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Swimming through Chocolate

Factual: Life Stories

Swimming Through Chocolate

BBC Radio 4 Extra - Swimming through Chocolate

Chocolate, swimming and sport: life working at the Cadbury factory in Bourneville.

4 Extra Debut. Chocolate, swimming and sport: Gladys Jones and Sir Adrian Cadbury reflect on life at Cadbury’s Bourneville factory. From May 2013.

For 30 years, Gladys Jones and Sir Adrian Cadbury worked at the same factory in Bourneville in Birmingham, but never met. They now come together to reflect on their lives then and now, and the love of chocolate and sport that unites them.

Gladys joined Cadbury in 1936 at the age of 14. She was grateful to have a job that would provide her with security, further education and a chance to indulge in her great passion: swimming. Having previously only ever swum in the local canal, the new opportunity to use the factory's 'Girls Baths' on a daily basis led her to a new career in the sport's section at the plant as a swimming teacher and life saver. 

Sir Adrian had a different trajectory: after Cambridge, the army and rowing in the Helsinki Olympics, he joined the family firm in 1952 rising to become Chairman of the company. 

We join them both as they travel from their homes to the Bourneville club to meet and compare their memories of the place, the people and a working life long gone.

Producer: Lucy Lunt

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 2013.

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