 College
and school apprentices were also increasing in numbers. By 1911 two year
courses were being offered to young men of 20 having B.Sc. or equivalent
degrees; they were paid 1s a week for the first year and \0s for the
second. The Company also led the way in taking 'vacation apprentices'
for preliminary workshop training for two months in the summer. At
the beginning of the war the demands of the forces caused a lull,
during which Fleming took the next important step-the coordination
of all apprentice training in a self-contained education department.
RESEARCH
Materials testing under Fleming and R. Johnson had by 1914 reached
a stage where insulation specification and routine test had become
more or less standardized This had been Johnson's side of the work,
and accordingly he transferred to d.c. motor design, leaving the
insulation and magnetic testing sections to be combined as a so-called
'insulation test. Here Fleming installed a 100,000-V testing transformer.
He also took over a small and not very effective chemical laboratory
and extended it to cover mechanical testing.
From
time to time enterprising engineers had carried out investigations
for special purposes in the various works testing departments. The
facilities were rudimentary, and the results (except Miles Walker's)
seldom went beyond the form of private notes. The ineffectiveness
of much of this effort suggested that greater technical advances
could be achieved by systematic investigations made with proper
resources and on a broad basis, even in advance of immediate needs.
By 1910 the first decision had been taken to set up a general research
organization, and at the beginning of 1914 Fleming put forward detailed
proposals. These having been approved in principle by Mensforth
and Lange, he made a personal inspection of research organizations
in America and produced a report, which had a considerable influence
on the formation of industrial research associations in this country.
The
claims of the war delayed matters, but eventually a research department
was constituted with Fleming as manager on October 1, 1917. It had
a three-room headquarters in the main office building, and the chemical
laboratory and insulation test as its main sections. It also absorbed
a small library, from which J. G. Pearce (now director of the British
Cast Iron Association) proceeded to develop a technical intelligence
service, which has grown more and more extensive.
In the
early days the path of research was not easy. Financial resources
were limited and the aims of the work were not always grasped, even
by those who would benefit most. However, the work gradually extended
to conform with the original plan of investigating future possibilities
as well as present needs, and for most of its history the department's
work has covered fundamental research as well as applied research
and raw material control. All three objectives, which are not of
course mutually exclusive, have done their share towards developments
of far-reaching importance to the Company's products.
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