Biography of Malcolm Archbald SMITH
[Ref. S.1]
| Employment in retirement |  |
Documents |
In 2000, Malcolm's son was working with PC Graphics (UK) Ltd producing computer aided maps. They took on a contract with Thompsons Yellow Pages to update town street maps for their directories and it emerged from a conversation that PC Graphice were short of surveyors. Malcolm offered his services and was accepted.
The first job he undertook was a street map of Leicester City. It actually proved quite intense as there was a concentrated network of streets and alleys and the map onto which he had to enter the information was rather small so it was dificult not to overlap the details. He drew some attachment plans for the places of greatest detail. He also rang the office on the first evening just to get confirmation about some of the detail required.
He left it a bit late in finding a room for the night and was hampered by public phones having been vandalised, one with faeces stuffed into the earpiece. Having booked an hotel, he set off having found the road on his map, but after searching for a while in the eveing rush hour, discovered that there were two roads with the same name and, of course, he had gone to the wrong one which was furthest away. Not too clever from someone who was drawing up street maps! He had only planned to stay one night but the work was such that he remained for a second, managing to get back into the same hotel at late notice.
In order to get around more efficiently, Malcolm took his bicycle with him. This proved useful where the roads were a bit longer but was more of an obstacle in confined areas. It was sometimed difficult to handle the bike and the mapping board at the same time. In order to receive payment, he had to submit a formal invoice so he created one based on his personal compliments slip.
PC Graphics picked up a contract to update the long distance walks on the Isle of Wight. Malcolm was called in to assist when they found that their permanent staff could not complete all the work in time. This was a perfect job for Malcolm as he greatly enjoyed country walking. Three of the walks were stages of the coastal path. He later completed the remaining stages in his own time and detailed the walks on his own website.
The next two jobs were in early in 2001 in Rochdale and Bury and these proved a bit easier. He surveyed Rochdale on a saturday. stayed in a pub in Bury and on that night there was a spot for amateur singers. One girl was magnificent but her appearance did not match her voice. On Sunday he went round the streets of Bury, famous for it's market but it was closed on tat day. Unfortunately, so were all the public toilets which eventually left Malcolm with a problem that had to be relieved in a quiet secluded corner.
In June 2001 Malcolm was asked to provide update information for the maps of Ringwood, Christchurch and Bournemouth. A couple of months later has did the same for Swanage then later for Poole also. After that, the work dried up. Malcolm spoke to his son later and enquired if his work had been up to the standard required. The reply was that he had provided more detail than was expected and far more than the professional surveyors.
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