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Timber and much more … A Family History of James Jones & Sons Among books by the same author are The Last Mill on the Esk – 150 years of Papermaking, Scottish Academic Press, 1987 The Bibby Line 1807-1990 – A Story of Booms & Slumps, James & James, 1990 The Celestial Glass Bottle Company – A Short Centenary History of Lax & Shaw Ltd, 1891-1991 Granta Editions, 1991 Time & Tide Wait for No Man – George Hammond PLC 1767-1992, Granta Editions, 1992 Brown Brothers – A Company History 1871-1996, privately published, 1996 The Story of Christian Salvesen 1846-1996, James & James, 1996 The Story of Airsprung 1870s-1990s, privately published, 1997 The Roots of BSW Timber plc – 150 Years in the Timber Industry, St Matthew’s Press, 1998 60 Years of Kangol Quality 1938-1998, privately published, 1998 When the Question is Steam – The Story of Spirax-Sarco, James & James, 2000 In Their Fathers’ Footsteps – The story of the James Donaldson Group, St Matthew’s Press, 2001 Waste Matters – A History of Cleansing Service Group, James & James, 2002 The Business of Adding Value – A Short History of the Christie Group, Christie Group, 2004 Timber and much more… A FAMILY HISTORY OF JAMES JONES & SONS Nigel Watson ❑❑❑ St Matthew’s Press First published 2005 by St Matthew’s Press 10 St Matthew’s Terrace Leyburn North Yorkshire dl8 5el Copyright © Nigel Watson & James Jones & Sons Ltd The moral right of the author has been asserted All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without written permission from the publisher isbn 0-9543782-3-7 Designed, printed and bound by smith settle printing & bookbinding ltd Ilkley Road, Otley, West Yorkshire ls21 3jp Contents Foreword by Tom A Bruce-Jones, CBE, Chairman of James Jones & Sons Ltd vi Acknowledgements vii 1 ‘What is thy father going to make of thee, James?’ 1838-1888 1 2 ‘He is here, he is there, he is everywhere’ 1888-1917 11 3 ‘Often difficult and never easy’ 1917-1945 29 4 ‘Many calamitous matters’ 1945-1967 49 5 ‘A very difficult and hazardous enterprise’ 1967-1984 67 6 ‘A time of huge change’ 1984-1998 78 7 Past, present and future 1998 onwards 92 Index 105 Foreword he recording of a company’s history is My father personally presented, I believe, 34 probably often left too late so that many awards for 50 years service with the company. His Tpersonal stories and anecdotes are lost. That is predecessors must have presented many more, and I certainly the case with James Jones & Sons Ltd. have also made several. We recently reached a point Belatedly, however, we asked Nigel Watson to under- where it was impossible for any employee to serve take this task for us to mark the 100th year of the for fifty years and so generously reduced the quali- company’s incorporation and the 167th year of trad- fying period to 40 years! ing according to the records. I wish to thank Nigel for I am hugely happy that I returned to Scotland in his work which he has conducted in a truly profes- time to have four years working in James Jones sional and good-humoured fashion. before my father died. That enabled me to learn at In the context of the Scottish sawmilling industry first hand the contribution he made within the com- ours is a unique story with the close family connec- pany and the affection our employees had for him. tions with the foundry and boat-building businesses, He was enormously respected through all sectors of and our direct involvement over the years in forestry, the industry as was evidenced by the list of people wood pole manufacture, joinery, engineering, pallet attending his memorial service which reads like a and packaging manufacture and timber building ‘who’s who’ of the whole industry. systems. We also have our close connection with Succession planning perhaps was not a priority in Stella-Jones Inc. in Canada and our recent investment the company when I arrived in 1979, but I am pleased together with Stella Group in the telecommunica- to say today as some of us senior people come close to tions construction industry in Italy. retirement that we have an excellent team of There is too through these pages an extraordinary managers throughout the business to take James record of long service and loyalty to the company Jones & Sons Ltd forward and build on what their which continues to this day. This applies not just to predecessors have so well achieved. the various branches of my own family but also to I am proud of our company and all its employees numerous other families whose members have and I hope you will enjoy this record of our past. served for several generations and for over 50 years in each one. Many of them are