Page 6 - John D. Cormack

In 1954, he obtained perhaps the most significant post of his career, the Deputy
Distribution Engineer for the Birmingham area of the West Midlands Gas Board. A
number of more senior Engineering positions followed, culminating in the
appointment in 1968 of the Distribution Engineer to the whole of West Midlands Gas
Board which extended from the Welsh Border in the west, to Coventry in the east,
Stoke in the North to Stratford on Avon in the South. An area which contained over 2
million customers and included one of the largest concentrations of industry in the
Country. During this period of John’s career he was associated with 3 of the most
important technical revolutions in the history of the British Gas Industry.

First was the change in gas manufacturing from coal to oil. This involved the
production of gas within large reformer plants making gas available at much higher
pressure than hitherto, and initiated the development of what is now the National gas
grid system.

Second was the introduction of liquefied Natural gas (LNG) from the Middle East,
were natural gas was liquefied and transported by sea in large LNG tankers to the
UK where it was regasified and fed into the grid system.

This led to the third major development following the discovery of natural gas under
the North Sea, which over a period of 5 years required the systematic introduction of
natural gas and the conversion from town gas of every appliance used by the 13
million British Gas customers.

In 1972 John was appointed Director of Engineering for the Southern Gas Board and
was directly responsible for the supply of gas to over 1 million customers, he was
also responsible for all the engineering disciplines within Southern Gas.

He retired in 1983.

John’s sporting interests until around 50 years of age focused mainly on club and
league cricket and had the good fortune of playing some excellent cricket in
Yorkshire and the Midlands area. John’s most notable achievement was being
appointed Vice Captain of Yorkshire Cricket Club, an unheard of event, appointing a
non-Yorkshire man (especially a true Southerner) which ran very much counter to
the Yorkshire adage that there’s nowt much good outside Yorkshire!

John enjoyed many other competitive games requiring ball striking which included
tennis, squash, snooker and golf.