Fridtjof (Fred) Langnes
FRIDTJOF ALANT LANGNES (1918-1993) was born Frithjov Allan Kristiansen (Frithjof Alant Kristiansen) at Nordre Sandfjord on the island of Sørøya, Hammerfest in northern Norway on 22 September 1918.
He was the youngest of the ten children of Kristian Henrik Marentius Olufsen (1878-1943) and Marie Joakime Stuberg (1883-1971). His name was to have many variations over the course of his life with the family taking the name of Langnes from the farm they lived on. Throughout his life in Buckie he was simply Fred Langnes. |
This page has created with the help and assistance of Fred's family. It has been created from notes compiled by Vera and Steve; archive work done by Liz and an oral history interview with Vera, Frank and Liz. |
Sørøya evakuering
During the autumn of 1944, the Germans pursued a scorched earth policy in Northern Norway with thousands of homes being burned and people left homeless. Many took to the hills and mountains. By late January 1945, the British became aware that communities like Sørøya were being besieged by the Germans.
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The Royal Navy, under Real Admiral R.R. McGrigor who was commanding the Arctic Convoys at the time, mounted a rescue mission codenamed Operation Open Door from a base at the Kola inlet in the north of the Soviet Union. Four destroyers were sent, Zambesi, Zealous, Zest from the Royal Navy, and Sioux from the Canadian Navy.
On 15 February 1945, in full daylight, the warships raced down a fjord eight miles long, embarked 525 Norwegians, and departed before the German navy’s group of armed trawlers and patrol craft guarding a neighbouring fjord became aware of the Allied destroyers’ presence. The rescued Norwegians were brought back to Kola inlet and distributed on board various ships sailing in the RA.64 convoy for delivery to the UK. Fred, his mother, Marie and sister, Vally, were amongst those rescued. |
NRK documentary about Sørøya (1985)
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After their arrival in Glasgow, they were sent to London to be screened in case they were spies. The majority of the evacuees returned to Scotland to the Kingston Civilian Transit Camp, at Neilston, Glasgow.
The picture (left) includes Fred's mother, Marie and sister Vally amongst the line up of Norwegians from Sørøya at the camp at Neilston. Many of the younger men joining the Free Norwegian forces. However, because Fred had some experience as a blacksmith when working his father back in Norway, he was sent north to Buckie to work in the Norwegian slip. |
Fred and Helen
After the war his mother and sister returned to Sørøya to rebuild their lives but Fred had met a local girl Helen Duncan and decided to stay in Buckie. Fred and Helen married at Elgin and had four children, Vera, Frank, Sandra and Steve.
He worked at the Norwegian Slip until its closure in 1946 and then at Thomson’s (Tappies), Herd & McKenzie (Herdies) for a week and finally at Jones's in Buckie as a blacksmith. In between jobs he worked at the Hydro schemes during the 1950s. Fred was always a staunch trades unionist and, in 1957, when at Jones’s, he was part of the National strike for seventeen weeks. |
During the time of the strike, he worked as lumper at the cargo boats and made handbags to make ends meet as they got little money when on strike in those days. During the coronation he made a floral display the shape of a crown in his garden at 38 St Peters Road, which was greatly admired and Fred's garden was always important to him.
He liked to follow the boxing and used to get up in the early hours of the morning to listen to the heavy weight fights in America. Did the Littlewood's pools, spot the ball and he and a friend were always trying to invent things to make their fortune. On year, he had a win of the pools. It didn't make his fortune but as Vera recalled 'we'd a graan Christmas that eer'. He teached me tae box. Doon on his knees “Always defend your solar plexus. Keep yer guard up lik that”. An ma mither pit her heid oot the door…..’’fits for tea the nicht Helen?’ he said. And a clouted him. Fit happened tae “Always defend yerself at all times”. (Frank, 2018) He wis mad aboot boxing. He eest tae buy the ‘Ring’ magazine. Boxing gloves for the boys. He geen me a shottie ae time. He wis jist gan tae defend himsel but I hid him up against the waa. I only got one shottie o’t. (Vera, 2018) |
Propellers......
