1959-03-16 — Page 4

Barnes Wallis:

(of the Dam Busters & the Swallow)

THE

UNDAUNTED.

GENIUS SPEAKS

by Donald Gomery

TODAY, after he has come houncing back into

the news like one of his own dam-busting bombs, the tremendous genius whose name is Barnes Wallis will breakfast as usual off three spconfuls of porridge and eight (always eight)

prunes.

Dr Harns Wallis, inventor of the stupendous 1,050-mlio an hour Swallow, the plot that moves its wings and ongines back and forward in flight, puts the porridge put on as soon as he is up at 6.30.

Then, on the bathrooan floor, he does of an hour of physlenk exer- cis. a. He Is 71

Lunch, an a warring day.

be has without interruption Af ls desk; the crust of

two tolls, a piece of cheese, and pot of tea. Ite has a cup of ten in the afternoon..

Last night, when he got home, he had stime cald rice pudding.

Ilis secret

That's all he eats,

And he Las been eating meals like this

for the last 20 years.

"A lean tummy. that's the merul of being fit," he says:

three-quarters

regularly visiting the grand- children and children. This has frken her to Canada, the West Balles, the Middle East. At the moment she is in Bmingham.

"When I came to see you,"

and he pat le cwn stemach, just has to apply logle."

his body

I

Symbols

THE CHINA MÁIL, MONDAY, MARCH 16, 1959..

homb

Ho began work at 10, 4s a week as an engineering appren- leo. Up at five, at work at six, right scho: Ull 10 at night.

Inspiring

I tell you, truly, that watching 13 that plane move like that one od the awe-inspiring nements of my Hle.

-

Amid steel tentacles, Barnes Wallis works at drawing board where inspiration and conviction, take form on paper.

Background (right): picture of Moehne Dam splintered by his spectacular bomb.

right in

the end. And I am seventieth birthday. It shows second pleture, in the dam rieptes - "Lat my career And he adds: "Education Ir it

and the wings of the sey, "I expected to find some- Uinking especially now of the some of the major imperiances busted bolling watera, Guy could not be repented today; providing us with men who are Swallow fold back for fast o like that scientist In Nevil Swallow; two years ago the of his life... the crest of Gibson, V.C., has signed his though I'm not sure that Intellectual tools but where are fight, and the engines move to Shute's Look "No Highway Government dropped its Christ's ilusplus-the Bluecoal name.

egree. You need an exception- the creative brains? You can and fro.... know, the pari James Bancial backing: recently School he attended-to which

ally good physique, mind you- niways buy or hire knowledge— Strwort playeri In the film." changed its mind and decided to he gave the £10,000

awarded We talk of his other, 10-wn the physicni strain is terrife" Immense knowledge-to solve "Good heavens, no," says Dr buck it again.

him for his dam-busting bomb bombs, Brunes Wollls shows (the one thing that has worried your problemas. But who is the 'It was a good book,

me an immense treatise he sent Barnes Walls is the Walfie,

the crest of G17 Squadron,

migraine man who gets the Weas these which enrried out the dam to the R.A.F. in the early part of headaches he has had since he cher men are asked to work but the hero was eccentric. An

dock engineer" - Wallis

not

busting raids the Tallboy the war, urging the use of glant

wns 12).

on?" the Grand Slam bomba on German industry, and touch care for the word selentist an. eccentric. IIC

And "can't be

Barnes Walls and I are talk- bomb-those immense bombs he

suddenly he On the first page is a

quotes qilofa g in his office in the Vickers invented which also helped to

Chaucer fluently to support him from Thomas works at Weybridge,

Hardy: where win the war... the Wellesley tlon

as to intensity

the herd way are more originn! "It's absolutely lovely," that men who have come up these very wise men icave him plane he designed the first "Experience is

the modern plane

and not as to duration." But along and let him just get on ally

then all the savants, with It.

well loved Wellington which he the RA.F. experts preferred

uf little bombe "they Every inch covered with books,

his huge dest; is also designed the only, decent lots

papers, bomber we had at the beginning thought I was mud."

of the war... the airship RIQU drawings, Beside it is a train .n-

which he designed and which cous drawing

board, an

few successfully to Canada and nstonishing thing, with wear back, but which was scropped melal armis above it ta carry light to any spot, and foot enn- “Yes, misery — the trols to tip it this way and that Mire.y? mistry when you have a miracle, way, and every way except up- masterpiece, something side down. "It's Uke a dentist's marvellous, und you can't get chair,"

Елуд Barnes Wallis, others to realise I."

busily working the controls. "Heaven knows hows many

much it cosi." He loves it,

We talk too of another

Bim,

1 hair is white, but Tools tough; he is quick of eye, "The Dam Busters," in which cech, and movement, and his Michael Redgrave played Barnes "Michael did it very brain, of course, is a Klant Wallis, dynamo. I would have put bis vel!" he says, "but you can't ut into two hours of film two age at 58.

or years of misery."

