Pipiwharauroa It Must Be Watties
Page 5
It Must Be Watties
Wattie’s was started off by Sir James (Jim) Wattie and friend Harold Carr in Hawke’s Bay in 1934 and extended operations to Gisborne in 1952 seeing our region as the best corn-growing land in New Zealand. The factory here was built virtually overnight from scratch. Wattie’s Sir James Wattie became the world’s biggest frozen food manufacturer outside the USA and, soon after, began catching, processing and canning fish. Concerned with the amount of waste this industry generated Wattie’s pet food brands ‘Felix’ and ‘Fido’ to use what had once been waste, another New Zealand first. In 1958, Wattie’s started production of its own lines of baby food. In 1980, Goodman Fielder and Wattie Industries purchased shares in each other’s companies and merged together in 1987 to create Goodman Fielder Wattie Ltd. In October 1992, the H.J. Heinz Company purchased Wattie’s from Goodman Fielder and invested $100 million in upgrading the factories in Hawke’s Bay to meet the quality and price demands of international food markets. Unfortunately the downside for Gisborne was the closure of the operations here. Talking with past employees affected by the closure there was not so much anger at the decision but devastation with what was the end of an era for them and their whānau. For years Watties had provided them with safe and secure employment paying sufficient wages for them to buy their own homes and job opportunities for their whānau. Most of all it provided whanaungatanga and companionship for so many. This month past employees held a great reunion dinner at the RSA with over 250 people attending and hope to make this an annual event. If you want to be kept updated with developments contact Blanche Walker on 06 8685044 or 0273619201.
On the production line
The pea line
from the cafeteria. Mary gathered the leftovers from the food lines, took them home and cooked delicious dishes that she brought back the next day to share. She also baked scrumptious crackles with honey and peanuts. Fong cleaned the yards and could not speak English but he was taught by the staff to swear properly and learnt some Māori words as well. Bella Cleaver was hard case. One day her husband, Sid Cleaver had a big parcel delivered to him in the factory. Everyone stopped to look then out popped his wife wishing him a happy birthday. His reaction is not suitable for publication.
Cats and Rats There were heaps of cats around the factory, one of the guys in labelling fed them every day even coming in over the weekends and holidays. Whenever he appeared all these cats just materialised from all over the place. One of the cats became unwell so he took it to the factory nurse who successfully treated it. He was nicknamed the Pied Piper. When a law came in banning cats from food places, including factories and shops, the cats were collected and boxed for removal but for every one that was removed another appeared to take its place. Story went that there was a white freezer rat called Baldy. Apparently he got his name from snuggling up to the freezer lights for warmth which burnt his hair off leaving him with large bald patches. Staff would go looking for Baldy in the freezers with BB guns but no one knew what happened to him in the end. The rat man was responsible for setting the rat traps, they were big and the ones that lived in the freezers were really furry no doubt because they lived in such cold conditions. There were heaps of rats, when a forklift lifted a pallet they would scuttle everywhere and you could see where they had chewed their way through the packaging.
A group photo taken of some of the workers on their last day at Watties
The Characters A homeless fellow by the name of Raymond used to sleep all over the place. You’d walk through the corn line or one of the sheds and there he was parked up for the night sleeping on a pile of folded cartons. That was if he was not down in the skip bins at Bulmer Harvest located alongside the Wattie’s factory. He climbed into the bins, gathered up the discarded plastic bottles of cider and drank the dregs. There I would find him having a grand old party singing away all by himself in the middle of the night but he was harmless. A couple of Chinese ladies worked there for years, Mary Foot (Waewae) and Lee, Lee used to ride to work on a little three wheeler tricycle. They were both very careful with their money never buying anything
Ghosts
Everyone was uncle or auntie to the younger workers who installing good work ethics among the younger generation particularly if, as was frequently the case, they had got them the job. Watties was very family orientated with members of up to three to four generations working throughout the operations. Anyone who did not get on with the others could only blame themselves.
The Cafeteria The cafeteria was amazing, Ces Mulligan was the chef. Breakfast was delicious, we had sausages, bacon, baked beans, eggs you name it. There were also the pie men, one of them was Ray Harries. They started at 2 or 3 am in the morning making fresh pies every day and then there were those fabulous date scones. The cost of the food from the cafeteria was very reasonable, I used to buy pies as a treat for my kid’s lunches. Everything going south was sent by rail. There must have been about 20 wagons carrying cans and frozen foods in the refrigerated ones going out each day. Trucking firms took the products north and then started to undercut the railways to freight the products south.
Health and Safety Some of the cleaners had a pretty dangerous job cleaning the machinery and there were some horrific accidents with people losing limbs cleaning or working on the lines. The retort boys had a hard job, they stacked the cans full of produce into crates piled on top of each other then pushed them into the retort to be cooked. It was also a very noisy place to work in. Standards of hygiene were very high, you were provided with green or white uniforms depending on where you worked. We all had to wear gloves and turbans, we had white ones and the leading hands wore pink ones. The quality controllers were strict.
I never saw a ghost but many said they did, usually workers who had passed on. They said there were a few ghosts around including in the ladies changing room but that was probably just a ploy to keep the women from spending too much time in there.
Whānau Like many at Watties I got my job through a whānau member, in my case it was my mum Waka. I was only 15 and started off on the Tuna Line in the fish house which ran 24 hours a day, it was fun to start with, I loved it except for Friday and Saturday nights as I wanted to go out but that was my shift. Wasn’t long though and I was transferred to another department that didn’t interfere so much with my social life.
Lovie and Tom Morgan at the final Watties staff party held in their shed