RAILWAY RETIREMENT

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 71, 17 December 1930, Page 10

RAILWAY RETIREMENT

Chief Loco. Draughtsman MR. E. A. COPLEY Mr. E. A. Copley, chief draughtsman of the locomotive branch, who is retiring on superannuation, was farwelled on Saturday afternoon by representatives of the Chief Mechanical Engineers’ Department of the New Zealand Railways and of the Hutt Valley Workshops, who presented him with a silver tea service. Mr. E. T. Spidey, general superintendent of the workshops, in making the presentation, said that he did not know another man in the service who had given of his best to a greater extent than Mr. Copley. He trusted that Mr. Copley would long enjoy his period of superannuation. Other members of the staff who expressed appreciation of Mr. Copley’s cheery disposition, his helpful attitude toward others in their work, and his great value to the department in the work of the drawing office, were the assistant chief mechanical engineer (Mr. T. R. Angus), the workshops manager m the Hutt Valley (Mr. A. P. Walworth), and Messrs. R. J. G. Gard, H. F. Jenkinson, N. Ewart and G. R. Wilson. Mr. Copley said that the large attendance at the gathering spoke well tor the co-ordiiiation between the head office, drawing office, and workshops. During the forty years he had been in the service he had worked at times under unusual circumstances, referring to the demand made in 1924 for the equipmem of eight cars with sleeping accommodation for the “Limited” express in eight days. This had been possible by the splendid co-operation of the workshops Within a quarter of an hour after he bad visited the shops, after drawing up the plans, the work was actually started. The friends he had made in the railway service were the best. As far as he was concerned, he had foufid his job the most interesting thing in life, and now, though he felt that he was far from past work, he, like others, would find it difficult to know what to do with himself. Mr. Copley joined the sen-ice on No vember 10, 1890, and has been senior draughtsman in the mechanical engmeer’s office since April, 1928.