Robert Walker Haulage Ltd: The History of the UK's Largest Fork Truck Transport Company

By Carl Jarman

This book tells the story of Robert Walker Haulage. Established in 1935, Robert Walker never intended to run a haulage business; he initially bought a lorry to carry the produce from his market garden to the local markets. He then branched out into other types of transport work including carrying prisoners of war! Later, his forward thinking sons Brian and Eric saw a niche market in the transport of fork lift trucks and decided to try converting an old R.A.F. trailer into an early fork lift truck carrier. Today the company is in the hands of the third and fourth generations of the family and despite its humble beginnings, it is now the largest fork truck transporter in the UK. The book details the history of the company's success including anecdotes from people that have worked for or with the company over the years. It details how Walkers carried Donald Campbell's Bluebird around on his exhibition tour of 1965 after setting his land speed records between 1955 and 1964, and shows how ERF played a major role in the expansion of the fork truck transport business. Including 229 previously un-printed pictures of the four wheel basic lorries that Robert used in the early days, to the latest vehicles operated by this specialist haulier, this book will be of interest to truck drivers and other transport enthusiasts.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Old Pond Books
• Release date: Aug 5, 2016
• ISBN: 9781910456675

Carl Jarman

Carl Jarman has always had an interest in transport since 'helping out' at a local family coach firm in 1973 at the age of 12. He went on to do a heavy vehicle mechanics course for HGV/PSV, then started driving coaches and trucks. He started his own coach firm in 1986 before moving onto operating lorries. He currently operate 2 lorries on UK haulage working for two different companies. He is a regular contributor to Truck and Driver magazine and the ERF magazine (REVS) and owns a classic 141 Scania which he restored with the help of his son into the colours of Astran, the famous Middle East haulier

Book preview

1

A Tall Story

RING, RING, RING, RING.

‘Morning, Robert Walker’s’.

Brian Walker answers the phone again. Is it a customer confirming a job? Or an enquiry for a job? Maybe a driver wanting his next load, or at worst a driver with a problem.

‘Hello, I wonder if you can help us?’ says the voice on the other end of the line.

‘I’m a zoo keeper at BelleVue Zoo, I’ve looked in the phone book and see you are a local transport firm who specialize in moving abnormal loads’.

‘Yes’, says Brian; they must need a large cage or something similar moving, he thinks quickly.

‘What would you like us to help you with?’

The zoo keeper replies, hesitantly.

‘We have a giraffe to move’.

Brian looks around the office. Is anyone looking at him and laughing? Is it a wind-up? It’s not April Fool’s Day, is it? No.

‘A giraffe, you’re joking’, says Brian.

‘No sir, we have a giraffe that we need to move from here at BelleVue to Whipsnade Zoo.’

Now Brian would not claim to be an expert on animals but he was aware that giraffes were very elegant creatures and very tall. Could one travel by road? He thinks.

‘Is it a baby one?’ he asks.

‘No sir, it’s fully grown, standing at 17 foot tall’, says the keeper.

Brian takes another cursory glance around the office; no one is sniggering or laughing at him. He jots the details down on his notepad. On our 2-foot bed trailer that would be travelling at 19 feet high, too tall for normal operations.

Is it a wind-up? It’s not April Fool’s Day, is it?

‘Er, will it be lying down?’ he asks.

‘Oh no sir, stood up’.

‘What! Just stood on the trailer?’

‘No sir, we will provide a sort of packing case for it to stand in which we will pack with straw to make it comfortable. There will be no lid so the giraffe’s neck and head can stick out of the top’.

‘Ok’, says Brian, ‘and how do you plan to get this . . . case, with a giraffe inside, onto our trailer?’, he asks inquisitively, but not being rude.

‘We think a crane can lift it onto your trailer’.

‘Well, if you are happy with that we can help to organize it, but you are aware that we will be travelling at an overall height of 19 feet’.

Travelling at height was not a problem for Brian, he had planned plenty of jobs with height restrictions, contacting the telephone people to get the lines lifted, and the same with local authorities regarding existing tram or trolleybus wires and overhanging trees.

‘We would have to plan a route for you avoiding all low fixed obstacles and bridges,’ he says to the keeper.

I will travel with the giraffe and will have a box of apples

‘No sir’, says the keeper, ‘I will travel with the giraffe and will have a box of apples. I will tie a rope round its neck, and when we come to anything low, I offer it an apple and hold down its neck as it bends down to take the apple, and under the low obstacle we go. We will only be going slowly so this should work’.

‘Oh right’, says Brian, thinking to himself, ‘this has got to be a bloody wind-up!’

