During the war, the number of workpeople increased from 5200 to a peak figure of 8000 in May 1917, but the old skilled workers nearly disappeared. Women came into the factory in large numbers, growing from 620 to 2500—nearly a third of the employees. They worked on munitions such as 9-2 and 3-3 shells, Hotchkiss fuses Marks III and IV, and magnetos, thus adding machining, inspecting, and varnishing to their normal occupations, and they were also employed for storekeeping, crane-driving, transport and maintenance work. During the same period the Company took the lead in giving women professional engineers opportunities on the same terms as men, the first time that this had been done. A superintendent of women workers, Miss E. E. Wilson, was appointed in May 1916 to deal with women's employment and with canteens, ambulance services and other welfare work; her foresight and organization laid the foundations of the women's employment and canteen departments of today. Much was done to train foremistresses and chargehands, who were often inexperienced, and to support them in their responsible positions.

Typing, though one of the chief staff occupations for women, was by no means reserved to them. When some centralization of typing work began and dictaphones were installed about 1910, the staff of the stenographic department on the fifth floor of the main office block consisted of about twenty typists, men and women; one, Fred Clayton, is still with the Company. The department was then in charge of Everard H. Raby, who was immortalized in an early Club 'panto'. The Girl from Raby's, or the Passing of the Fifth Floor Back. By 1915 the department under the supervision of Mrs. G. Wibberley had trebled its original size, and in 1918 centralization and the use of dictaphones were carried still further. 'Steno' has continued to grow, and today, under Miss E. Taylor who has been in charge since 1929, it operates 60 typewriters and 60 transcribers.

THE HUMAN FACTOR
Relations between the management and their fellow-employees had changed steadily for the better, but during the war there arose a general feeling of unrest in the shops, largely due to the continued ebb and flow of workpeople and the dilution of labour by unskilled men and women. As a result two important steps were taken in 1917, when Mensforth as general works manager instigated the setting up of a 'works committee' and a 'staff committee'.

Tne British Westinghouse works committee, which can claim to have anticipated the Whitley Councils by nine months, was formed in February 1917 with fourteen men to represent various sections of the factory and two for the management.