Absent Friend

They probably don’t make tights like that anymore. The technology was obviously at an early stage. Though these girls may have been on the cusp of modernity in April 1969, the tights did not really do them any favours – wrinkly knees, Nora Batty style. Smart move, Paula.

The occasion was Sheila’s forthcoming emigration to Tasmania. We were playing football on “the dips” and the girls came down to join us so that we could say goodbye to her. Sadly, she was never to return and so this was the last time that we saw her.

I had intended to go on a bit about the railway on the embankment in the background, but it can wait for another time.

R.I.P., Sheila Culshaw, remembered with affection by her friends. [Photo with thanks to Dave Beck]

Deltics or Westerns?

Tricky. Deltics had an air of power and grandeur about them and did a lot of impressive throbbing. Westerns were easier on the eye - perhaps the most attractive diesels of all. I was lucky enough to see all the members of both classes [though, on reflection, I would have preferred to have copped all the Streaks and Kings].

D9005 The Prince of Wales’s Own Regiment of Yorkshire at York, 25/10/71.

D1030 Western Musketeer at Reading, 21/8/71.

Birkenhead North

Birkenhead North station was opened by the Wirral Railway in 1888, as Birkenhead Docks. It was renamed Birkenhead North in 1926 by the London Midland and Scottish Railway. Through electric trains to Liverpool began in 1938 via the Mersey rail tunnel. There has been recent upgrading to the original station buildings and a park and ride facility has been added.

We knew it as the junction for West Kirby line trains, on the few occasions that we went off to dabble in the Dee. Otherwise, it was because we had taken a West Kirby train home from Liverpool as far as North, rather than wait for a New Brighton train underground in the city - in other words, to break up the journey. Though the advantage would be daylight and comparatively fresh air, on the downside, the surroundings were visually a little depressing, and a cold wind could certainly howl along that platform from time to time, though that was certainly not the case on this summer’s day in 1971.

Between 1971 and 1978, the DMU services to Wrexham [previously from New Brighton and later from Bidston] terminated at the central platform here, which is why the Liverpool bound electric service is seen using the platform on the left.

The Borderers

Carlisle youth hostel, known as Etterby House, was on Etterby Road at the northern edge of the city. It had previously been the abode of a local magnate and came with its own fishing rights on the River Eden. We spent 7 overnight stays there, as part of 5 different Lake District short breaks between October 1964 and April 1972.

In April 1967, we travelled there by car but had to secrete it around a corner and out of sight, as YHA rules did not permit such things at that time. We invented a story, which no one would ever have believed had we seriously had to air it, that we were travelling by canoe. I think that my mum knitted my light-blue bobble hat, which is just in view. It was obviously as much of a ‘Wow” with the girls that we had met the night before as my anorak must have been. [Photo with thanks to Ian Hughes]

The hostel closed in 1997. The building has since been converted into several individual properties and renamed Eden Bank.  

Rather than fish, the attraction that this location provided was the view of Kingmoor sheds, as well as that from the bridge just to the south where the main line from Glasgow crossed the River Eden in its approach to Carlisle Citadel station. Our earlier visits coincided with the run-down of steam power, before it disappeared completely in 1968. By 1967, Kingmoor had become a hot-spot for the Britannia Pacifics already ousted from other parts of the network.

Type One No. D8120 is passing below the Etterby Road bridge on 25/3/67.

Type Two No. D5708 has just crossed the River Eden in Carlisle on 25/3/67.

Pullman Surprise

The only other time that I remember seeing one of the blue Pullmans was when the South Wales Pullman turned up at Aintree with a Grand National day special, on 27/3/65. As can be seen, the drivers of the blue Pullmans wore white coats. Its design was certainly very modern at the time, although I was a bit disappointed that a diesel unit adorned the front cover of my summer 1962 combined volume. I was obviously sufficiently impressed by its arrival, however, to devote a photograph to it.

In this view, race-goers were still streaming from another special train that had set down its passengers at a more westerly platform. The station was a hive of activity on this day. All the other special trains were locomotive-hauled and most of those arrived behind steam.  Having shed the punters, they quickly vacated the platforms to allow access for following special trains. Locomotives stabled their stock in nearby sidings and then went off to Aintree sheds, or elsewhere, for servicing.

The Mini Dress

Our first holiday away as a couple was exploring the Cambrian coast line between Aberystwyth and Pwllheli. We stayed at Borth, Corris, Llanbedr and Harlech youth hostels between the 26^th and 30^th July 1969. Chris was sixteen and she had made her own mini dress. There would not have been much of an outlay on the amount of fabric required. She had recently won the needlework prize at her girls’ grammar school.

Corris was the only hostel that we could not reach by train, so we took our haversacks on the bus. It was in the old village school building and it looked quite forbidding and spooky. Overnight, it was pitch black, the wind blew through the rafters, the fittings creaked and Chris was the only one in the ladies’ dormitory. She has never forgiven me for strictly adhering to the separate dormitories rule. After all, I did not want to get kicked out of the YHA.

At Harlech station, waiting for the train home, on 30/7/69.

A DMU heading for Machynlleth, in the southbound platform at Barmouth station, on 27/9/69.

An early morning pick-up freight enters Llanbedr station [then known as Talwrn Bach] behind a Brush Sulzer Type 2, on 29/7/69.

The Colour Maroon

I’m not sure that I’ve ever got as worked up as some folk about locomotive liveries. Maybe that’s because our time came well after the independent companies had ceased to exist in 1948. I know that the rivalries established prior to that change spilled over into the BR regional set-up amongst those who were already in one camp or another.

My own interest has always been aesthetic, but rather on design as a whole, rather than just colour. Are they nice to look at? In the early days, it was pretty clear that some steam locomotives were a lot more attractive than others and that was also true of the new diesel and electric types that replaced them. Yet, I know that a lot of attention was nevertheless afforded to liveries. I would guess that preferences eventually reflected familiarity.

Our big steam engines were always red or green and so that is how we still like to see them today. I remember the curiosity and even a degree of bewilderment that surrounded the new Western diesels when they started appearing in desert sand and golden ochre, as well as maroon and green – now that did seem to be revolutionary.

We also witnessed the arrival of some experimental engines, which we just viewed as complete curiosities, like Falcon, Kestrel, the all-white Lion, DP2 and GT3 - the box shaped creature with an outline and dimensions more like those of a main line steam tender engine. Most of these became regulars at Crewe. We saw them all at one time or another, but I had no idea what their essential mechanical characteristics were, what it was that made them special, or the ways in which they represented any significant technological advance. For us, they were unusual one off numbers to be spotted and any attraction was in their uniqueness.

The west bound Bristol Pullman in Bath Spa on 7/8/64. These units were known to us as the “blue Pullmans” well before British Rail had its own blue period.