Peterson production

“All Peterson pipes are made for individual people. There’s no two Peterson pipes the same.” —Jonathan Fields, Production Manager Lá Fhéile Pádraig sona duit! Happy St. Patrick’s Day to you! I have been saving this interview with Peterson’s production manager Jonathan Fields for a special occasion, and this is it. Jonathan is one of the “new,” younger generation of craftsmen at Peterson—he’s only got 23 years’ service under his belt at this point—but his enthusiasm, energy and strength typify all that’s best about “the lads” out in the shop. So light up your favorite SPD or any of your Petes and enjoy! How’d you get started at Peterson? I think Angela Fortune’s one of the reasons I got a job here. My grandad, Patrick Corcoran used to work here—not on the floor, but as a cleaner and he did all the gardens on the property. And he lived down the road from Angela. And my brother used to play with Angela’s sons. So when I walked in and handed in my CV, Angela said, “Jonathan!” That was on a Friday, and I got the call the following Monday. I always presumed she put in a good word for me, and that’s 20 odd years ago. Well, she’s really one of the biggest reasons the Peterson book got written. I was constantly emailing her and we began to develop a friendship. She was sending me loads of information as she had time and seemed to enjoy and have a knack for the detective work. And then finally she wrote and said, “Why don’t you come over for a week and have a look for yourself? We’d all love to have you.” And so we did. She’s a lovely lady. And she knows my mom as well. To get places, it’s really not what you know, but who you know. Speaking of which, this is my third time to visit the factory and just as on my previous visits, there seems to be a lot of camaraderie. In my teaching days, I was lucky to find one guy that I could joke around with or eat lunch with, but one or the other of us always transferred out just as the friendship was really being established. Jason Hinch, Peterson's lead silversmith We have a group here that hang around each other and slag each other—it’s very good. I was one of the new lads when Jason Hinch [Peterson’s lead silversmith] started, and we kind of clicked together. Did you ever think you’d be production manager? No. When I started back in 1997, there were a lot of older people who’d been here a long time, and I could look down the line and say, ‘No, he’s not retiring yet, so he’ll be in line for it,’ and there were lots of guys like that. I never thought I would’ve made production manager under Tom Palmer [CEO 1991-2018]. For some reason, we never saw eye to eye. He’s a lovely fellow, and he’d…