I certainly do not recall giving my parents the amount of grief that modern teenagers do, but that may be through my rose tinted spectacles.
So, on 5 Jan 1957 a month after I turned 16 I started work along with another 5 boys (another one of whom as also named Warwick – so we nicknamed HIM Mickey, I remained Warwick of course).
This required my being in Auckland city ready to start work at 7.30 a.m. each morning This meant catching a bus at 6.20 am – something of a shock to the system as you can imagine.
It will come as no surprise then that I managed to buy my first car (a 1935 Morris 8) within a month of starting work.
Not that I could afford to use it all the time but at least I had it.
Most apprenticeships in those days were 10,000 hours but ours were for 5 Calendar years. I think I can find my Certificate of Completion somewhere if I look hard enough.
This was because of the wonderful trade training scheme we had 'signed up for'.
We were to become Electrical Fitters, which included becoming Registered Electricians – the schedule went something like this
Year 1. Workshop skills, including fitting and turning, welding, all types, riveting etc. We sat exams (City and Guild level), until we passed as competent.
Year 2 Six months on Substation or Power station construction, and the other six months on maintenance and learning how to be an operator. Most of this time I was at
Otahuhu, but also at Penrose and Bombay.
Year 3. We had some months in the Drawing Office, some with Line Gangs (yes I have climbed power pylons) and each of us was also lent out to private contractors to learn the electrical wiring industry.
Part of this required learning to operate a full size corded telephone switchboard another skill to add to the list
Year 4 Included a stint in the Test Laboratory which I really enjoyed.
Year 5 We were allowed (required) to select the area we wanted to specialise in which was to become our life's work.) I picked Test Laboratory and was promptly dispatched to Hamilton District with their myriads of Power Stations and Substations.
I should point out that formal academic training was not ignored either.
We had a 'day release' scheme which sent us to Seddon Memorial Technical College one day a fortnight (8 hrs.) but we had to do the equivalent 4 hrs. per week at night school (in our own time).
This made for quite late arrival home some nights – either by bus or car.
This arrangement was only supposed to apply until all exams had been passed, but as I had passed all mine quite early in the piece the deal (both ways) was then extended for as long as I wished.
I already had my Registered Electrician's and Advanced Trade Cert so I thus carried on to do basic physics and advanced electronics under the scheme.
A very good employer indeed.
One of my night school tutors, Frank. (another Colin Atkinson in fact) also had a couple of other advantages,:
One he lived in Manurewa too and the other he had two teenage daughters!! One of whom (Joy) agreed to become my partner at my 21st birthday party.
It would not be true to say that girls were an 'all encompassing passion', but I can sure relate to American Pie!
I certainly do not intend to regale you with page after page of girls names, but a couple really are worthy of mention.
Beverley used to ride horses at shows and I used to drive her and the horse float on the back of her mother's 1938 Chev all over the north island.
She proved impossible to teach to drive though.
When wanting to slow down or stop she would pull hard back on the steering wheel and shout WHOA – strangely enough it never seemed to work!
Jackie (Jacquline), was and I assume still is, a very clever girl (I attended her wedding years later).
She painted large black and white photos taken by Whites Aviation for whom she worked, turning them into works of art.- I still have one on my wall.
I also got involved with the Pickering girls (Julie and Gay) Gay married my brother Rob a few years later..
I was growing up ! I was not the only one of our group with a car, but one of a reasonably small number that did.
We undertook the usual teenage boys activities, rugby, cricket, tennis, booze and girls !!
Top – Mavis and Boyd Wedding – me third from right. Sue far right. Middle – Jacque's wedding Bottom – Pat my ex wife
Sue At 19, The Kathryn At 12
However, again probably because of my grounding at Southwell, I became very active in the Anglican Church St Luke's Manurewa, sang in the choir, was an altar boy, Secretary of the Server's guild, I also wired St David's church at Wiri etc,
It was not unknown for me to attend 3 services in one day – but I don't think I ever actually took a service while still a teenager though.
Our vicar was Canon Corbin who while he had a somewhat older wife not in the best of health, was, strangely enough a tower of strength to us teenagers.
My sister Sue married her first husband. Ian in St Luke's too some years later in 1971,
My 5th year in Hamilton was a real learning curve.
By then I was 20, boarded with Mrs Kessle in Boundary Rd could walk to work (even though I had a car) and could EVEN come home for lunch!! No more 5.30 rising catching the bus at 6.20.
The experience gained with HTL (Hamilton Test Lab) was absolutely first class.
I was involved with testing and commissioning work at Waipapa Power Station, the #4 machine at Ohakuri, also worked on virtually all the Waikato River stations, Wairakei Geothermal, did testing both High Voltage insulator testing and routine panel instrument testing.
I have worked on all the substations between Kerepehi and Opotiki as I said a really great leaning curve.
I also worked at Meremere, the correct name for which is Mercer Steam Station, the coal for which was transported from the nearby coalfield by overhead conveyors – no wasteful trucking here.
But I must confess to not being all that keen on thermal stations.
With the hydro ones if there was a system disturbance, and provided we had sufficient spinning reserve as we were trained to do, there may be a significant amount of grunting but then the extra load was taken up.
But with a thermal station any disturbance – i.e. outage anywhere on the system it says 'oh dear, I don't want to get involved in this problem' and promptly shuts down – thus adding to what may well be an already precarious situation.
By this time Auntie Bea had married a widower (with 2 children, one of whom was almost exactly the same age as me) and settled in Hamilton too.