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60 years of Anglia Locksmiths
60 years ago people were going crazy over The Beatles in America and BBC2 starting broadcasting . This was also the beginning of Anglia Locksmiths .
» IT ALL BEGAN WHEN MY LATE father Ray Ward had a small decorating shop in the middle of The Fens in a small market town called Wisbech in Cambridgeshire . By chance , an American tourist , Fred Patterson , came into his shop asked him why he hadn ’ t thought about cutting keys and becoming a locksmith like himself in America . This was the start of a long-term friendship as Fred taught my father via sending him many lessons , locks and keys from overseas . As he got more confident , the shop turned from being a painters and decorators into an old-fashioned ironmongers and locksmiths ; renamed to Anglia Locksmiths .
To this day people can come in and buy one screw , one hinge or one picture pin rather and it also makes stock-taking very interesting !
All through my childhood I grew up in the shop environment , having to work on Saturdays and during my school holidays cutting simple cylinder keys and dealing with the public . At primary school , we were asked to write a story about what we did during our school holidays . I did a vivid account of going out with my father and breaking into this enormous safe and when my teacher came to mark this obviously she thought that I was being forced into a world of crime and immediately went to report it to the headmaster . Luckily the headmaster knew my father and whenever I see her , she
always has a good old giggle about it . This safe was also memorable for me as it was full of Green Shield stamps ; which my father took as payment . For many years , if I ever wanted a new bag or trousers or whatever ; I would have to spend the weekend tearing , licking and sticking these stamps into a book to get them !
When I left school , my father took me on under the YTS scheme where I earned £ 25 a week . This was on old fashioned apprenticeship where for the first year all I was allowed to do was watch and learn and any mistakes I made ended up with a rap over the fingers with a screwdriver or similar tool .
After this , my father ’ s health deteriorated with Alzheimer ’ s and Glaucoma and so I was very suddenly left at the deep end to run the business along with my mother . House repossessions were at their peak in the 1980s with three or four a day and I had to learn very quickly on my own . I often felt very lonely and wished I had known other locksmiths for guidance but it was years before the
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NOVEMBER 2024
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