Born and Bred

Frank's Story

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In his younger days Frank was an excellent footballer and played for several of the well known local teams. He also had trials for Leeds United and Leicester City.

As well as being an excellent footballer, Frank was also a good cricket player. He played for his works team, Oxley Engineering, and later on also played for and captained Rothwell Cricket team for many years.

During the Second World War Frank was in a reserved occupation working at Oxley Engineering Co. Ltd. in Leeds. Whilst there he worked on the building of tanks and also on the Mulberry harbour which was successfully used in the D-Day landings on the French Coast in 1944.

Oxley Engineering, was one of the many firms given the task of constructing these huge floating harbours. As a result Frank soon found himself working on the flexible steel roadways (code-named Whales) that floated on steel or concrete pontoons (called Beetles).

Codenamed 'Mulberries', these harbours would eventually consist of two breakwaters - offshore and flanking - made from hollow, ferro-concrete caissons called 'Phoenixes'. These massive prefabricated components would be towed by tugs across the Channel from England and, once laid end to end to form the breakwaters, would be sunk. Within each of the protected areas of the two harbours would be three floating piers, connected to the shore by floating steel roadways. Each Mulberry would be supplemented by 70 blockships.

Frank had been involved in local politics since just after the end of the Second World War. Whilst they had been living at Robin Hood, he had helped form the local Labour Party, eventually becoming its chairman.

In 1965 he was asked to become the treasurer of the Normanton Divisional Labour Party, a post which he held with distinction for over twenty years until he finally retired from local politics.

However, the most important event in his political life happened in 1971 when he was elected to represent the North Ward on Rothwell Council.

He also served on the Rothwell Road Safety Committee as its chairman for many years and his smiling face became familiar to many school children in the district when visiting the local schools to present Road Safety Awards, including myself when I came in the top 25 entrants for cycling proficiency awards for the entire Leeds area in 1976.