He data not roků, Crinit. eat meat. He gave up smoking "when I began to have chil- dien" as an example to them.

married at 38.) (He was

Re doen't eat meat berase "5 cun't kill an ànimal myrelf, so I tion't think it's fair that I should exprel someone else to kill it for me,"

Miseries

There have been

He explains his present rather strange domestic arrangements such "miseries" et frustra by saying "I'm a Kros grand- finn in BTC: Wallis's life. Father is wife moves around Always be has been proved

JUST FANCY THAT

Nunnamed chimney sweep whose chimney caught fire-the And to be called has been warned about it by

Plympton, Devon, rural council,

MIERE are 1,400 girls at the Elmos Technical College, a Stoke- on-Trent pro-nursing institution And one bay, 15-year-old Rex Meredith. He wants to be a nurse and would otherwise have to wait until he was 17 before going into a hospital.

**

W

ARMER Jolin Leeks is trying to solve the mystery of his 00f1.-

FARM

wide pand which vanished overnight-down a three-inch hole

on the pond bed.

The pond has provided water for cattle on Greve Farm.

Bramford, near Ipswich, for as long as villagers remember,

In one comer is a picture his cam

him gave

when the R101 (which he d not design) crashed 011 its maiden light....

No rules

In the room, also, are two pic- Lures of the Mochre Dan,

Too easy

So Barnes Wollis distributed 100 stonelled copies of his huge treatise to the most influential people he knew (genlus sticks y no rules). "Th security men were furicus." But he got his big bombs-eventually.

"My children tell me," Barnes Wallis he has

"When your landlady makon you a cup of cocoa last thing and you fall asleep drinking it because you're so tired that IS ving."

The ultimate

"Isn't it lovely?" he says.

he says..

the

And suddenly one feels terribly humble in the presence of this great Inventor,

"Great inventar?" Finally, and Inevitably, we "Nonsense. move into a corner of his room where, on a pedestal, stands a But nowadays apprentices get 4ft. model of the Swallow. two days off in the week to go "London to Melboume in seven to technical schock and are hours. This is the ultimate taken there by bus. "Two days!" fonn of manned aircrali," he

слув

Dr Barrics Wallis 18 not belog fogmatic about this. The Swallow's wings are at because he is not sure; but " the normal angle, for lake-off. four ruther think that youngsters Dr Barnes Walls busles him- today perhaps get it toe easy," self at a control box just besido

ол his "before and after," and in the children and two who aro

I just had opportunities-and £7,000,000 or backing. We are all urged finally by what we

have left indone, not what we have done.

"The parable of the talents, my boy."

And he said goodbye and took his brilliant brain back to his drawing boarch

London Express Service.

FOR ATTENTION OF ALL PEOPLE AT THE TOP-AND ALL THOSE RUNNING TO GET THERE

Here's how to succeed

-and still stay alive!

Sald 45-year-old Mr. Lecks: "The hole seems to CERIOUS news

be Bft, deep, Though I am pouring 1,000 gallons of water an hour Into the pond, it is still atmost bone dry. The hole most Join a aubterranean river."

Now Farmer Lecks plans to make a plus for the hole, con- crete the bottom of the pond, and use it as a swimming pool for hie six children.

London Express Service.

trickles from the deep-carpeted fastness

of the Institute of Direc A PURE SOLARE QUE

tors, prosperously and robustly situated among the noble teficaces of Belgravia.

DOAC

COMET 4 to

BRITAIN, EUROPE

and JAPAN

Commencing 3rd April. BOOK NOW!

BRITISH OVERSEAS AIRWAYS CORPORATION

British bosses

are getting anxious about their collective

ulcers. Too many hearts that beat beneath smooth Savile Row suiting are flirting with throm- basis.

Tco many are teetering on breakdown.

AN EXECUTIVE-LEVEL INQUIRY

by FRANK ENTWISLE

unificently equipped-radiology171osy who has Interests you You must take exercbet department.

outside, work-winning prizea at the Jocul flower show, for instance-can, stand up 10 the

based man can take a knock In business, and recover because he is doing well in some other sphere.

Bosses go there for regular examinations which better The Broadly rumoured, the fees can be as steep as the Welsh hills. Usually, the firm pays.

