British Aluminium a Memoir
My experience as an apprentice, student and engineer from 1954 to 1964. A small contribution to Britain's industrial history, one of the world's greatest stories. The British Aluminium Company Ltd was founded on 7 May 1894 and became Rio Tinto Alcan in 2007. But the three factories where I worked have now been demolished. The Kinlochleven hydro-electric factory built between 1905 and 1907 not only produced Aluminium but also provide electrical power to every house in the village, a first in the world. The factory was closed in 1996 but the hydro power station is still in use.
Cover photo - The cover photo has nothing to do with my memoir except that it illustrates the beginning of the industrial revolution. It is a replica of Trevithick's Penydarren tramway locomotive built by the National Museums and Galleries of Wales, Swansea. (Incidentally, near Resolven, Wales). The pioneering locomotive built in 1803-04 by the Cornishman Richard Trevithick at the Penydarren Ironworks, Merthyr Tydfil. On 21 February 1804, this locomotive ran the nine mile tramway from Penydarren to Abercynon, hauling a load of ten tons of iron and about seventy people who hitched an unofficial ride! This was the first successful journey made by a steam locomotive on rails, and would initiate a world-wide revolution in transport in the nineteenth century.