The early years

CHAPTER ONE

THE EARLY YEARS

Bird Cameron began practice on 27th March, 1922 as The National Service Company. The founder, Edgar Robert Woolcott, later known as “Bill” and in the firm as “ERW” or “the old man”, was born in Sydney on the 30th of December 1887. He was the third child of Thomas and Ruth Woolcott. His father, a draper, was born in Devon UK and his mother was born in Brisbane, Queensland.

The family moved to Western Australia in approximately 1897 and Bill was brought up on a station in the North West, where he learnt a lot of practical skills.

He joined the services at the outbreak of the Great War and spent most of the next four years overseas as a Quartermaster with the Australian Army but before departing from Australia he married Jessie Mauger in 1915. Jessie was born in Jersey in the Channel Islands.

An important requirement of being a Quartermaster is to be good at record-keeping and ERW seems to have excelled at this.

Exhibiting a flair not only for record keeping but also skills in organisation and delegation he devised a recording system so that his deputy could properly maintain the records thus freeing him of the obligation of being present at all times. The installation of an efficient but simple business recording system was to be the principal service offered by the new firm.

The war ended and he was discharged in 1918. He spent a few months in Sydney and then he and Jessie came to Western Australia. He got a job working for a firm called “WA Taxpayers” which involved selling a simple system of books for three guineas ($6.30) cash. He was a natural salesman and was particularly successful in selling the bookkeeping system to farmers and small storekeepers. He covered the state by horse and sulky. A typical day would be: Arrived at 5pm at a farm -milked two cows and killed a sheep - sold a system and stayed the night.

After about three years on the road for WA Taxpayers, at the age of 34, he made the big decision to start out on his own.

He rented a room in the old AMP Chambers on the comer of St Georges Terrace and William Street Perth, formed a partnership with his wife, registered the name “The National Service Company” and commenced operations on Monday, 27th March 1922. The division of work was simple. ERW travelled around the city and country among the clients doing the books and bringing in the fees while Mrs Woolcott attended to the typing and general office work.

The recording system ERW had devised as a Quartermaster during the war was further developed and no doubt the favourable aspects of the WA Taxpayers system were incorporated and there finally emerged the “Business System” of The National Service Company. On the 25th of June 1924 the Commonwealth Registrar of Copyrights registered E.R. Woolcott as the “Owner of the copyright in a literary work viz., a book entitled ‘The National Business Service for Business Men”’. This, together with a type of self-balancing spreadsheet known as the B 10/11 was the mainstay of the firm’s accounting service for small business people and farmers for many years.

While the recording system was the basis of the service, taxation was also important. Note that the occupation of the firm as registered in March, 1922 was “Accountants and Taxation Experts”. As Government expanded so did taxation and increasingly people, whether in business or employed, were being drawn into the taxation net and required the firm to advise on this subject.

Soon there was too much work for Mr. Woolcott to handle on his own and in September, 1925 he engaged Alex Redmond, an accountant, followed in February, 1926 by Percy Paull to assist with the marketing and promotion and in July, 1926 Bill Keene, another accountant. Bill completed forty-one years’ service with the firm, retiring in October 1967.

The year 1927 saw the start of a period of rapid expansion. Percy Paull and Bill Woolcott were bringing in a steady flow of new clients. Accountants Bob Thorn, Percy Johnson and Arthur Greaves were engaged and on the support side, Connie Glasson, the first female staff member, started in February, 1927 as assistant to Mrs. Woolcott followed the same month by Delphi Steadman a senior typist and in March, Belle Edmonds as secretary to Mr. Woolcott.

That year also marked the beginning of a more structured approach to handling the country work. Instead of a party of accountants visiting a specific town or area and then returning to Perth before heading out in another direction a start was made

EDGAR ROBERT WOOLCOTT

E.R. Woolcott was a man of considerable vitality and selling ability and great confidence. In the early days when there was little in the way of reserves, a check on Thursday might reveal there was insufficient in the coffers to pay the mainstay of the firm’s staff on Friday so ERW would go out and sign up a few new clients collecting fees in advance.

He did not excel at financial planning or organisation and administration but he had the ideas and soon gathered around him, in the firm, people who were good at these things.

He was a big man and looked very impressive behind his huge desk in a very large office. Staff never felt very much at ease during interviews especially as he had his secretary sitting in the office with him at her own table.

