Tongland Works

Today's the day ……………………. for girl power

This is all that's left of the Galloway Engineering Co Ltd, commonly known as the Tongland Works  - but the story behind it is a fascinating one.

It opened in 1917 as a subsidiary of Arrol-Johnston at Heathhall in Dumfries and its purpose was to manufacture aero-engines for the war effort.  The amazing thing was that the workforce was almost entirely female.  This was partly because so many men were required for front-line combat in the War - but mainly because the managing director, T. C. Pullinger, under the influence of his visionary daughter Dorothee, treated the enterprise as an 'experiment' in making engineering attractive to women as a profession.

Girls were offered 3-year apprenticeships, at least two years shorter than a male one, because women, according to Pullinger, 'are born mechanics, who work with their brains as well as their hands, and they learn with astonishing rapidity'.  He went on to say that he was 'convinced that there is an immense future in engineering for women who really love their work and are keen on it'.

The design of the factory was progressive - based on the early automobile plants of Detroit.  The walls were almost entirely of glass, reducing the need for artificial lighting (see extra). The factory had its own hydro-electric plant, which substantially reduced its energy cost.  There was an emphasis on workers' amenities: a swimming-pool, a piano in the rest-room, and tennis courts on the flat roof.

At the end of the war, the Tongland Works  switched to the manufacture of cars, in particular a light model called The Galloway, which was described in the trade press as 'a car made by ladies for others of their sex'...………………..