I began my life in the construction industry with Mary Harrison's as a trainee site engineer working on the Eccup Reservoir and Filtration Works project. Poorly paid at the time (1961) but loved the work and the outdoor life and the experience gained was fantastic.
My father (from Co. Mayo) worked as a dragline driver (Lima excavators) for many years on Harrisons' numerous opencast coal jobs in the Wakefield area and we lived in a house rented from Harrison's in Garnet Terrace, Hunslet. And when we bought our own place in Cross Flatts Grove, our next door neighbour was a Harrison foreman. It was he who created the chance for me. I didn't waste it.
Harrison was the most prominent construction firm in Leeds in those days (Geo Wimpey excepted) - the junction of Boar Lane and Vicar Lane was alive with their trucks and buses collecting workers each morning. Eventually I left Leeds (and, in time UK) and don't know what became of the business. I suspect that they failed to modernise and were swept away in the end. The Taylor Woodrow I was working for by 1967 was a vastly different outfit. But, I'll always have a soft spot for Harrisons - and remember the long winter of 1962-63 when the workforce was laid off and I spent weeks playing chess with Victor Allerton, one of the firm's directors, because there was not much else to do. He won each and every game!
