My Home During School Holidays

A Memory of Droitwich Spa.

York Jones is the correct spelling i.e. no 'e' on York! In 1955, I was ten years old and would work here during school holidays. My Great Uncle (my Grandmother's brother), was Frank York-Jones, the Managing Director. His son, Alan York-Jones, ran the factory with my father, Dick Sinfield, who was the Finance Director. In this picture, you can see the two brine tanks against the back wall in the background. The brine was cold and would freeze the ice-lolly liquid in the metal moulds. This is where I would stand for ages putting the sticks in the lollies, before they froze completely. Later on we had all this automated.
On the right are two large tanks where the ice cream would be 'cooked'. This was my Uncle Alan York-Jones' job. Once cooked, it would be pumped through to the machine on the left of the picture (there were two of these). The ice cream would be like Mr Whippy's ice cream as it came out, slightly cold but soft enough to guide through a nozzle into large trays on the table shown. These trays would be put into the deep freeze (rear, centre left, of the photo is the door), called a 'hold', at about minus 14 degrees. When frozen, the blocks of ice cream would be taken out, cut into small blocks and put through the choc-ice machine or larger blocks, called bricks, would be packed for people to take home. Happy days!