firbeck
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Posts posted by firbeck
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I've done all that, shown them the results, with photographic proof, they don't want to know, they know best. There's so much more to this story, I've only touched the tip of the iceburg, when the council chairman is a grinning, self promoting bitch who's claim to fame is the wife of the former Conservative Party Leader under Thatcher, who's never done a days work in her life and can't tell a house sparrow from an ostrich, then theres not much hope is there.
When I eventually find the inevitable dead Otter, it's going through her living room window with a brick attached.
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Shilton won a record 125 England caps, but should have had 50 more because idiot Greenwood rotated him with the vastly inferior Clemence.
Cheers
Robt P.
I totally agree with you, but didn't Clemence pull off a wonder save from Scanlon to stop Notts knocking Spurs out of the Cup, it ranks with McManus against Peter Lorimer, Leeds v Notts, League Cup, Elland Road.
Quite frankly, the finest save I ever saw in person was Peter Grummitt from a Dennis Law header in arguably one of the best games I ever saw live in any competition, 1967, Forest 3 ( Baker 2, Wignall 1 ) Man Utd 1, ( Best 1 ). I rated that save alongside Banks's epic against Pele, in fact I reckon Gordon learnt from it, Law and Charlton were so impressed that they actually shook the great Grummitts hand afterwards, another fantastic goalie neglected by England, though with our Banksie about, who was going to argue, so whats happened to the era when we had world class goalies who couldn't even get into the England B team.
An amusing tale of Forests 1980 European Cup win for our pal, the Liverpool supporter.
At the time I was restoring a 17th Century cottage in Braintree, it was a complete shambles and we were virtually living in the dining room. The day before the final, my brother in law anounced he was coming down from Yorkshire for a few days to help, but bringing his mad Irish mother and kids with him. After spending a panic stricken evening trying to clear bedroom space, I had to go up to Norfolk the next day to survey an old rectory. On the way home, travelling back at high speed, panicking to let them in, get some tea and settle down for the match, my Mini died on the hill outside Sudbury, the carb had fallen to pieces. Putting it back together as best I could, I crawled home at 20mph in a cloud of black smoke to find them sitting outside the front door, my missus was working late and not around to help.
Stocking up with Fish and Chips, booze and cramming into this tiny room, we watched the match on a grotty flickery telly affected by all the dust. Not forgetting that the others were Liverpool and Keegan fans in particular, I was in despair, but the nutty old girl got so excited, that when Robertson scored she did a lap of honour round the front garden losing her false teeth in the process, she insisted on waiting till full time and the presentation until we had to root around in the flower beds to find them, what a way to watch an epic win, something you never forget, more exciting than the actual match I reckon.
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This is supposed to be a thread about the 70's but has turned into a discussion about the 60's side, why is that then, do people have fonder memories of them for some reason.
Unfortunately for me, I left the City in 76 and missed out on the 'Glory Days', I used to travel to see them locally and witnessed Clarke being brought on as a sub in place of Peter Withe and scoring the winning goal against Ipswich at Portman Road that I believe clinched the Championship. I also went to the Charity Shield Match at Wembley that season when Forest took Ipswich apart 5-1, and Clough showed his perplexing character by taking off O'Neil when he was on a hat trick and playing out of his skin, that was the problem with the man, he could do some stupid things sometimes, and I recall the overwhelming number of Forest fans voicing their disaproval. O'Neil was brilliant that day, you don't take off a player who shines at Wembley, it's a once in a life time opportunity for them personally, and there was no reason for it apart from Cloughs arrogance. Don't get me wrong, the man was a genius, but sometimes he could be a real pain in the bum, we all know that, but thats why he never, unfortunately, became England manager.
One amusing tale of this period, when Forest were going for the European Cup, was that the preliminary matches were only shown as highlights on TV. I had an old mate from Nottm Uni who was Turkish, yet a fanatical Forest fan. He lived in a most remote part of Turkey, next to the Iranian/ Iraq border, but they used to show Forest matches live on their local TV, he would phone me up from this godforsaken part of the world and ask me for my thoughts on a match, only to find I'd been hiding from the score and not yet seen the highlights, he couldn't believe it.
