ann Crouch and another, whose name was Barlow I think.
Eric Cole wrote: “Ted Bartlett was a “Bermondsey Boy” born and bred and was involved in local affairs, serving as a young Councillor for that area. This must have drawn the attention of the “Hierarchy” at Martins, who saw him as an ideal candidate for manager of the new Elephant and Castle branch. The branch was opened on 8 August 1963 by Freddie Hardman and many local dignatories were present, including the Mayor of Southwark. I was plucked from Securities Section at St James’s Street and appointed (or rather, told to report) as Ted’s Second Man. The branch was located in the new Ministry of Health building (Enoch Powell was the Minister!!) where 1,200 civil servants worked with the misguided expectation that many would transfer their accounts. This did not happen and we found outselves (3 men plus typist) fully occupied doing unremunerative agency work. (I don’t think that there was any agency claim scheme to compensate for the work at that time.) In spite of Ted’s tireless efforts to gain business, the Elephant and Castle branch was a “white elephant” from the start and was closed soon after the merger. Ted was a down-to-earth straight talking person. He was very fair and helpful to me, and I enjoyed my four years working as his assistant. I regarded him as a friend. When the branch closed, Ted was appointed manager of Rotherhithe branch but, he later told me, he never fitted into the Barclays system and, having crossed swords with a particular local director, he took early retirement in his 50s, leaving him very bitter about his treatment.”
Iris Austin Peter Butler wrote: I do not know this lady but could it be the former Iris Cresswell ? Iris always came to our early meetings in the basement of 54, when Don Harris was secretary. I know that she married a reverend gentleman and moved to Holt in Norfolk, but I cannot recall her married name. I am sure that someone will come up with an answer.
	David Milne Mark Dancey wrote: “ I worked with “Bootsie”, as he was affectionately known (but not to his face), at Southampton back in the late ‘70s. I recall one day when I wrote off my mini in a head on collision with a lorry on the way to work. He lent me his brand new Supafast Cortina, Lotus I think, to go and see my solicitor.
In view of what I had just done to my car I thought that was very trusting. He was a member of The Salvation Army. I went to his wedding at the local citadel, and his wife’s Mum was the cleaner at the sub –branch I ran. I also found his name on the guest list at the retirement party we had for the late Bob Sharrock in 1980.”
Alan Turner John Ford wrote: I was at Farnborough branch when Alan Turner joined the bank. He was always known to us as Bob Tanner or, when we were feeling really facetious, one and six. I still have the wedding present he gave us ! Before he was called up he used to visit us at our home. He was always really helpful.
recent deaths
		Mike Pinks Mike died on 23 February aged 85. He and Enid had moved a few years ago from Northampton to Wimborne Minster to be nearer to their daughter, and it was in the Minster that his funeral service took place. Joe and I drove down on a beautiful sunny day, and met another Grasshopper there, Mike Harris, whom Mike Pinks had introduced to the club. He was at Eltham branch when Mike was appointed manager.
Joe and I worked with Mike Pinks in 68 Lombard Street, first in Loans Department and later in District Office. In the early 1960s Loans Department was full of very able and well qualified clerks, all impatiently waiting for a call to higher things. Mike beavered away as a securities clerk, but was soon sent to District Office, and then to manage Eltham branch. Joe tells me that Mike was not in favour of credit cards when the first one was introduced and advertised widely as “Barclaycard”. He wrote to his superiors and explained his misgivings. Unsurprisingly he was given the task of heading up a team whose job it was to “sell” Barclaycard to Martins managers all round the country. He wrote about that time in a recent newsletter. Michael Harris wrote: I met Michael when he arrived at Martins Bank, Eltham to take over as Branch Manager, where I had recently been moved down from Liverpool as Assistant Manager. His predecessor was a pompous and somewhat humourless individual, whom Mike and I both recalled for his insistence on flying the Union Jack on all high days and holidays, whatever the weather. Mike's arrival was truly a breath of fresh air, and I remember that after close of business on his first day, he and I, along with the Chief Cashier Roy Thacker, adjourned to the hostelry next door, as the best way of getting to know each other.   When we made contact with each other again barely five years ago, his first comment was "Have often longed, over the years, to read you the riot act for introducing me to whisky drinking after banking hours. My only response had to be an apology for leading him astray in such a shameful manner - though my memory tells me that G & T was Michael's usual tipple in those days. I'm afraid I was a reluctant banker, and barely a year later, I abandoned him to join the new Automation Department (to begin my fascination with computers). I am not sure if he ever forgave me, but the rest was history as far as my career was concerned - though with the Barclays takeover I jumped ship again and moved out to Canada to further my computing career. I think Michael must have forgiven me, though, as only two or three years later, the telephone in my Toronto apartment rang - and it was Michael. By then he was with Barclaycard, and he told me that he was over for some conference or other, and had tracked me down through the telephone book!   Moreover, he was with a colleague - Keith Maddocks - whom I also remembered from my final Martins/Barclays days.   The upshot was that he invited me to join them for dinner at their very posh hotel in downtown Toronto - and my fondest memory was of Michael ordering a bottle of the most expensive claret on the wine list, and declaring to Keith and me "This is something I have always wanted to do!"   When I taxed him with this recently, he claimed that he could not remember the incident at all !
