Peter Guest b.1934, died 1995 aged 61, LEO Maintenance Engineer
Margaret Guest, his widow writes: Peter’s education badly disrupted during Wartime,
leaving Wm. Penn School, Peckham, London aged 16 in 1951. Attended Woolwich
Polytechnic 1951-55 for part time day release, obtained ONC in civil engineering while
working for Sir Murdock MacDonald & Partners as a trainee draughtsman. Further HND
studies but National Service in RAF intervened including training in communication
hardware preparing to be a wireless operator and then posted to Aden where he worked for
the Commonwealth Air Forces Communications Network with the rank of Corporal.
Came back and worked for Vickers Armstrong at a factory in Crayford, Kent. At the time
he joined they were building a valve computer for Powers Samas, the PCC, which had an
immense number of problems and not many people capable of solving them! He left
when the PCC was going to be superseded by a future design done by ICT.
Early 1960 (the year we were planning to marry) Peter was employed by LEO in London
(for a very small wage for the first 6 months) while getting a good grounding in all aspects
of this new invention; engineering, testing, commissioning, etc. He was sent out to
maintain computers at Ford Dagenham (LEOII/4) and Ilford Films (LEO II/9)
while we lived in a caravan on the outskirts of Romford. He was also training on LEO
- At the time the head office of LEO Computers was in Bayswater.
Then, about 1964, after LEO amalgamated with English Electric, we moved to the South
Coast where he was sent to commission a new English Electric computer for Lloyds Bank
at Durrington, Worthing, while also troubleshooting other installations in London and the
South Coast.
After the merger with English Electric he spent a lot of time up in Kidsgrove on the KDF9
commissioning and troubleshooting.
Our next move was to Long Ashton, on the outskirts of Bristol where he was Assistan