If you want to make the comparisons between the 60's and 70's teams, it was money. The 60's team had no reserve strength because the directors wouldn't put their hands in their pockets.
When Joe Baker had his leg broken by Brian Labone, the 67 side was stuffed, they had no-one to come into the team, Hinton was OK, but that was it, though his style unbalanced the playing formula of the team, the rest of the reserves were just not good enough.
They had no sense either, when Barnwell was injured the next season they invested in the sad, past it Jim Baxter, what scouts had done their homework on him, and remember the Alex Ingram disaster, the greatest centre forward to grace Scottish turf, yeah, right, and let us not forget how they kept playing Sammy Chapman at centre forward, utterly unfair to him, but what did the fans know.
Well at least the 76/77 season saw a lot of red faces down here, Daan Saaf, it was well worth it.
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Teebee,
firbeck, wild life conservation has to be one of the most difficult subjects to deal with, there's always the do gooders who know best but know bu99er all, they think if it looks pretty or looks like their garden the wildlife will love it, rubbish, leave things to go wild and see what you get, I also agree with you about otters, trying to convince folk that you have them in a particular area is a waste of time especially with the so called professionals, so you have my sympathy with the authorities, just keep the records for your self and take some pictures and blow the self important jobsworths
Rog
The problem is, I get really wound up about this sort of thing, I'm not going to let these scumbags get way with it.
The thing is, the area at the back of me is/was really wild, the river walk carries on behind a large housing estate where you have very large swathes of cut grass where people have picnics, fly kites walk their dogs, race around on quad bikes, drink lager, burn trees down, chuck their rubbish about, deal in drugs and generally vandalise everything.
Despite this and despite knowing the problems, the council obtained a £50,000 pound grant from the Essex County Council, formed a commitee of local rich twats, and carried on regardless. As you say, you point out things to any of them and they get all patronising and reckon they know more than you do, which in respect of some of my conversations with these people is complete crap.
I would not admit to being the worlds greatest expert on local wildlife, I wouldn't consider being so, but between my missus, my stepson and myself, we could probably take them apart on anything, we've tried it, but they always tell you something that they want you to hear and lie on behalf of the dickheads that have had an excuse to p### £50,000 of our money up the wall.
We then have self glorification articles in the local paper about for instance, that they have planted 2500 trees along the river here. When I point out to the council that it should make this place look like Sherwood f#####g Forest then, so where are they, what they actually mean is a dozen or so have been planted, neglected and are now dead, the rest being unnecessary hedging saplings that were ripped up and vandalised within a day of planting, followed up by very clever mowing removal by their own employees, but do they want to know, like hell, they've accounted for their dosh and thats all they care about.
You want to see the mega bucks childrens play area, it's a load of crappy old logs arranged in a circle, we call it Woodhenge, constructed and maintained by a company from Sheffield, they regularly have to come down here and fix it, being put up in local hotels at our expense, all the local families and kids hate the bloody thing, mind you, it's a good meeting place for the local dope and lager heads, so thats alright then.
The council refuse to talk to me about it.
Complaining about this sort of thing is time consuming and exasperating, trying to get people to back you up is hopeless, they shove their two penneth into to me over the fence and that's it. Unbelievably theres a bloke across the road who's an Otter expert with the Essex Wildlife trust, he admits to finding spraints down the back here, but wants a quiet life and won't make any complaints.
I ain't giving up, I decided to bide my time and see what happened over the summer, this time last year they shoved a gang mower through everything and destroyed the local habitat, it hasn't happened, so somethings afoot, I think it's time to strike.
Just out of interest, when I moved in last year before the scumbags went on the rampage, this is what I had in my small garden, backing on to this place, which haven't been seen this year.
Reed Buntings, feeding with their chicks, Category Red RSPB, Willow Warblers, feeding with chicks, Category Orange RSPB, Yellowhammers, Corn Buntings, Greater and Lesser Spotted Woodpeckers, Buzzards, even sparrows, sloworms, grassnakes, Comma butterflies, Emperor Dragonflies, down the river, Little Grebes, Egrets, Kingfishers, evidence of Otters, though I'm sure I disturbed one last week, munkjak and roe deer, badgers, even Mr Fox has'nt been having his usual argument over the fence with our Jack Russell.
