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Rowntrees girls picking gum, c1900
© Borthwick Institute
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“Very strict but very good …”: Women’s memories of rules and regulations at the Rowntree factory, York |
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“She was bloomin’ Queen o’ Sheba” (Gladys): tensions with immediate supervision
Bagging machine, 1929
© Borthwick Institute |
The existence of jobs for women above the level of operative at Rowntrees may have been a relatively advanced policy but it was also a point of tension amongst the women. The relationship with authority, particularly female authority, was highly complicated. Women’s memories of their immediate superiors show signs of the tension between their preferred view of Rowntrees as a good and fair firm and their negative experiences of authority. Many of the women I spoke to had fond memories of those in charge:
“Miss O…She was lovely…used to talk to you in a nice way…talked more or less in our language.” (Margaret)
Amy remembered those in charge as strict but fair:
“they used to say, ‘not you laughing again.’ ‘Cos we always used to be sat laughing. But yet, that same person…when my uncle died…she saw how upset I was…she sent me home…she were very nice really.”
These individual kindnesses, whilst they could certainly be interpreted as resulting from the personality of the person in question, were interpreted by the women as indicative of Rowntrees as a whole and reinforced loyalty to the firm.
Authority was mediated through the language of human relations. Indeed, this was likely to be a consequence, at least in part, of the discourse of the “human factor” so important to the Rowntrees’ business ideology. Where human contact was diminished, women felt resentment at being subjected to the will and gaze of their superiors. Thus, the practice of an overlooker sitting high on a chair in the centre of the room, watching over everything that went on, was critiqued by several women:
“She was bloomin’ Queen o’ Sheeba sat up there. She used to have her seat risen up so she could see everybody.” (Gladys)
Despite such feelings, women continued to stress to me their love of their job:
“you used to think, ‘God she’s watching me.’…So you used to talk with your head down and try and do as fast as you could – but it was all good fun.” (Mavis)
As with so many aspects of women’s memories of the Rowntree factory, there is ambiguity surrounding women’s assertion of company loyalty; they must negotiate with both positive and negative experiences of employment and a sense of duty to Rowntrees as former employees and York residents. In the end, most women prefer to emphasise the positive aspects of working at Rowntrees and are proud of the firm as one of the most important and successful industries in York.
This article is based on the oral histories of 13 women who worked at the Rowntree factory between 1930 and 1988. To learn more about them and their working lives, please visit .
Words: Emma Robertson
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