Phillips, Map Makers

A Memory of North Acton.

Does anyone remember Phillips, the map makers on Victoria Road? The building seems to be being used by a company called BraiForm these days. I worked at Phillips for a brief six months on first leaving school in 1964. I worked in the office off the lithographic area and worked on a light table using Indian ink and old fashioned steel nib pens to outline the little boxes that would eventually be where road numbers would be printed! Very boring, hence my short stay there. My work colleagues were mainly elderly women, probably in their 50s to my 16, and a couple of younger girls, Barbara Garnham and a girl called Frankie ? Crawford. Whatever happened to them? I remember a chap called John Long who worked in the lithographic area, the external wooden canteen, the way the road flooded where it went under the nearby railway bridge when it rained hard. I remember having to clock in and out, and the very distinctive smell of paper and ink in the main body of the place as you walked through to the office where I worked. I lived in Hounslow and caught the train at Hounslow West, and after a couple of changes got off the train at North Acton and walked up Victoria Road. That must have been a bit of a trek every day but I don't now remember the details of my journey. If anyone else worked at Phillips would like to hear your memories.