Although she never got her hands in clay or held a decorator’s brush, Frances Donnell was a much-respected figure at George Wade and Son. In a career lasting 25 years, she rose from office junior to company secretary at the Manchester Pottery, Burslem. Frances worked closely with Sir George Wade and his son, Tony, and remembers them both as wonderful bosses. Now 77, she has lived for some years in Shrewsbury.

It was my good fortune to know three generations of the Wades because I started in 1934 when the founder, George Wade senior, was still going into the works. I remember him as a very big man, perhaps because I was a little girl who’d just started work in the office and was frightened to death. When I think of him in his black homburg, he reminds me of Orson Welles.

Mr Wade stood over me while I was typing and I was so nervous that I spelled the word ceiling with an s instead of a c. He corrected me gently. Like his son and grandson, he was a really lovely man. Unlike most of the people who worked at George Wade, I wasn’t a person with Potteries roots. In fact, I was born in France in 1920 as my father was stationed there in the army of occupation.

A few years later, my father’s work as a civil servant brought him to Burslem. I went to Summerbank School at Tunstall and joined Wades at 14 as a general runabout in the office. I was Frances Gladdy then. At first, I didn’t like it at all. The language used by some of the women was even worse than that used by the men. It was a shock for a young girl just out of school.

However, I think it helped to complete my education. It soon became obvious to me that these rough and ready ladies had hearts of gold. But, my word, you couldn’t afford to be hoity-toity in their company. You’d very quickly be cut down to size.

I also learned that they were happy in their work, or seemed to be. The radio programme Music While You Work came over the speakers and the pressers and the fettlers sang at the top of their voices.

At our works we made electrical porcelain products for people like GEC and Siemens. We also introduced figurines, many of them designed by an arty but talented lady named Jessie Hallen.

Much later, Jessie was involved in the design of the Wade Whimsies, which sold in tens of thousands. I saw some of the Whimsies in a Shrewsbury antique shop recently. They were priced at £40 apiece!

Wades had a book of rules which quoted the company’s firm conviction that efficiency and happiness went hand in hand. So the happy atmosphere was partly the management’s own creation.

Looking at this little book now reminds me how differently we looked at things in the 1930s. For example, it sets out the rules on holidays with pay. For one week off, men got 15 shillings and women 10 shillings.

There was another rule about gambling on the premises and general advice about keeping ourselves clean. Personal cleanliness and a neat appearance, it said, were highly appreciated by fellow workers.

Another memory of my early life at Wades is of the mess room, where a lady was ready to cook for us. Everybody’s favourite seemed to be a boiled egg. You had to be sure to write your name on your egg because they all went into the same pot.

There was a pub called the Foaming Quart just round the corner. We girls went there for a drink and a giggle. By the way, the Christmas parties at Wades were out of this world.

It was the sort of factory where many people seemed to be relations. The forewomen all had sons or daughters working there. And this family atmosphere applied to the bosses as well.

All Colonel Wade’s three children took part in running the firm. Tony was joint managing director with his father, Iris ran the factory in Northern Ireland with her husband, and Cynthia was in charge at Burslem while Colonel Wade and Tony were away during the war.

I was away myself for a couple of years during the war, working for the American Army on signals at Cheltenham and later at a base underneath Selfridge’s Store in Oxford Street.

On one occasion Colonel Wade took me and another girl to the factory at Portadown in Northern Ireland. We went in a chauffeur-driven car to Liverpool, but unfortunately on the boat to Belfast both of us were terribly seasick.

In his office Colonel Wade kept a silver box containing black Russian cigarettes. In those days I smoked myself and he offered me one to try. It nearly killed me!

I remember him as a marvellous boss. He always had time to talk to his employees and help them with personal problems. Indeed, he was a father-figure to all of us.

Tony was a different character, but also a pleasure to work for. He was a jolly chap who enjoyed playing the clown occasionally. I was very upset to hear some years ago that Tony had died at 63.

I always felt that the Wade family regarded a happy workforce as being just as important as making money. If we were happy in our jobs, so were the management, including the works manager, George Brett, another lovely man.

Colonel Wade was much more than a potter, of course. When he was made Sir George, we felt that he richly deserved it. Not everyone who gets such an honour deserves it, but he did.