B Cooke & Son, Hull: Inside the firm which one of the last vestiges of Yorkshire’s nautical past

Cooke’s has the feeling of a living museum, one of the last vestiges of the city’s nautical past, but while the maritime fortunes of Hull may have changed greatly over years, there’s a feeling that somehow time stands still at Cooke’s.

That’s Cooke with an “e” – unlike the explorer, Captain James Cook, also born in Yorkshire – but the name also comes with quite a story. Barnard Cooke – an optician by trade – clearly had an eye for opportunity.

In the 1840s and 1850s, he had learned his craft alongside his brother, the renowned clock maker Thomas Cooke, of York. Son of a Pocklington shoemaker, he was a self-taught mathematician and physicist who carved out a reputation building telescopes, later opening a shop in York, then a factory, as his reputation as a manufacturer of excellent optical instruments spread around the world.

Thomas’s younger brother Barnard had been his right-hand man as the business grew, but by the early 1860s Barnard was ready to strike out on his own.

The first rail links between York and Hull had been established in the 1840s and new fishing grounds had just been discovered. This was the peak of Victorian prosperity, Hull was a major trading port with Europe and the city was booming.

Barnard set up shop in the centre of town, close to the busy Queen’s Dock, where he began to supply the nautical trade with compasses, sextants, barometers, clocks and telescopes.

B Cooke & Son grew with the city’s fortunes. Solid and reliable, a Cooke compass became the captain’s choice, synonymous with quality. Over the years, the business changed hands and moved premises, finally coming to rest in the mid-1950s in its current location.

Brian Walker is 71 – and still making compasses – but in 1968 he was just 15 years old when he became an apprentice compass maker at Cooke’s.

“Back then the docks were filled with boats,” recalls Brian. “We had a van that used to go there twice a day and each time he’d come back with a tea chest full of gauges, sextants, compasses, chronometers, barometers for fixing – we had to sort them before the ship sailed.

"We had 25 staff – you had the office staff, then the chart department, the gauge department, the sextant department, then on top of the building was the compass department.

“You could walk out of the door and get anything you needed to do the job. All the suppliers where there – Humber Rubber, Humber Electricals. There were ship’s agents, chandlers, shipyards that you were supplying, all that e xpertise. There was always somebody behind a counter that would help you.”

Happy, prosperous times, but over the years priorities shifted. The Cod Wars didn’t help but things were changing anyway.

Accountants were brought in by the trawler owners to lower costs, cheaper plastic instruments were chosen over brass and glass. By the 1990s, fishing from Hull had all but ended and one by one the shipyards closed as the few new vessels that were needed were built abroad.

So when the ageing workforce at B Cooke & Son gradually retired, they weren’t replaced – there simply wasn’t the demand any more.

It was left to young Brian to upskill and fill the gaps, extending beyond compasses to sextants, gauges, basically anything that needed attention. “It never got boring,” says Brian. “There was always something to learn and something to fix.”

Back in 2016, Brian was 63 and it seemed likely that if he ever retired, his skills and knowledge would retire with him, calling time on a long unbroken maritime trade in Hull. But then along came Sylvester Perrera.

Sylvester’s mum Priyanka happens to be the MD of B Cooke & Sons. Sri Lankan Priyanka previously worked in a similar business to Cooke’s in the capital city of Colombo. She moved to the UK in 2002 to study Marine and Freshwater Biology at the University of Hull.

“I already knew of B Cooke & Son,” she says. “I ordered equipment from them – so when I moved to Hull I got in touch to see if they needed someone who could work part-time.”

Cooke’s was (and still is) owned by the family of Stacy Dickeson, the man who bought the business in 1926. Priyanka saw room for improvement. The roof needed fixing, the building required rewiring, there was definite need to bring things into the 21st century.

After Mike Plaxton retired, the family realised Priyanka had the best interests of B Cooke & Son at heart and appointed her as a director and MD. Priyanka’s son Sylvester had studied computer science, so when the computers at Cooke’s needed some maintenance, he helped out.

“I’d never really seen myself working in computers all my life,” says Sylvester. “But I came along to help out and update things. I was replacing one of the motherboards and needed something to be cut out of a circuit board to make some space.

"I asked Brian if he could help – he just did such a perfect job and so fast – and I was so intrigued by the place, so much knowledge, so many skills – so when the opportunity came up to come and train with Brian, it was yes, definitely yes.”

It was very much a traditional apprenticeship, adds Sylvester: “He started me slowly, giving me basic tasks to repeat and repeat, then slowly moving me onto the next machine and the next process. Then once I’d got the basics, when a job would come in we’d consult on it and collaborate.”

The rapport between Brian and Sylvester is clear: “He’s a joker!” says Sylvester, laughing. “We always have fun, we always make fun of each other. Every day we have those times where we just chat and enjoy each other’s company.

"We talk about his generation and my generation – the differences; we talk about politics or just simple things – family and friends, things we’re tinkering with.”

B. Cooke and Son occupies a Victorian building filled with ancient machines, there’s a creaky stairwell lift that looks like it could be a 100 years old, worn floorboards and bakelite door knobs, brass machine parts in cardboard boxes that have sat on the same shelf for years.

There’s a warmth that only comes with the patina of the years, a feeling that in a certain light bygone staff might reappear - old and faded in dusty blue cotton work-coats, shuffling down darkening corridors. But Cooke’s is no relic, Priyanka and her staff are more than custodians of the past, they have kept this place alive.

For Priyanka, hearing the laughter of Brian and Sylvester echoing down the stairwell has been a joy: “They have a special relationship, Brian’s a great teacher and a great role model – and Sylvester is my child, it gives me great happiness.”

As for Sylvester, he sees his future in compasses. “I think part of what Brian wanted to do was for his knowledge to be passed forward. So it’s only right that one day, I do the same and pass it on to whoever would want that knowledge, and make sure it’s kept alive.”

bcookeandson.co.uk