Up Periscope!
Emma Haxhaj is a PHD researcher studying the development of Chatham Dockyard. She has kindly shared her research on Periscope, the Dockyard’s own newspaper.
Amongst the management changes introduced to the dockyards between 1955 and 1969 was an overhaul of their personnel management systems. Chatham Dockyard was chosen as the pilot yard for the majority of the management changes, and by 1959 the Admiralty had sent Capt William Allen Haynes to Chatham to design a sound personnel management organisation, which would then be used as a pattern for Devonport and Portsmouth.
Among his achievements as Chatham’s Personnel Manager, Capt Haynes has been credited with the first suggestion of a newspaper for the dockyards. Treasury approval was given in November 1964 for a monthly newspaper to be published at Chatham Dockyard, on a two-year experimental basis. Depending on its success, the intention was to extend the publication to the other three home dockyards at Portsmouth, Devonport and Rosyth. £5,000 of public funds was allocated to the project to take up the shortfall between subscription and advertising revenue and the costs of running the newspaper.
The employees were first informed that there would be a dockyard newspaper on 1st April 1965 by means of a notice board memo, which also invited them to enter a competition to find a name for the publication. The Yardman, The Kentish Yard and Dockyard Digest were three of the four titles short listed, but Miss D.M. Gorham of the Naval Stores Department submitted the name Periscope, which was adopted. The first issue appeared on 29th October 1965, with A.J. Furzeman as Editor and J.J.V Allen as Advertising Manager. The cover price was 3d.
A report of the paper’s first year’s working showed that only £4,255 of the public funds had been used, and that Periscope had sold 4,000 copies. The undoubted success of Periscope led to a further application to the Treasury for a four-in-one newspaper for all four home dockyards. The Treasury’s approval was conditional on the cover price being raised to 4d. Local editors were to be employed at each yard, plus Furzeman was promoted to Editor-in-Chief, responsible for all the newspapers. An initial subsidy of £15,000 was agreed.
The newspaper retained a very professional look and an interesting and readable content. Articles varied from morale boosting reports on vessels launching or refitting, to editorials encouraging attitudes to the change of the period. News of retirements, exam results and more casual items such as recipes and knitting patterns and examples of Dockyard humour were also featured.
The Editorial in the first issue stated “Today, Chatham Dockyard, always progressive, ever a trend-setter, launches Periscope which, from this moment, will mirror the Yard’s activities, record all of its most important happenings, and reflect its thrusting spirit”. (Even with the best intentions of impartiality and objective reporting, the newspapers were undoubtedly a management tool in the fight for higher worker morale and better productivity).
The Dockyard newspapers succeeded in attracting a known readership of approximately 40 – 45% of the workforce, and an unknown number who read them but did not buy them.
Do you remember Periscope? Why not share your thoughts on the newspaper in the Guestbook (all contributions will also be passed to Emma Haxhaj, author of this article, and Dockyard researcher).