Two of his great interests in life were motor cars and fishing. He was able to indulge his interest in fishing from his cottage at Whitfords Beach. From time to time he would invite a group of men from the office to spend a weekend with him at Whitfords fishing and swimming and getting the occasional pep talk.

The challenges of a rapidly growing accountancy practice were not enough to fully occupy him and he tried a number of other enterprises. He set up a wholesale grocery business which was reasonably successful. He tried to initiate trade in groceries with Java and Singapore and made a trip to those places in 1931 accompanied by Cyril Bird but the venture was not successful.

In 1932, in association with a mining engineer, he promoted a gold mine but this also was unsuccessful.

After the mining venture he decided to go into the business of debt collecting. The firm had a T model Ford Tourer and ERW would use this vehicle to go around and collect debts. In place of one of the side curtains there was installed a black blind with the words “Debt Collector” on it. When he stopped outside the home or premises of the person owing the money he would pull down the blind to the embarrassment of the debtor who would endeavour to dispose of the matter as quickly as possible to get the Tourer on its way.

He always had five or six men on the staff whose job it was to obtain new clients for the firm (often called “Organisers”). Every Friday’ evening these men would gather in ERW’s office and over whisky and milk discuss their successes and failures of the previous week and be fired up by the old man with the necessary enthusiasm to get out and do better the following week.

on grouping all the clients in a region (or regions) and allocating responsibility to one accountant. The first of these “rounds” as they came to be known, was the Great Southern from Perth to Albany and the wheatbelt east of York to Bruce Rock and south to Narrogin and Bill Keene was given responsibility for this enormous area in 1927.

In May 1928 Reg Parker, who was to complete 50 years’ full and part-time service, joined the firm as also did the firm’s first lady accountant, Alice Morgan. At that time there were about twelve on the staff. Reg became part of a three man team with Alex Redmond and Arthur Greaves which followed in the footsteps of Percy Paull opening up the books for the new clients he had obtained. Along with his skills as a business promoter, Percy was a talented guitarist. On arrival in a country town he would invite farmers and townspeople to attend a musical evening in the hotel. At the end of a happy evening of drinking and singing the names of perhaps a dozen or more people would be added to the client list.

As the 1920’s were drawing to a close expansion continued at a rapid rate. The Wall Street crash of October 1929 would not have any serious effects for a couple of years. Among the accountants recruited in 1929 were Cyril Bird (firstly in an associated trading company), who was to become managing partner, Len Newman, who became his deputy and Len Simmonds who that same year was given responsibility for the second “round” which embraced the clients in Kalgoorlie and those along the Great Eastern Highway and in the wheatbelt towns north of the Highway.

The “team” had begun to form and Mrs Jessie Woolcott was making her contribution. She took a motherly interest in the welfare of the girls who worked for the firm. They were invited in groups to her home on a regular basis and there was a very friendly atmosphere at these evening gatherings.

There is rarely just one element which is responsible for the success or failure of an organisation but there is often a key element and early members of the firm consider that the key element in the success of the firm in those days was E.R. Woolcott’s idea of taking the service to the client instead of asking the client to come to an office in the town or city with his books and other records. Doing the work at the place of business or on the farm, the accountant got to be almost one of the family and this principle (known in the firm as “the feet under the kitchen table concept”) was largely responsible for the continued growth of the practice over many years. SIGNIFICANT EVENTS OF THE 1920’s

1922 Firm commenced on 27th March

1924 Copyright granted for the recording system

1925 First accountant employed

1926

1927 First organiser and second accountant engaged First “round’ established embracing Great Southern and part of wheatbelt. Bill Keene in charge.

1928 First lady accountant employed.

1929 Second “round” established embracing Kalgoorlie, Great Eastern Highway and part of wheatbelt. Len Simmonds in charge. Wall Street crash in October.

LONG SERVING AND SENIOR PERSONNEL ENGAGED 1920’s

Year Name Retired Completed Years

1922 E.R. Woolcott 1952 30

1922 Mrs Jessie Woolcott 1948 26

1925 Alex Redmond 1935 10

1926 Percy Paull 1934 8

1926 Bill Keene 1967 41

1927 Bob Thorn 1932 5

1927 Arthur Greaves 1933 6

1927 Connie Milner (nee Glasson) 1946 18

1927 Delphi Steadman Not Known

1927 Belle Edmonds Not Known

1928 Reg Parker 1969 41

1928 Alice Morgan 1934 6

1929 Cyril Bird 1969 39

1929 Len Newman 1968 38

1929 Len Simmonds 1938 9