BCD Mtg Jun23 Wild Card Chad Valley 200pc Ketton Portland Cement Co Rutland S&T Phil S adj DSC03859
An unusual Chad Valley 200pc promotional jigsaw, made from hardboard/fibreboard. Phil thinks that it was made at the start of WWII, c1939, hence its plain unprinted red box. It commemorates Ketton Portland Cement Co, Rutland. The cutaway schematic image is very amusing, showing all kinds of supposed factory scenes from the quarrying, crushing, coking, testing, packaging and selling of the product. It is packed full of likely and unlikely characters, in a sort of Walter Mitty fantastical view of factory life.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketton_Cement_Works
Ketton Cement works can trace its history back to Frank Walker, a Sheffield builder, who was looking to establish a works for sectional buildings and cement products. In 1921, he bought 1174 acres of Ketton parish, most of which consisted of old quarries and clay pits. In 1925, Walker established a small concrete block factory company under the name "Walkers Ketton Stone Company", and by 1927 was looking to raise the capital for a cement works. The project was taken up by Sheffield businessman Joseph Ward, the brother of Thomas William Ward and chairman of the business which also had interests in machinery, scrap metal, fuel and ship breaking. For most of its history, Ketton Cement was treated as a subsidiary of Thos. W. Ward.
Frank Walker sold his block business to the newly formed The Ketton Portland Cement Company in July 1928, followed by his land at Ketton in August. Work began on the cement works on 1 August 1928, with much of the machinery and railway equipment coming from Ward's. The first full weekly wage-bill of £202.2.11 was paid on the week ending 10 August 1928 for about 90 men. By the week ending 8 November, the wage bill had risen to over £600 for around 250 men and boys, which were at work on the site.
The works was built with just one kiln but in 1933 Kiln Two was added. Kiln Three soon followed in 1939. A major part of the construction of Kiln Three was its new chimney built out of reinforced concrete, as opposed to brick. The chimney stood at an impressive 338 feet (103 m) high and was the tallest structure in the south of England, visible for as far as 50 miles away. The rapid growth of the plant was in line with a rise of cement prices towards the end of the late 1930s. By 1939, production had increased from 50,000 tonnes in 1930 to well over 200,000 tonnes. During the Second World War, the demand for cement increased hugely due to the construction of military bases and defences, but, as with most industry at the time, Ketton Cement suffered hugely from labour shortages due to the call up of most able-bodied men.
Later history:
As production increased, the transport of limestone and silica clay from the quarry to the plant needed to become more efficient. The standard gauge railway that had operated since the opening of the factory was replaced initially by dump-trucks, before being superseded by conveyor belts. New, larger crushers were installed in the quarry to reduce the size of the limestone before mixing with the clay. Kiln 7 was completed in 1975 at a cost of £10m. This kiln produced clinker by the dry process, as opposed to Kilns 1 – 6 which heated the crushed lime and clay as a slurry mixture. Dry process kilns were much more efficient as there was no water to evaporate first. By the late 1970s, Ketton was producing around 700,000 tonnes of cement per annum from all seven kilns.
In the early 1980s, Thos. W. Ward became part of worldwide group Rio Tinto Zinc, and Ketton Cement was rebranded as Castle Cement. With an increasing market share, Kiln 8 was designed and built in the mid 1980s. At a cost of £70m, the kiln is 68m long and the preheater tower is around 80m high. Two large stores with capacity of 43,000 and 10,000 tonnes each were constructed to enable storage of raw materials to feed the kilns. This enabled working hours in the quarry to be reduced to a five-day week, mostly to reduce disruption on the local community. Kilns 1 – 4 were closed in 1986, followed by Kilns 5 & 6 in 1987. These have now been demolished and the area where they stood now grassed over. The workforce at Ketton was reduced from around 520 to 310 mostly through compulsory redundancies. In 1989, Castle Cement passed into the ownership of Scancem, which was a cement and building materials manufacturer operating across Europe and Africa.
Hanson Cement have invested heavily in the delivery fleet at Ketton works including new Euro 6 tractor units and bulk tankers
Scancem was bought by Heidelberg Cement in 1999 and the Castle Cement logo was adjusted to incorporate the name of its new parent company. In 2007, Hanson Plc (formally ARC) was bought by Heidelberg[1] and two years later Castle Cement was merged with Civil & Marine to form Hanson Cement. The distinctive Castle logo was replaced by the Hanson "H" logo though the Castle "Turret" was retained on packaging due to the strength of customer loyalty. The economic downturn hit Ketton hard, and with a reduction in the output of cement, Kiln 7 was mothballed in September 2008 with no prospect of restarting in the near future. Following a shake-up and cost-cutting exercise in 2012, many office functions including planning and distribution for the prepacked aggregates business were moved to Ketton. This includes logistics for bagging plants such as Needingworth and Nuneaton.
