Hull Truck Theatre and Hull Maritime have worked in partnership to deliver a community production which retells the story of 15 women in a fish packing factory in Hull who made history. As part of the research for Guts! The Musical, we asked people to share their stories of working in Hull’s fish factories in the 1980s.
Here are some the stories.
What was it like to work in a fish factory in the 80’s? Can you describe your job/jobs?
“I worked at Birds Eye as a student for two summers in the mid-70s but suspect things might not have changed too much! We wore hairnets and hats, massive hard white plastic aprons, big hard plastic gloves and wellies, all white. I was on the lines for fish fingers. There was a massive mincer that minced up the fish and regurgitated it out to a big metal tray divided into two. I was on Moulding. Two lines of women on either side then squashed it down with our hands (first two) then smoothed it down with an iron like implement, (next two) then the metal lid went on at the end and it was sent to the freezer.” – Pat
“I was the one that went to court with the union for equal pay! Working there was fab. My twin sister (Lisa) and I, Cindy, Ken and Duncan (managed by our supervisor Thommo) ran the breading department. We had a ball, always had the radio full fast trying to beat the previous days target, always played the pop quiz in a morning. They were very happy times.” – Heidi
“My father-in-law was a general manager at a fish cake factory on Hessle Road using lugs boiled from fish. I started work there at 16 years old. My mam Maggie was a supervisor. I worked on a line with lots of other girls packing really hot fish cakes that had just come out a fryer which you put on to steel trays to cool. The smell was a mixture of stinking fish to hot frying oil. The vats at the back of the factory were full of boiling fish lugs which once cooked went into a mincer. The smell of fish be it cooked or raw hung in the air and literally got on your skin and your cloths then the grease from working on the frying line clung to your skin but in all that said I loved going to work everyday. The camaraderie of the women and young girls in that factory was amazing.” – Doreen
“You can’t answer the question ‘what was it like’ though without mentioning the smell. Obviously, it hit you at the beginning, but you got used to it. Even after a shower and hair wash though others would wrinkle their noses and say ‘you stink of fish’!” - Pat
Describe a typical day. What sort of things would you do?
“At Birds Eye I was a kind of carrier/gofer/runner/general dogsbody. The women would be Pattie Slapping, that is smoothing off one of the many trays of fish that were coming down the conveyor belt and sort of splitting the fish into fish finger shapes and then they immediately passed them to me to transport onto a barrow ready to be prepared with breadcrumbs and taken to a kiln or large industrial cooker. I had to be very quick as the tray are coming fast and furious.” - John
Was there a social life connected to the factory? Friendships, nights out etc?
“I remember my sister losing her wages on the bandit up the street and everybody had a whip-round to get her wages again! Most generous people in the world I worked with.” – Heidi
“Yes, all the young girls went out on Friday nights because that was pay day you had nothing left by the Monday. You even had to have a tab in the canteen to buy a sandwich pay it off on pay day Friday.” - Doreen
Was there a difference in ‘men’s jobs’ and ‘women’s jobs’ at the time?
“There was no difference in the men’s and women's jobs - we all took a turn in lifting trays of fillets, moving pallets of fish, I remember in the main factory women having to pull round the big trollies of smoked fish in and out of the smokers.” – Lisa
Do you have any favourite memories you could share?
“We once lost all our wages on the slot machines one lunch time and Cindy who was about 21 years at the time gave us a good telling off and organised a whip round and everyone contributed so we could go home and pay our board! Really generous people. A lesson was learned that week not to go on bandits and the guilt from others who didn't have much putting their hand in their pockets to avoid us going home and having to explain how we'd come to lose it!” – Lisa
“In 1976 I had had a perm in the morning to give me the tight curls that were trendy at the time and was very pleased with it. I went in for my 2 o’clock shift and was mortified that my co-workers assumed it had gone wrong and were very kindly giving me advice on how to put it right!” - Pat
Is there anything else you’d like to add?
“Yes, working in that environment at such a young age shaped my whole life as a young girl, daughter, mother, wife. I went on to have my own catering business which was very successful and gave me a great standard of living for me and my family. The basic values of life are always need to build on and my job working there gave me them values.” - Doreen
“In the early eighties in some fish factories a notice was put out asking if young fish house girls would consider work in the fish factories in Iceland as they were short on staff in some of their fish factories. I put my name down, but my Mum refused to allow me to go as I was only sixteen at the time I thought it would be an adventure.” - Doreen
With special thanks to everyone who took the time to share their stories with us.
Book tickets to see Guts! The Musical here.
