Joseph Bamford could shoot, fish, swim, and sail. Bamford paid more than fair wages, which rose regularly, and annual bonuses based on reports of individual worth. In 1967 Bamford stood on a farm cart and handed out personal cheques totalling £250,000. This extraordinary focus in return gave unprecedented levels of workforce flexibility, with the average JCB employee through the strike-dominated 1970s and early 1980s being seven times more productive than the average British manufacturing worker. In 1975 Bamford and his wife Marjorie (née Griffin – married 1941) handed over the business to their two sons, and retired to Switzerland as tax exiles.
Samuel Bamford Samuel Bamford Samuel Bamford (28 February 1788 – 13 April 1872), was an English radical and writer, who was born in Middleton, Lancashire. He wrote also in and on dialect. Bamford was one of five children born to Daniel Bamford (a muslin weaver and part-time teacher, and later master of the Salford workhouse), and his wife, Hannah. After his father withdrew him from Manchester Grammar School Bamford became a weaver, and then a warehouseman in Manchester. In 1817 he was imprisoned in the New Bailey Prison in Salford on suspicion of high treason, on account of his political activities. From