BCD Mtg Jun23 Wild Card Chad Valley 200pc Ketton Portland Cement Co Rutland S&T Phil S adj DSC03859
An unusual Chad Valley 200pc promotional jigsaw, made from hardboard/fibreboard. Phil thinks that it was made at the start of WWII, c1939, hence its plain unprinted red box. It commemorates Ketton Portland Cement Co, Rutland. The cutaway schematic image is very amusing, showing all kinds of supposed factory scenes from the quarrying, crushing, coking, testing, packaging and selling of the product. It is packed full of likely and unlikely characters, in a sort of Walter Mitty fantastical view of factory life.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketton_Cement_Works
Ketton Cement works can trace its history back to Frank Walker, a Sheffield builder, who was looking to establish a works for sectional buildings and cement products. In 1921, he bought 1174 acres of Ketton parish, most of which consisted of old quarries and clay pits. In 1925, Walker established a small concrete block factory company under the name "Walkers Ketton Stone Company", and by 1927 was looking to raise the capital for a cement works. The project was taken up by Sheffield businessman Joseph Ward, the brother of Thomas William Ward and chairman of the business which also had interests in machinery, scrap metal, fuel and ship breaking. For most of its history, Ketton Cement was treated as a subsidiary of Thos. W. Ward.
Frank Walker sold his block business to the newly formed The Ketton Portland Cement Company in July 1928, followed by his land at Ketton in August. Work began on the cement works on 1 August 1928, with much of the machinery and railway equipment coming from Ward's. The first full weekly wage-bill of £202.2.11 was paid on the week ending 10 August 1928 for about 90 men. By the week ending 8 November, the wage bill had risen to over £600 for around 250 men and boys, which were at work on the site.
The works was built with just one kiln but in 1933 Kiln Two was added. Kiln Three soon followed in 1939. A major part of the construction of Kiln Three was its new chimney built out of reinforced concrete, as opposed to brick. The chimney stood at an impressive 338 feet (103 m) high and was the tallest structure in the south of England, visible for as far as 50 miles away. The rapid growth of the plant was in line with a rise of cement prices towards the end of the late 1930s. By 1939, production had increased from 50,000 tonnes in 1930 to well over 200,000 tonnes. During the Second World War, the demand for cement increased hugely due to the construction of military bases and defences, but, as with most industry at the time, Ketton Cement suffered hugely from labour shortages due to the call up of most able-bodied men.
Later history:
As production increased, the transport of limestone and silica clay from the quarry to the plant needed to become more efficient. The standard gauge railway that had operated since the opening of the factory was replaced initially by dump-trucks, before being superseded by conveyor belts. New, larger crushers were installed in the quarry to reduce the size of the limestone before mixing with the clay. Kiln 7 was completed in 1975 at a cost of £10m. This kiln produced clinker by the dry process, as opposed to Kilns 1 – 6 which heated the crushed lime and clay as a slurry mixture. Dry process kilns were much more efficient as there was no water to evaporate first. By the late 1970s, Ketton was producing around 700,000 tonnes of cement per annum from all seven kilns.
In the early 1980s, Thos. W. Ward became part of worldwide group Rio Tinto Zinc, and Ketton Cement was rebranded as Castle Cement. With an increasing market share, Kiln 8 was designed and built in the mid 1980s. At a cost of £70m, the kiln is 68m long and the preheater tower is around 80m high. Two large stores with capacity of 43,000 and 10,000 tonnes each were constructed to enable storage of raw materials to feed the kilns. This enabled working hours in the quarry to be reduced to a five-day week, mostly to reduce disruption on the local community. Kilns 1 – 4 were closed in 1986, followed by Kilns 5 & 6 in 1987. These have now been demolished and the area where they stood now grassed over. The workforce at Ketton was reduced from around 520 to 310 mostly through compulsory redundancies. In 1989, Castle Cement passed into the ownership of Scancem, which was a cement and building materials manufacturer operating across Europe and Africa.
Hanson Cement have invested heavily in the delivery fleet at Ketton works including new Euro 6 tractor units and bulk tankers
Scancem was bought by Heidelberg Cement in 1999 and the Castle Cement logo was adjusted to incorporate the name of its new parent company. In 2007, Hanson Plc (formally ARC) was bought by Heidelberg[1] and two years later Castle Cement was merged with Civil & Marine to form Hanson Cement. The distinctive Castle logo was replaced by the Hanson "H" logo though the Castle "Turret" was retained on packaging due to the strength of customer loyalty. The economic downturn hit Ketton hard, and with a reduction in the output of cement, Kiln 7 was mothballed in September 2008 with no prospect of restarting in the near future. Following a shake-up and cost-cutting exercise in 2012, many office functions including planning and distribution for the prepacked aggregates business were moved to Ketton. This includes logistics for bagging plants such as Needingworth and Nuneaton.