Dick Hampton

[duncan]

Hi Martyn and Steve thanks for the advice on posting photo's as you can see I Did it thanks Duncan

[McGrath]

Dig deep for Dick! What a find, nostalgier up to the makers name. I started with Dick in 1962 on the Bellbroughton ByPass driving a 955 traxcavator. Ashton Reece had the shout with Barry Gold as Agent. After that it was Ross on Wye with Harry Wrath, Port Talbot with Chris Chaplin,and Monmouth before ending up in Scotland on the Hamilton Bypass and Glasgow Inner Ring road. I had a couple of years with Shands and Laings before returning to the fold at M5 Cheltenham and finally having the shout at M4 Newbury. In 1972 I left for Nigeria for five years with Stevin the Dutch dredgers. Dicks 'no cabs' police had it criticts, but he maintained that if the weather was bad enough to warrent a cab then it was questionable if you should be working any way.When I see todays ADT locked up in 6x6drive ploughing on untill the site looks like the Somme, I oftent think how right he was. Again Dicks were often called Hamptons School of Motoring, but all jokes a side, just look at the the management of todays top muckshifter and you'll find a good few ex Hampton men. Blackwell comes to mind straight away. Great days Cheers

[Dowsett Boy]

Harry Wrath thats a name from the past he was on the m20 for tarmacs as muck shift agent .
That was 1979 -81 imagine it was his last job he was a good age then.

[McGrath]

THat's right, Harry was origanally with Dowsett on the Opencast before joining Dicks, that last time I saw him was about 1974 when they were doing the muck for Laings on the Morrison Bypass. I believe he joined Barry Gold at Tarmac after Trafalgar House sold Dick to Dick Seymore about 76 or so.

[jcb4cx]

i was once told he had no cabs ,and shortened exhaust's to get under that little railway bridge just down from his yard

[Dowsett Boy]

My late father was on Dowsetts when Harry Wrath was there thats what is so good about this site there is always someone who knows someone.
On Tarmacs was if my memory is correct was a ex Hampton fitter Joe Fitzpatrick who came from the Southampton area.

[duncan]

Hi from OZ photo taken in 2008 of myself Duncan Mcinnes (blondie) Norman Dowding (lofty)and Harold Penn.
Lofty was the Bently workshop foreman,when I was there 62 -65 and told me ( in 2008) that he had gone with the last machine Dick owned and not sold with the rest, of the plant,a 38 RB as the fitter when it was on hire in Germany.
Harold was a mechanic and then a plant inspector, and then was fore man in the work shop when the take over happened.

[McGrath]

Great phito Duncan,but who are those old guys? Other names that come to mind from the Bentley workshop are Basil Gamgee and Bert Parish. There can be little doubt the those workshops were second to none, cerrtainly on a par with Bowmakers or Levertons. Whoops we wern't suppose to mention Levertons,as I remember Dick would not have any dealing with them, so much so, that at M4 Newbury, only a stones through from Levertons Windsor depot, all spares came from Bowmakers at Cannock. Infact Bowmakers had a bonded store with their own guy on site.

[adamec140]

Anyone seen this pic in a previous thread? By far my favourite on this site

[tctractors]

An old Hampon driver I used to be big pals with Nobby Richards, had a mountain of realy top photo's of motorway jobs with Dick, sadly he was pushed out by the ejector (his words for lack of living) as he lived by himself his home was empty even the locals seemed to know nothing about any funeral arangments, even at the local shop and pub I could not find out anything, but 1 photo sticks in my mind with him driving an RD8 and a swarm of stock cars working around him, it was a majic B&W shot of a realy busy site, its my thoughts that all his photos are now in the local waste tip, I would have loved that 1 photo to keep his face in my mind, I still repair George Pardo's D8's and have some great shots of them working, but the Stock Cars have all vanished???.

tctractors