The Long Shop and The Hold

A huge thank you to all the staff at The Hold in Ipswich, for making us so welcome yesterday; the visit was a huge success and the air conditioning particularly welcome, as temperatures outside steadily rose.

We were visiting with a group of volunteers and staff from the Long Shop Museum in Leiston; although the Long Shop has its own archive, it is small in comparison with the documents stored at the Hold, and this was an opportunity for us to explore just a few of them at first hand.

The ‘Long Shop’ itself was the world’s first purpose built workshop for assembly line production. It was staffed by engineers and craftsmen who designed and built ploughs, steam engines, peat harvesters, threshing machines, trolley buses and even washing machines.

And whilst the volunteers pored over details of wages, sales and intricate design patterns, I went in search of connections between the Garretts of Leiston and football, in preparation for our next Extra Time season which kicks off in Leiston in September.