The man the Institute of Directors picked to put in charge of their new Medical Research

"Be A magistrate. Join the Unit is a rather handsome 40- hospital

local council. Join the local

management com year-old called Dr H. Deric mittee, where they are short of Wright, who got ideas about the business brains scientific study of boss-stress as

good administrators,

You may the brink of he mixed with oil-cxecutives doesn't matter.

be using the same talents. The

The pace

So a medical research unit

when he was employed by Shell.

met him in his Belgrave Square office, He was relaxed and affable, suding deep into bis

he talked,

A 'tigress'

executive-type swivel chair as probably more to the chap it "This applies just as much- charge of a small or medium Arm The loads some of these chaps carry is appalling."

has been set up to make a scientific study of the boss, his allments, his death-rate, his

Since he took over at the work-routine, home-life, hobbies Institute in September he has and even the shape of the written a pamphlet about the health problems of directors which says:.

chair in which he sits.

Gospel

ย

Dr Wright deplores the currently fashionable practice of tho over-open-door to the boss's office..

develop cardine reserve. When and how? Well, don't take the lift every day,

own stats, sy DP Wright That is what the doctors are doing to Eisenhower, he says. That is why he plays golf.

there is no univa no urCES Run up and Snatching a few days here and pleasure that his secretary was

THINK-TIME-A DORS should Nor did I netice anyone build- take at least three 20-minute Ing up cardiac-reserve on the periods alone in his office with cushioned stairs, his feet up-doing nothing.

DIET Find out what your weight should be and get within 10 or 15 per cent of it,

SMOKING,--Fifteen to 20 is heavy cigarettes smoking. It leads to bronchial troubles and lowers resistance to pneumonia.

day

The diners In the Instituto The ability to delegate werk club down below were tucking Is one of the executive's greatest in to pea soup, trout, veal cullet assets, says Dr Wright, Lack of and apple pie, to say nothing of confidence in subordinates is one the loaded wine glassca.

The gospel will, of course, of the first signs of breakdown.

To avoid such breakdowns take time to percolate down- more and more firms are setting stairs, up their own medical units for top employees. There is even talk of such a consulting unit being set up at the Institute of

you must have them, count them tons.

.Directors. Bosses would KO BUSINESS LUNCHES, -- It to London for regular exomina- as work and relax afterwards. If they go on too long they mean work piles up and you go home late. That fy not fair on wives and families.

DRINKING, A Hitle of what you fancy docs you good. But try to cut lunch-time drinka.

COCKTAIL PARTIES. An nbomination. Avoid them,

Their need

For it is feared that the

The executive's doctor is o executive, baffled by the arrival

special kind of animal, how- of new and mysterious industrial

ever. He must understand boss techniques, buffeted by the ex-

He believes that every boss

ENTERTAINMENT-A firm. problems, Which is one reason press pacs of his environment.

abould keep a "gress" in his should realise that this is work. Why so few tycoons take their may suffer from occupational "Evidence accumulating cuter offlec, "n real old battle-

troubles to the family doctor. maladies as serious as the dust which suggests it is time that axe who will protect you algning any paper, meme or chit PAPER WORK, — Try not diseases of the miner or the come of the (medical) interest through thick and thin."

"Big Arms are realising that

people for so long devated to the executive

Dre often bonds of the diver,

desperately in need of someone to talk to, says Dr Wright.. "The industrial doctor must be able to talk his language,

An

must have time to for three months that is not worker should be transferred to think alone to think of futura absolutely viial. The gain in Already, many big business the director. It is becoming up plans and leave the day-to-day time, money and émiciency may organisations have their own parent that he is not perhaps as routine to his lieutenants.

be surprising, medical-care organisations for fit and efficient as he might bo; managers. Senior mon at the he. may in fact be becoming: factories of Harlow New Town strained beyond his mit”. get regular- twice - yearly

Already ho has a gospel to examinations.

preach to bosses which, he says, is based on psychological com- moa, sense,

And up in Wales, there is a medical resort for businessmen, situated in a romantig Victorian And lils main point is that the castle, with deer-park, fishing, a life at the executive snduld he near-by golf course, and "broadly based,” Ho.explains;

I asked him for a programma for executives—a set of rules for

being a boss and staying alive..

Too busy

senior

"He must also be wise enough not to encourage the hypo- chondria which is so common among American, businessmen. HOLIDAYS-A man who is who come to depend on the too busy to take his annual annual check-up for peace of holiday should be pushed out of mind,” the office. Probably, both his ' EXERCISE. Remember your way of living and his respon As I walked through's Dr heurt la as' dabby as the rest of siblities - need, • investigation. Wright's office, I noted 'with

He rattled off a list, some points of which would shake most bosses I know.

POCKET CARTOON

by OSBERT LANCASTER

“General Franco, General' de Gaulie, General Motors, General Grivasi --- Thank heaven, Fortinbras, you and I retired with the substantia

rank of brigadier !!!!!

London Express Service.