1978 Mary Adams famous chimney sweep

This report is listed in Social Snapshots 1969-2000 inc

also click Jack & Mary Adams for her life story

also click 1955 Mrs Able (Mary Adams) by Rumer Godden

MARY ADAMS.   EXTRACT FROM A NEWSPAPER in 1978.

Thought to be the first woman chimney sweep in the country, Mrs Mary Adams of Lacey Green who is now retired, probably knows more about what’s up a chimney or down a flue than many a builder.

OLD METHODS BEST. Not for Mrs Adams the new-fangled vacuum cleaners for sweeping chimneys.   She uses the old method of brush rods and muscle and as a result has won a reputation as one of the cleanest sweeps in the business.

THE START. But how did she start as a sweep, which after all isn’t the most sought after of feminine jobs?   “I was in a friend’s house one day and I couldn’t see across the room for the chimney smoking.   There was no sweep so I got some rods and a brush and swept the chimney.   When the brush stuck out the top I was so excited and passers-by saw it and all wanted me to sweep their chimneys”, she said

SEVEN A DAY. Since that day she never looked back and in the 1950’s used to sweep 7 chimneys a day – cycling to each job and for 20 minutes’ work earned the princely sum of two shillings. (10p).

TOO DANGEROUS. Insurance companies thought her job too dangerous and were reluctant to insure her and then only for £1 a week – even in those days.

UP MARKET CUSTOMERS. She has swept chimneys all over the district – Chequers Lodges, Hughenden Manor and has been official sweep at Bomber Command, having seen four Commanders – in –Chief come and go.

NEVER DIRTY. She scoff at the idea of a dirty sweep – “I never get dirty and I never make dirt – you don’t if you are patient and take the job steady, there’s an art in sweeping.”.

THE KNOWLEDGE. She is an authority on chimneys now and with each one there is something different – a new problem to tackle. Some chimneys have one bend, some have two and many modern ones go straight up, which is why they don’t make a good fire “they need to bend to draw properly.   As for the tools of her trade, her bristle brushes and cane rods, she couldn’t remember how old they were, but they were bent and misshapen, but pliable, to negotiate the weird shaped chimneys.

RETIRED ?. Both she and her husband Jack, who at one time worked on the railway, are quite happy to take things a bit easier in ‘retirement’.  But Mrs Adams doesn’t sit by her own roaring fire for very long – she still does the occasional chimney in an emergency, but dreads doing her own!

FAMILY. No one would guess she is 69, with two children and three grandchildren.   She still has a part-time job and came in a good and barely puffing, third in Lacey Green’s Shrove Tuesday Pancake Race earlier this year.

MISSED. In the future her customers are going to miss her and make do with a vacuum man who gets the job done in four minutes, but often leaves half a day’s cleaning behind.