What can you say, what can you do, but I'm a nuisance, it disturbs their little lifestyle and their clinical view on the world according to the Local Authorities route map, what I say doesnt count, they know best, but in reality they have a lot to answer for.
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Ayup firbeck,
A quick question though, what was the Jack Russel doing on your bird table? we get squirrels up here on our tables
Rog
Sorry, poor use of grammar, he'd get on there if he could when the wood pidgeons are about, he hates them, anything else is safe. We have an overfriendly Robin, he's just been sitting on a garden chair outside the patio door waiting for some meal worms, he's so brazen that he'll fly in and sit on a dining room chair, or hop around the birdseed bags on the kitchen worktop, the dog couldn't care less, he'll sit on the kitchen doorstep and the Robin will join him, they seem quite good pals.
We seem to have a large number of Coal Tits on the feeders this morning, whereas yesterday we had a huge flock of Long Tailed Tits flitting about in the trees.
We moved to Braintree nearly two years ago, what attracted us to this house was that despite living only a few minutes walk from the town centre, the River Blackwater flows a 100m away over the back of the fence, so the end of our garden is just trees, and a wilderness running into attractive river walks, it's quite something. The only trouble is that the local council and a bunch of ignorant, rinse haired, rich local pillocks have been messing with the area for the past year, it's been a bit of a saga which got me in the local newspaper, it still hasn't been resolved, it's an interesting story of how the so called great, good and influential, like to manipulate things for their own devices without actually knowing what they are messing with, but the self opinionated, but thick wife of one of Thatchers former henchmen is involved so it's hard going.
If you are interested I'll tell you the tale sometime, lets just put it this way, they have wiped out the habitat of rare breeding birds, like the Reed Bunting, but call me a liar when I try to present my case, despite having photos, which they refuse to look at. Thank you RSPB for not bothering to back me up. We have Otters down here, well known, but they make life hard for them as well, people cluck about and offer you support but do nothing, it's opened my eyes to the difficulties of wildlife protection, I can tell you, it makes you want to weep.
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Pretty sure I have the Answer, they will be gulls heading to roost , from (possibly) a land fill , to some where relatively safe ( possibly the Trent)
They don't always fly in that V formation ,and if they are dawdling it is to try and catch a thermal to aid their flight
Sounds like a good bet, we get loads over here at night, they go to the landfill site just north of Braintree then fly off back to the coast in the evening, as the gull flies it's probably only about 15 odd miles to the estuary at Maldon, they sometimes fly in V formation if it's a nice evening or generally wheel about looking for thermals over the town. Something upset them big time in their way in early the other morning, I reckon it may have been our Mr Nasty, our local Sparrow Hawk, he really is a hell of a predator, nothing is safe round here, even our Jack Russell doesn't feel comfortable when he's about. He was standing on our bird table the other morning, arrogant git, he really is a handsome specimen and bloody big too, I wouldn't want to argue with him, typical though, as soon as you reach for the camera, he's off.
When I lived in our last village though, we did get massive flocks of rooks flying about every night at certain times, they all went off to a particular wood, they never nested there as the trees were too immature, they seemed to accumulate from other places as if there was safety in numbers, I can't think what predators were about over there, apart from the local gamekeeper, who notoriously blasted everything in sight, but the silly sods chose to roost in the nearest wood to his house, I could never work that one out.
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Ratcliffe/Radcliffe, I got them confused as well.
Weren't there water troughs on the line at Hathern, nearby, I have a vague memory of this, I thought that there must be some list of them on the net somewhere but no luck so far.
I can't even think where there were any others locally, can anyone remember, Clay Cross, Carlton on Trent, High Dyke??? these places ring a bell somewhere.
I used to spend time at Hest Bank troughs south of Carnforth, they were the only ones I remember being in use and getting close to, you had to watch out for the spray if something was travelling at speed, mainly Britannias in those days at the end of steam.
