G. L. Major & Co. Ltd. – c1950s (1)

Preface

Mr John R Walker
Caernarfon
Gwynedd
09 January 2023

Aireborough Historical Society

Dear All,

While clearing my late parent’s house in Pudsey, I found the enclosed photos of the G L Major leather works in a suitcase with my late aunt’s probate papers. My father must have kept them. My late aunt was Dorothy Walker and she used to ‘do accounts’ or similar when I was young – 6-10 maybe. Sometimes she took me with her on Saturday mornings and we’d make a day of it by going on to Ilkley or Otley, having a walk on the Moors or Chevin, and then coming back via Harry Ramsden’s for fish & Chips. I think Mr. Major lived in Ilkley up near Hebers Ghyll on the Moor and I think she sometimes took her calculations, which she did on an old-fashioned comptometer which I’ve still got, to him as part of the trip. I was left in the car for a while… That was in the late 1950s I think.

I remember Mr Major and his wife also used to come to my aunt’s house in Pudsey. He had a boxer dog called Sam which I used to play with. The financial stuff was all ‘over my head’ back then. It was all a big adventure for me. I was left to roam the factory while my aunt did her work. I was too young to understand what was going on really but it’s something I remember and I recpgnised the photos straight away. Some of them are duplicated, or triplicated, but they are too good to throw away. Our industrial heritage should be celebrated not cast aside. So the work that you, and Pudsey & District Civic Society, do is appreciated.

So I hope you can make use of them in some way?

Yours,

J R Walker.

Editor’s Note:

We acknowledge the generosity of Mr John Walker in saving these valuable images of a Guiseley business no longer with us and donating them to the AHS for the benefit of all. We hope that we have displayed them well on our webpages and we ask that whilst persusing these photographs should anyone with knowledge of these works and or of the people who worked there, to make a note of the image number and let us know any details which may enhance an understanding of the image(s) and or to the identity of the persons therein. Thank you. Ed. JB. 17 December 2023.