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In 1942-3 I was a student at the London School of Economics which was evacuated to Cambridge. Somehow some of us were inveigled into doing Sunday war work at Pye’s wireless (ie radio) factory near Cambridge. If I remember correctly, this was organised by the University Socialist Society which was probably run by Communists. The Communist Party had become enthusiastic supporters of the war effort in contradistinction to the period before Russia was invaded. We used to meet early on Sunday morning in Cambridge and cycle to the factory where each was told off to undertake a particular task. There were a few regular workers there, doing overtime, but most of what work was undertaken was by students. Most of us operated hand presses in which a tool-setter had introduced a machine tool which pressed out odd bits of components. Usually a ribbon of metal was introduced into the machine from the left and the tool was brought to bear on it and cut out the item. This was done by hand whereby a vertical handle was turned to operate a press. Sometimes the ribbon was of some plastic-like material which was heated slightly before being fed into the machine.
I think the hours were from 8am to about 5 pm with a break for lunch. Music was relayed from the ´óÏó´«Ã½ programmes and we sang quite a bit. Indeed we sang everything including the church services. The work was monotonous and output tended to vary according to the speed of the music. Monotony could be lightened by trying out different hand movements, eg instead of feeding the material into the machine by the left hand and operating the press with the right, you might change hands and feed with the right and press with the left., the arm movements imitating those of an orchestral conductor.
Lunchtime was spent in the factory canteen and I think, although I may have got this wrong, ‘Workers’ Playtime’ was the programme on the radio.
What did we produce? I don’t think we ever knew, although obviously something to do with parts of radio sets. There was a well-known wartime song, sung by Gracie Fields I think. It went roughly: ‘I’m the girl who makes the thing that joins the thing that makes the thing-a -me-jig…’ In other words no one knew what they made.
The communists who organised the activity arranged that the pay we received should be equal. We got paid something like 15 shillings for the day’s work, 75p in today’s money, but worth the equivalent of several pounds in today’s prices. This pay can be compared with the cost of the lodgings I occupied which was 30 or 35 shillings a week.

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