The job was taken on, and completed without incident although sadly, the giraffe died shortly after, but as Peter Walker said, ‘we got the delivery note signed, Received in good condition.’

Although Walker’s would not be moving giraffes every day, this was typical of the type of enquiries they would get whilst involved in abnormal load transport. The type of work they took on always required their professional attention and that was always guaranteed, as you will see in this book.

illustration

Sadly no photographs were taken of the giraffe being transported. This drawing by my dad illustrates the way the animal was carried and the difficulties faced when coming across low obstacles!

2

The Beginning

THE AREA OF BAGULEY IS LOCATED IN WYTHENSHAWE, which itself is 7 miles to the south of the City of Manchester. Back in the 1930s Baguley was fairly rural, in fact it gets its name from the old English words ‘bagga’, meaning badger and ‘leah’ meaning wood, thus Baguley means ‘Badgers Wood’. This in itself suggests there were a lot of woods and fields in the area. Back in the 1930s a lot of people had small plots of land on which to grow produce, many of course would be doing this to support their own families, by selling to local markets to provide an income.

Baguley was perfect for this – plenty of land to grow on, and the markets of Manchester to sell to.

Robert Walker was one of many people who took up this line of business. He was very successful and was growing enough to sell to the Manchester markets. To get his produce to these markets he purchased his first lorry, a small Chevrolet. Seeing his purchase a neighbour asked if he, Mr Walker, would also take his produce. Mr Walker agreed, for a ‘small’ fee of course. It was 1935 and this was undoubtedly the birth of Robert Walker Haulage.

Word soon got around that Mr Walker had a lorry, and it wasn’t long before the little Chevrolet was full of produce from market gardeners around Wythenshawe, as it headed off on its regular run to Manchester.

It was 1935 and this was undoubtedly the birth of Robert Walker Haulage.

By the outbreak of World War II the fleet had been expanded to three vehicles with the addition of two Bedfords.

During the war the market garden business was kept busy as obviously there was a need for locally grown produce. Prisoners of war were being ‘kept’ at camps in nearby Dunham Massey and Carrington; these men were used to help out on the land and also to clear up after bombing raids. Transporting these men from the camps to the areas where they were required to work became a nice little job for Mr Walker’s lorries. He would go to the camps each morning, collect the prisoners under armed guard and take them to where they were needed, and of course take them back to the camps at the end of the day.

By the early 1940s tipper trucks, approximately ten small 4 × 2 Austins, were added to the fleet. These were ideal for carrying the prisoners of war in! And then during the day, for moving the rubble from the numerous bomb sites that were being cleared. Oh, and just to make full use of the vehicles, they were used at night, after a quick brush-out, to take newspapers from the print works to the railway stations for onward distribution throughout the country.

After the war there was of course a massive clearing-up operation and re-building programme throughout Manchester. Robert Walker was in a perfect position to be included in this. His fleet continued to expand, now adding ex-army Bedfords to the fleet, most of which were converted to tippers by the Walker men. The vehicles were involved in the clear-up operation, one minute carrying rubble, the next carrying new products for the re-building programmes. Sand and bagged cement were regular loads.

Sand and bagged cement were regular loads.

The amount of work available, mostly through Manchester Corporation, allowed for the tipper fleet to expand to 43 vehicles all working in tough, arduous conditions.

During the late 1940s Walker’s was somewhat restricted by the number of licences it could get. More details about the licensing restrictions can be found in Chapter 4 but basically they could only operate in a 25-mile radius of their base.

There was of course plenty of work after the war, and this restriction was a problem, although a way round it was to buy plant, i.e. diggers, cranes, bulldozers, shovels, etc. and hire them out. There was plenty of work for them and no restrictions on licences to carry your own equipment, so this is what they did. The building of the 11-square mile Wythenshawe housing estate was a massive undertaking overseen by the City of Manchester; it started back in the 1920s and brought in plenty of work for Walker’s with its tippers and plant equipment. Walker’s worked for Turner, a company tasked with building the road network throughout the estate, as well as Manchester Corporation.

Robert’s sons, Brian and Eric were both involved in the company from an early age, in fact the family paid for Eric to leave school at 14 years of age! Brian stayed at school until 16. Both lads worked full time for the family firm until they were called to do National Service; both served in the RAF. Brian was to work as a mechanic on the lorry fleet both in the UK and some European bases, whilst Eric drove the trucks, delivering and collecting aircraft parts throughout the UK.

After completing National Service they both returned to the family firm; this would be around 1953. The market garden was compulsorily purchased as