mentioned in these tom a bruce-jones cbe pages and I would like to pay personal tribute to Spring 2005 them and to all our employees past and present whose efforts have allowed James Jones & Sons to be where it is today. Acknowledgements t has been a great pleasure researching and Roderick Jones not only gave me access to the writing the story of James Jones & Sons, thanks to archive of Jones & Campbell but he also very kindly I the friendly and hospitable way in which I have took me to see the Union Inn, Torwood Hall and the been helped by so many people. I shall miss ruins of Dunmore Park. Tom A Bruce-Jones, Roderick travelling the road north to Larbert! Jones and Robin Stevenson were also particularly I have been helped by many people and this book helpful in reviewing the draft text. For the illustra- is theirs as much as mine. I must first recognise my tions in the book, I am grateful to Airlie Bruce-Jones, debt to T D Bruce Jones whose previous history of the Tom Bruce-Jones, Roderick Jones, Michael Leslie, Ian Jones family companies was a fundamental source Pirie, Sandy Hogg senior and Christine Ferguson for for this book. their help. Some of the pictures came from the His- I would like to thank all those who kindly agreed tory Research Centre at Callender House in Falkirk, to be interviewed – Airlie Bruce-Jones, Tom A Bruce- part of the Falkirk Museums service, and I am grate- Jones, Tom R Bruce-Jones, Roderick Jones, T D Bruce ful to the staff at the Centre for the kindly and Jones, Michael Leslie, Jock Armstrong, Eddie Balfour, efficient assistance they gave me. I must also thank Bill Baillie, Christine Ferguson, Sandy Hogg senior, Lesley Masterson whose friendly help did much to Sandy Hogg junior, John Kissock, Bill Nicol, Ian Pirie, ensure things ran smoothly throughout the project. Sandy Mitchell, Jonathan Richie, Willie Smith, Neil Any mistakes which remain can be laid only at my Snedden and Robin Stevenson. door. nigel watson Spring 2005 1 ‘What is thy father going to make of thee, James?’ 1838-1888 ust think how different our lives would be and the coming of the railways, both industries with without wood. In one form or another it sur- apparently insatiable appetites for timber. With one J rounds us, from cricket bats and coffins to walk- or two exceptions, little consideration had ever been ing sticks and window frames, from barrels and given to replanting so Britain now looked overseas, billiard cues to telegraph poles and toothpicks, from initially to the colonies and then closer to home, for fences and flagpoles to jigsaw puzzles and joists. additional supplies of wood. With larger ships Wood is indispensable. The books and newspapers bringing greater loads into British ports, the railways we read, the notebooks and pads on which we transported these imports all over the country at a scribble, none of them could be produced without relatively low cost. Enterprising men opened up as wood. Tyres, textiles and tooth brushes all feature timber importers in the major ports. In Scotland, cellulose made from pulped wood. The best hard- ports on the west and east coasts imported timber wood can be transformed into the finest furniture to from North America, the East and West Indies, grace our homes while softwood has many uses, Russia and Scandinavia. There was good money to be from joinery and construction, including the roof made, often at the expense of the small wood trusses and floor joists in many modern houses, to merchants based in the hinterland. In 1845 one the boxes and pallets used everyday for the delivery survey listed just 80 sawmills in Scotland, supplying of almost anything you can name. local markets with timber for building, fencing, We have always been greedy consumers of wood gates, carts and agricultural implements. The domes- in the UK. Once upon a time, some five thousand or tic industry became the poor cousin in the timber more years ago, two-thirds of the British countryside trade and many estate owners preferred to keep local was covered in a forest so dense, very few flowering timber merchants well away from their woodland, plants could survive beneath it. Yet although the where gamekeepers tended pheasants and herds of population of the British Isles was barely a million at deer. By the end of the nineteenth century as little as the time of the Domesday Book in 1086, the Book’s five per cent of the country’s timber needs came from compilers discovered that just 20 per cent of England British timber. was still wooded. As the population continued to The First World War shattered all complacency grow, as towns were developed and houses built, over the state of the nation’s forests.