Beryl Calder I received from Barclays Wealth a cryptic letter informing me that “this company” was dealing with the estate of the above named. “Please remove the name and address of the deceased from your mailing list.” Beryl used to contribute regularly to this newsletter and was a truly remarkable character. She didn’t deserve to be written out of our lives so coldly. Beryl’s first husband was killed in 1940, just before her second son was born. Six years later she married Donald Calder, whose wife had died while he was serving in the Royal Marines in Egypt. He was left with a young son, and they later added a son and daughter of their own to the family. Donald worked for Martins Bank, but I never found out where, and he died in 1997. By 2004 Beryl was 89 years old, but full of energy. She was raising money for Parkinson’s Disease Society by reciting Joyce Grenfell and Stanley Holloway monologues which she knew off by heart. Nearly 100 people came, and chose pieces at random for her to act. She had various props such as a shawl and steel rimmed specs for an old woman. “Yes, I know I am old, but I tried to enlarge on it”. She also used different accents – Yorkshire, cockney and Scandinavian. She raised £3,000 and there was an article in the local paper about her. Most years Beryl travelled to America to visit her many relatives. Last summer she wrote: “I have just celebrated my 95^th birthday and am still fit and able, thank goodness. Last year I went to America to see my son and his family. I took my daughter and for the second time we crossed the Atlantic on the Queen Mary2. We had a very pleasant week in New York State. During the past twelve years I have been able to see quite a lot of the world, and now I think it is time for my relatives to come and visit me.”
David Johnson Arthur Rowe and Mark Dancey emailed to say:: David Johnson died in February. He began his career with Martins in the north east of England and moved to Southampton area in the late 1960s. He worked at the former Martins branch in Southampton High Street and at Portsmouth branch. He was a Business Advisory Service Manager and completed his career as Assistant Manager at Havant branch, retiring in the early 1990s. He was not a Grasshopper member.
Thomas Muitt Bas Bush emailed from Southampton Spreadeagle Club: Tom was an active member of the SSC. He died in February at the age of 85. He began his career with Martins in the post war years in the north east of England, progressing to manager of Central Newcastle branch. In 1970 he came to Southampton and under Barclays was appointed manager of the branch at Elm Grove, Southsea. He moved to Portswood branch before retirement in the early 1980s. He also was not a Grasshopper.
correspondence
Barrie Brookes emailed: “I actually had it in mind, following the lunch in November, to ask you or Bill if you had contact with any ex-Martins pensioners in Liverpool – I felt sure there would be a group of them meeting regularly on the basis of any excuse for a knees up, or whatever they can manage these days. You can imagine my surprise to read in your recent newsletter that Brian Constable had rung you with news of the 20 strong group that meets monthly. I still travel up to Merseyside quite regularly and would very much like to get in touch with them.” (I gave Barrie the necessary contact details and hope to hear that they have managed a convivial lunch. If so, those members can count as “active members” and we can claim the maximum subsidy from the bank.) Barrie ended by saying that he has met up with Carmel Bradley, as well as his cousin Sam Brookes through this club and is particularly grateful to us for keeping alive the chance to meet old colleagues and relatives in this way. That is certainly our aim, and it is really good to get such feedback. I have had many contributions from members this time. It is always good to hear from you, even if the news is of funerals attended. We can all look back on the days when we were young and vigorous and worked with colleagues in the prime of life too. Don’t forget to consider coming to the AGM. Also, the menu and reply slip for the Spring Lunch is attached and you would really enjoy that. Ann Williamson will be waiting for the letters to roll in. With best wishes Ros Edwards Hon. Sec. forthcoming events
AGM at Global Head Office					31 March 2011
Spring Lunch at Barnsgate Manor Vineyard					12 May 2011
Summer Lunch at Donnington Manor					4 August 2011
London Lunch at Royal Overseas League					3 November 2011
© gut informiert 2007 to date

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