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Oh no, I didn't realise that the gang were twitchers, what fantastic sightings Beefsteak, brilliant, it must be in the blood, trains, aircraft, general interest, I bet that you are despairing that I'm a twitcher as well, thank god that decent people care, I usually have the p##s taken out of me for taking an interest, but there you go, what do they know or care.
Looks like a buzzard to me by the way, rarities in this part of the world.
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Interesting to look on the old 1885 map and see no trace of this railway, well there wouldn't be, it wasn't open until 1889, on the other hand, how long would it have taken to build all those tunnels and cuttings, it must have taken a few years.
Had the formations remained intact to this day it could have made an ideal tram route, the Circle Line of Nottingham, linking up from Bulwell, to Daybrook then round the suburban to Weekday Cross, but who would have forseen a future tram system when it was closed.
Incidentally, I have a vague memory of catching an excursion train to Mablethorpe from Daybrook Station in the 50's, why from there, I don't know, it must have been a pain to get to from Wollaton, no doubt it must have been one of my fathers cunning plans, nice to think that I must have actually travelled through Mapperley Tunnel by steam, no doubt hauled by one of those impressive K3's.
I also remember catching an excursion to Mablethorpe from Midland, on leaving the station we were shunted backwards into Low Level Station where a very gleaming K3 was waiting to take us on to our destination, wierd thing to do, but there was no connecting spur at Netherfield then. Obviously both trains started from other places, possibly Derby. I always recall the excitement of going off on these trips, never remembering coming back though, but I have a memory of arriving back at Mablethorpe Station and finding it so full of trains that I didn't know where to start looking for ours.
As an aside, for those who complain about the railways these days, our youth has just insisted on being given a lift to Witham from Braintree, looking it up on the net, it's only £2:10p return on the train, he's just gone off to the station in disgust, bloody bargain I think, it makes more sense than all the time and money spent driving the boggers around.
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So were you on our doomed train in 1960 then.
A couple of memories of that trip, remember the scrapyard on the left on the way in to Doncaster, it was full of Churchill tanks, their turrets poking above the piles of scrap metal. We were also treated to the sight of Deltic parked up at the south end of the station, I've just looked at my brothers scanned photo of it, unfortunately Photobucket says no and my computer goes barmy if I try to send anything at the moment.
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"just sent to fight"? as at belsen or warsaw ghetto? and not just nazi's in WW1 they were burning villages in belgium. My dad used to say the war ended too soon, another year would have done it, as per hiroshima
I think I understand what you are trying to say, but I don't think that my old man would have agreed
with your last statement, after fighting through Europe, he also had the misfortune to be sent off to India to fight the Japanese as part of Tiger Force, luckily for him he arrived at Bombay on the day that Hiroshima was nuked, saved the lives of thousands of allied troops they reckon.
Incidentally, the old man was the first into Belsen, they were chasing a Panzer Div at the time and it wasn't prudent to stop, he radioed in to inform the authorities and that was that. When I asked him about it, he reckoned he saw worse things in the war, what they were, I never found out.
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Sorry, in a bit of a mood this morning.
Did any of you old boys get involved with the infamous Ian Allan trip from Vic to Doncaster Works in 1960.
Ian Allan Publications, via the Trains Illustrated magazine organised a trip to Doncaster works, I think it was supposed to start from Leicester Central, but it was due to be pulled by City of Truro double heading with Compound 1000. Great, the old man did some overtime and paid for the 10 shillings ticket each for my brother and I and off we trotted to Vic.
The platform was solid with spotters, but did we see the great duo, no, in came a filthy B1 instead, we found out later that the trip had been massively over subscribed and anything was thrown into the fray to keep us happy. Unfortunately the B1 died on the embankment alongside Hucknall Airfield, blocking the line. After hours of mucking about, we were dragged off to Doncaster by a replacement engine and arrived hours late. We were then treated to a high speed run around the works, it was pathetic. I remember a line of gleaming pacifics being pulled out of the paint shop and being dragged away before we could see what they were. We were then ordered back on the train and taken back to Vic, I have a lovely sequence of events of this day on photos, taken by my brother.