One day at Thomsons, he was asked if he would be able to braze a tip onto a damaged propeller. Fred knew that this was not as simple as just welding on a new tip to the damaged blade but that it would need to be the same shape, thickness and angle as the other blades and that it would need to be finely balanced. He set about making new specific tools to do the work and also to check that it had been done correctly. He completed the repair and it was to be completely successful.
So they said 'Fred wid you be able tae sort an strechten up that propeller?' They persuaded him tae tak the propeller aff, heat it in the forge an strechten it up an he welded a wee bit on tae it an he said that disna look richt an I’ll hae tae check the hicht o the blades. So he checked the hicht an checked the angle o the blades an he made a great job o it and pit it on an it workit perfect. (Frank, 2018)
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After he joined Jones’s Shipyard he continued to repair propellers, so much so that Jones’s offered to build a propeller repair shop for him to work in.
Jones’s hid approached him an said 'we’re thinking aboot building a propeller shop for ye Fred jist on that bit a land ower there an we will git a couple of apprentices and ye can lairn them up'. (Frank, 2018).
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So Fred set up in business himself and in 1961 he purchased an old fish smoking building for the princely sum £148.00. With the help of family, he gutted the interior of the building and re-fitted it to begin his propeller repair business - The Commercial Welding Works.
In the early years when asked to travel to shipyards in Fraserburgh and Peterhead to carry out propeller repairs in situ they had to hire taxis for the day to do the job as Fred couldn’t drive or owned a car and Frank was not yet old enough to drive.
He expanded the Commercial Road workshop twice before he run out of room and then decided to have a new factory built. In 1974 they moved to a new building at March Road Industrial Estate under a new name. Initially it was to be called Scottish Propeller Service but the government would not allow this because it was not a state-owned concern. So, the company name used Fred's initials and it became FAL Scottish Propeller Service. The bigger building with overhead cranes allowed FAL to undertake larger propeller repairs and also start a machining facility and increase their manufacture of fishing gear. Working along side him were sons Frank and Steve in developing the business.
He expanded the Commercial Road workshop twice before he run out of room and then decided to have a new factory built. In 1974 they moved to a new building at March Road Industrial Estate under a new name. Initially it was to be called Scottish Propeller Service but the government would not allow this because it was not a state-owned concern. So, the company name used Fred's initials and it became FAL Scottish Propeller Service. The bigger building with overhead cranes allowed FAL to undertake larger propeller repairs and also start a machining facility and increase their manufacture of fishing gear. Working along side him were sons Frank and Steve in developing the business.
The company is now in its third generation run by Mark, Fred's grandson, and having required expansion has moved three times since its start to new purpose-built premises and has gained an enviable reputation within the propeller industry having repaired over 35,000 propellers since its humble beginnings in the old fish smoking building.
Images courtesy of FAL Scottish Propeller Service.
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Fred finally became a naturalised British subject on 16 November 1967. He was the last of the Norwegians and Danes who had come to Buckie during the war to do so.
Most who had stayed had naturalised in the later 1940s or early 1950s with, ironically enough, it being the three most well-known who were last, Olav Huldal in 1965, Knud Thomsen in 1966 and Fred himself in 1967. |
Ma father aye eest tae say: "This is my home now"
Fred and Helen moved to McNaughton Avenue (the house was called Hammerfest) where, each year, he would put on a display of Christmas lights in the garden that attracted many people. Although Fred's cabling, plugs and fuses were perhaps best not seen. Helen and he also went round local schools showing the films he made on their trips to the United States. He was also a skilled maker of model boats.
Fred visited Norway around 1970 to visit his elderly mother who had gone into to a home but for him Buckie was now his home. Fin ma faither finally went hame tae Norway, there wisna that mony o them an he wis embarrassed he hid forgotten the Norwegian language cos a lot of the time he eest tae git ma mither, ma mither wis better it Norwegian. Fan he got a letter in Norwegian, he hid tae git ma mither tae ging an translate it. He lost the language. (Frank, 2018) |
....an honest and hard-working man
Fred died on 26 April 1993, aged 74. Helen survived him by ten years, passing away on 20 December 2003. They are buried in the New Cemetery at Buckie.
The names Langnes and FAL are still part-and-parcel of everyday life in Buckie. A tribute to the man from Sørøya and that wartime evacuation which took him to Scotland. |