CALLING all past and present employees, agents and customers of Kay's who may have memories or memorabilia to impart about this 207 year-old Worcester company.

Your help and interest is earnestly sought by Bernard Mills, who has recently been appointed as the first official historian of Kay's.

He is bubbling with enthusiasm for his daunting task to produce what he describes as "a definitive human history" of a company that has been such an important and integral part of the commercial life of the Faithful City for more than two centuries.

Bernard is ready and eager "to fish in the vast pool of memories and knowledge" about Kay's which must exist in the minds of so many local people.

"There can be few in this city and surrounding area who have not had family or friends working for Kay's, or who themselves were employed by the company," stresses Bernard.

"It has been a major employer for such a long time and has had a good effect on people's lives, being very much part and parcel of the local scene."

He hopes people will be willing to bring forward photographs, documents, memorabilia and anecdotes concerning Kay's.

"I want people to tell me of their times at Kay's and to impart their memories, whether they be good, bad, happy or sad."

Bernard aims to distil "a human, living history" of Kay's, not a dry and stodgy record of the company.

"Kay's possesses a wondrous heritage and I am keen to tap into as much of it as possible," he says.

He is willing to visit people in their own homes to record their memories of Kay's and emphasises that he is not asking anyone to give up their photographs or memorabilia, simply to let him take copies.

The end product of Bernard's research will be the making of a multi-media CD Rom containing the first official history of Kay's.

He explains that the Reality Group, owners of Kay's since May last year, have set him the task, under its Community Programme, of seeking to develop this record of the giant company, particularly as no-one has done one before. It's a project he is to undertake alongside his main company role as project manager in the Electronic Enabling Division.

"A living history and a fully-recorded heritage will show where the company has come from and where it is going to," suggests Bernard, who has worked for Kay's since 1973 and who is proud that his mother was a Kay's agent back in 1963.

He is now custodian too, of Kay's own archives and memorabilia, which occupy a room in the historic Georgian building which forms part of the company's offices complex in The Tything.

There are board of directors' minute books and Kay's mail order catalogues going back to the 1890s, and it is possible to turn to a neatly hand-written record of the June 1895 board meeting when Kay's became an incorporated company under the chairmanship of W. Kilbourne Kay, then a leading figure in Worcester life.

He died in 1929, but two of his brothers were actively involved in Kay's until bowing out in 1937. Bernard would dearly like to discover if there are any descendants of these three Kay brothers still alive today.

He points out too, that though the company's collection of Kay's past catalogues is quite extensive, it is certainly not complete. If, in particular, people have any Kay's catalogues prior to 1920, he would dearly like to have them as a gift to the archives or to borrow for copying.

In dating back more than 100 years, the Kay's catalogues obviously offer an invaluable history of fashion and of household furnishings and fittings through all the 20th Century. As such, they are important to history researchers and to costume and setting designers for stage plays and for period dramas made for cinema or television.

The company has given a duplicate set of Kay's catalogues for one decade to the nearby Alice Ottley School, where teacher Maureen Fox uses them as significant material for course work.

Bernard hopes the History of Kay's CD Rom will not only have pictorial images drawn from past Kay's catalogues, minute books and memorabilia but also the recorded voices of many past and present employees recounting their memories.

Where possible, he would like to have video interviews with some of those giving their recollections. There will also be engravings and old photographs of the firm's various offices and warehouses in the city down the past two centuries, plus pictures of some of the company's own specialised products from the past such as watches, clocks and sewing machines.

Another of Bernard's wishes is that, with the public's help, he can amass a significant collection of Kay's archives, catalogues, photographs, memories and memorabilia, to be stored by Reality at Worcester as a valuable resource for researchers and all those interested in retail history.

"It would surely be better to have a heritage collection of this sort readily available rather than locked away from view in dark and dingy rooms or basements," says Bernard.

* Anyone who can help with memories or memorabilia for the history of Kay's should contact Bernard Mills on telephone 01905 615248, by e-mail - bernard.mills@reality group.co or by writing to him at Reality Group Ltd., Northwick Avenue, Worcester WR99 1GA.

* March of time on mail order firm

Memory Lane has previously featured Kay & Co. in depth, so I am giving just a brief thumb-nail history of the company here today.

It traces its roots back to 1794 and a watchmaker's shop in Goose Lane, Worcester - now St Swithin's Street.

The firm, under John Skarratt, later branched out and moved to larger premises at 2 Broad Street, subsequently transferring, first to Shrub Hill Road and then to Foregate Street.

During late Victorian times, W. Kilbourne Kay, who had worked for Skarratt's for some years, took over the business and became its boss.

It was he who masterminded the vast expansion of the company as it blossomed into the giant Kay's mail order company with thousands of employees and agents and a huge financial turnover.

In 1895, it became an incorporated limited company, and by 1908 Kay's nerve-centre had transferred to newly-built offices and warehouses at The Tything,

During the 20th Century, the Kay's empire at Worcester expanded to encompass large premises in Northwick Avenue and Watery Lane and massive new warehouse complexes at Bromyard Road and Bransford Road.

There was also a modern office block at Shrub Hill.

The company has been under only three ownerships in its two centuries of life - Skarratt's, Kay's (as part of Great Universal Stores) and now, since May of last year, the Reality Group.

For decades, Kay's supplied all the station clocks and staff watches to the Great Western Railway, including a huge three-faced clock to grace London's Paddington Station.

Only recently, the company donated a similar but smaller clock with two faces to the Steam Rail Museum at Swindon.

This clock had been languishing in one of Kay's warehouses at Worcester for 10 years or more.

* Bernard Mills, in preparing a history of Kay's, wonders if there are any descendants of John Skarratt still living in the Worcester area? If so, will they please contact him on 01905 615248.