Betty Winslow of Rosewood Court, Liden, remembers a member of the family more clearly than she recalls the family's Ford motor dealership.

As 14-year-old Betty Randell, who was about to leave Ferndale Road senior school, she wrote to Lilian Preater, one the the firm's directors, for a character reference.

"I think I was going to apply for a job at Comptons, which was a garment factory in Station Road," said Mrs Winslow. "Mrs Preater was then chairman of the North Ward branch of an organisation called the Young Britons, to which I belonged."

Mrs Preater, who lived in a large house in Victoria Road, did her proud. On thick embossed notepaper she wrote: "I have had good opportunities to study her character and I would like to say she has always been conscientious and painstaking in her work and I have every confidence in recommending her."

Betty got the job, but at 17 soon after the 1939-45 war started, she left to join the ATS, one of the women's branches of the Forces.