Industry Legends

I was about to move on to start and discuss the main business of looking for that perfect T shirt, but I can’t help myself, and the mention of Harry Harris from Berwick Street has simply forced me to remember another industry legend, Dr Albert Hackett.

The good Doctor came to work for us on a year’s sabbatical from the University of Michigan, where he was founder of the university’s Rheology Department, and Senior Lecturer in Molecule Vibration. He arrived in the UK to further his studies on mesh tensions, and refine his patented screen wipes.

It wasn’t long before he was a major contributor in the leading industry magazine, where in his opening address he commented…

“I’m happiest alone in a laboratory, throbbing test tube in hand, but while I’m in Great Britain I’m more than willing to help out with any technical questions screen printers may have, particularly on the subject of yellow mesh, low frequency light diffusion.”

Over the months he touched on many key technical issues, and was taken very seriously by both editors and readers alike…on one occasion he travelled back to Philadelphia to meet rapper Whoop Doggy Puffhouse, to see how he dealt with the dazzle from his massive bling, and whether that could help screen printers in England suffering from problems with their vision, due to applying too much foil onto T-shirts. He developed a patented device for shaving the garment fluff off T-shirt printing equipment, the Dr Albert Hackett Fuzz Platt, £19.99 in all good stores. And he investigated the problem of shrinkage after spilling a mug of cocoa on his sports jacket….in his own words….

‘In relaxation shrinkage during manufacturing, textiles can stretch, and are sometimes shaped and dried under tension. Macroscopic stresses occur, particularly when fibres swell in a liquid medium or when heat is applied during drying, but they can be easily released, by simply adding three teaspoons of Diddly Mixture’

He developed a huge following over the months, became the screen printer’s friend and was asked to open a local supermarket, so you can imagine how disappointed everyone was when his column was axed, after his article on ‘How to tie your tie without getting your hand stuck,’ alerted the editors to the fact that he was a complete and utter fictitious wind up, and actually a character based on one of the lads from October Textiles Ltd…reminding us before we get on with the serious stuff, let’s make it fun…