June Wheeler

June Wheeler (left) with her sisters.

June, pictured here with her two sisters, has written and told us a bit about her life as a weaver with Early's:

I lived in Stanton Harcourt and always wanted to work in the blanket factory. My mother Beatrice Newton moved to Witney from Lincolnshire and took a job as a weaver at Early's factory. She later met my dad Bill Ayers and they married in 1928. They lived at Tar Farm Cottages near Stanton Harcourt. My mother worked at the Early factory till she had my sister Audrey and then two and a half years later she had Eileen, the family moved into a cottage in the village.

Mum went back to work leaving the two girls with a friend in the village, I am not sure if she was working full time then. There were no buses to the mill in those days so she cycled five miles each way. I was born six years later which is when my mum gave up working in the mill.

We all followed in my mum's footsteps and were all weavers at Early's. We were picked up at 7.30 by coach also calling at Standlake and Ducklington to pick up others. We would work from 8am to 6pm. We were taught by Elsie and Muriel King in a small shed behind the weaving shed, which is where we also took our morning break of half an hour.

We spent many hours at our looms; it was hard work, noisy and very messy, especially on a Friday when we had to clean the looms, as they were thick with fluff and oil. We had some good times too, it was very noisy but we seemed able to communicate with each other.

When I worked on the loom my partner was Sheila Knight from Standlake, later when I was given two looms to look after - I found it very hard work.

Most of the friends I made came from Leafield, one of which is Doreen Pratley (née Dore) who I have kept in touch with for over fifty years.

Our foreman was Arthur Parr and later Reg Painter and the loom tuner was Jackie Kearsey who married my workmate Shirley Dore.

The weft was brought to us in baskets and weighed into pairs, we put the bobbins in shuttles, and sometimes if the leathers snapped on the arms the shuttle would shoot across to the loom opposite. I remember Betsy Wiggins opposite me had a few near misses. When the weft ran out we called it tying, we had to have a tier-on to set up the next lot, which was usually done by Elsie and Muriel King.

One of my vivid memories was the day on which the looms caught fire, I was able to get the fire extinguisher off the wall and I started putting the fire out. Reg Painter (who was Foreman) took it off me and I soaked him with water. The next day Mr Early personally came and thanked me for acting quickly.

We had a very good canteen just outside the mill gates, where we would all go for a hot meal or take our sandwiches and have a cup of tea. Some of us stayed in the sheds or went out a little door at the back and sat by the river, as you can imagine in the summer it got very hot in the sheds.

I left working at Early's after five years because of back problems, but loved every minute I worked there. I now live in Dorset but still visit Witney from time to time and have very fond memories of the Early Blanket Mill and the many friends I made there and would love to hear from anyone I worked with.