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Jean Haslam
• There was nothing very unusual about Mrs Jean Haslam's entry into road transport. Like so many she started with general office duties for an own-account operator and drifted into the transport department.
From here Jean Haslam's career is less than typical. A married woman with a home to run, she embarked on a course of study which took her to night-school three times a week and has eventually led her to the post of transport management specialist at the US Army Depot at Burtonwood. More recently she was elected as a member of the council of the Chartered Institute of Transport. Before the Industrial Transport Association's amalgamation with CIT Mrs Haslam was elected a Fellow of the ITA.
Distinctions seem to come naturally to this mild-mannered grandmother in a man's world. In 1972 she received an award from General M. S. Davison, C in C US Army Europe and 7th Army for "the most outstanding contribution to the cost reduction programme by an individual". Jean Haslam like most women is particularly cost conscious. She does not shelter behind her femininity but speaks boldly on matters which she understands and believes in.
Back in 1962 at the beginning of what has become known as the container revolution she read a paper on the subject which was greeted with some indifference. This did not stop her pressing on with containerization movements or with expounding its usefulness. But this is only one facet of road transport and Jean Haslam writes and lectures on its many other facets. She is well known around the United Kingdom as a transport lecturer and has had a thesis published in the USA on the subject. She has won two awards in worldwide competitions for papers on transport which were sponsored by the British Steel Industry.
Her success she attributes to the guidance she received when entering the industry. She was encouraged to think ahead, think originally and above all to "put it down on paper".
Jean Haslam has neither the need nor the time for .women's liberationists. She believes that those who talk about "women's lib" do so because they have nothing better to do.
As a woman she is not unnaturally something of a sentimentalist. For example she has a very soft spot for the older type of driver whom she refers to as the "knight of the road". Perhaps because one of them once pulled her from her wrecked car on M5. The smash occurred when she was on her way to Barry Docks to supervise a shipment.
Jean Haslam is a dedicated transport woman who still finds time for her two grandchildren and her very with-it hobbies which include Latin American dancing and motor rallying. G.M.