What made it worse, was that in the panic, I left my Ian Allan books on the train and never saw them again, all those numbers lost forever.
Eventually Ian Allan Publications saw the error of their ways and sent us a book token, for their products of course, I still have the combie that I bought as a consequence of this.
As for City of Truro and Compound 1000, never saw them once on that day, have done since and even been pulled by CoT, but what a bloody shambles on the day.
Did anyone else experience it.
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Strangely enough, the last A4 I saw at speed on a normal working through Grantham was Sir Nigel Gresley, I have a rather blurred photograph of it somewhere. That day was the only time we sneaked around the sheds, there was another A4 in there, think it was Silver Fox, we went in the cab as well.
If Mallard ever came into Grantham on a stopping train, the drivers always used to let us spotters in the cab, it was as if they were obliged to do so. We went to an exhibition at Lincoln in 1958 where a load of motive power was displayed, including Mallard, we were allowed to walk through the corridor tender, I was only a little kid then and it was claustrophobic, how a large driver ever managed to get through there at speed, I'll never know.
I recall the very first Deltic prototype appearing at Grantham and later at Doncaster, it looked smart in it's blue livery with yellow stripes, later the first production type appeared, the first one I saw at Grantham was 'Alycidon', the cab was stuffed with technicians in white overalls, if any diesel had the charisma to take over from those pacifics, only the Deltics had it, on a school trip we timed one at 108 down Stoke Bank, nothing these days is it.
The Midland Pullman was a gem, pity one wasn't preserved. At first we had to go to Sawley to watch it come through, then it was introduced to Nottingham. Despite being skint schoolkids, we were determined to have a ride on the last working. We could only afford a one way trip to Loughborough, it was a first class ticket plus Pullman supplement, hideously expensive, we even decided to wear our school uniforms so we would look reasonably smart. On the great day, we were greeted at the door by a steward, all straight faced, and shown to our seats, it was magic. Big problem, the venetian blinds were down, they were set between the double glazing and couldn't be manually adjusted. There were several buttons to press, I pressed the wrong one and the ever patient steward arrived and put us right. It was a great experience, when we got out at Loughborough, the spotters at the end of the platform were astonished by the sight of these 'erberts getting off a Pullman.
We decided to go back via the GCR and a scruffy Black 5, of course we had first class tickets and the guard was very red faced when he tried to chuck us out of our compartment.
My only other experience of a Pullman was in the 70's. I used to travel up to Huddersfield from Nottingham on a friday night to see my girlfriend, right journey that was, it must have been a real pain for a non enthusiast. I had noticed, however, that the Deltic hauled 'Yorkshire Pullman' always followed us up from Wakefield to Leeds. One night, I got out at Wakefield and waited for it to come in, in came the usual gleaming Deltic with the Pullman, the stewards were waiting at the doors, I explained that I just fancied the trip to Leeds and would hang out the window of the nearest Pullman coach next to the Deltic and not bother anyone, and they let me on too, magic, the days of reasonable folk eh!!
My old man had a tandem, our only means of transport them days. My older brother went on the back and I sat on a little red seat on the cross bar in front of him. Every saturday morning we went shopping round town, but if we got back early, out came the tandem and we went down to Stanton Gate for a bit of spotting on the bridge, followed by a trip up to the Stanhope Arms at Stanton where the old man would have a pint. I clearly remember going there one day and seeing a Garrett on a freight out of Toton yard and just looking at the shaky pencil underlining in my very old Combine Volume, it was 47990!!
If you lived Radcliffe on Soar way, do you remember the little steam shunter that lived in the small shed next to the river and worked the Gypsum trains, it was all green and gleaming and always used to be outside having a service on a sunday lunchtime.
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Ayup firbeck,
I should imagine going down Stoke bank at 126 mph in a DMU would be quite an experience and put you off rail travel for life, In your opinion which was the best railway? ie: GWR, LNER, Midland etc and why, I'm just curious no other reason.
Rog
Just going all that way to London on a DMU nearly put me off for life.
All those trips to Grantham made the LNER my favourite, it was fantastic to see those pacifics coming through the station at high speed, and of course the excitement of peering down the London end of the line and seeing a 'Streak' heading our way.
We went to Peterborough for a change once, an A1 there and an A4 back, it was the only time that I travelled along there by steam.
I went to Crewe a few times and saw the Stanier Pacifics, but never at speed, and it was exciting to travel on the GW for the first time and see all their 'pretty' loco's, and of course travelling on holiday behind a Southern pacific was an experience.
But the LNER did it for me more than the others.
Railway Walks was mildly interesting, I thought that there'd be a bit more about Weymouth, but Portland is a strange place, forts and quarries all over the place, if you ever go, try and get a trip up Portland Bill Lighthouse, worth the effort.
The programme did clear up a mystery for me, I knew that an old battleship had been sunk as a blockship in Portland Harbour but was told it was the Iron Duke, so now we know it was the pre-dreadnought Hood, there you go.
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C'mon, be positive about it, if we don't need the stations and the Luftwaffe are forgiven, then the world is a better place, isn't it? If the Nazi Luftwaffe killers are accepted and drooled over at book signings at Duxford then thats fine, my late uncle who flew decimated Blenheims and won a DFC for his bravery against the 'Hun', would I'm sure have embraced meeting his former adversaries who were trying to kill him.
I went on a course to Bavaria, home of the Nazis, a couple of years ago. It was impossible to get anything out of them about the war. We all got pissed in a bar one night and one of them admitted that his uncle had been in U Boats during the war. When I pointed out to him that anyone who had been in action in submarines, whichever side, were very brave men, he just shrugged and didn't want to talk about it, they have a very guilty conscience, lets hope they lose it, we have to forgive but not forget, it seems to be their guilty problem not ours.
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We went on a mystery trip via the railway to Weymouth cirrca 1974/5. It was a long way for a day trip , but well worth it.
Incedently we had a sweep stake to guess where we were going , the driver won !!
Great, they used to do all those trips in those days, why not now. I never went on a mystery trip, but I remember about the same time going from Nottingham to Edinburgh and return for a fiver, to Plymouth and on a very interesting trip to London Zoo via Grantham on a load of old rattly DMU's connected together, they tried to beat Mallards record down Stoke Bank, but didn't quite succeed!!!!
Trouble is, the privatitised system would end up arguing about the validity of cross service tickets, sad isn't it, happy days, eh.
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Don't forget there were peoples from just about every country in the world who fought for the allies including Hidu's, sikhs, and Muslim's, The only peoples that don't seem to bother or don't understand is our young folk, and I put that down to us older folk for not educating them.
Rog
Yes I agree with you in a way, but I was trying to put it into the context of modern thinking, people like to conveniently manipulate the past these days to suit themselves, it's not PC, whether you are green, purple or ginger pink with blue spots. On the other hand, the people you speak of fought as a consequence of being part of the British Empire or in the case of the Far East during WW2, the Dutch Empire as well ( we disregard the French dependencies as they were mostly loyal to Vichy), they really hadn't got a lot of choice in this, being subjegated by their colonial masters and being persuaded, possibly benignly, but who knows, to support their imperial rulers in whatever War to End Wars was going on at the time.
There was a story that Indian troops, Sikh, Hindu, Muslim or otherwise, who were captured in the desert campaign, were turned by the Nazis and integrated into an Indian SS Division, with the promise of an independent India after the war, a similar campaign was also carried out by the Japanese. I can't blame the Indian nationalists for doing this, the Empire of India was dying anyway as a colonial power, on the other hand, the consequences of an Axis takeover of India would have been even worse, at least the British had the sense to give them independance after the war, the Nazis or Japanese Warlords would have turned them all into permanent slaves at best, I shudder to think what might have happened had these scum obtained world dominance.
I don't think that anything that we do or say will turn young people round, some will, most won't, it's a fact of life.
I don't know about you but I was born only 5 years after the war, my father fought in some of the most savage battles in European history, but many of these people, like my father, are now dead. Kids of today don't have that immediate relationship with people who have experienced such horrors of warfare, unless they live in Colchester.
The world is a different place from the one I grew up in, these kids haven't even gone through the experience of the Cold War, life has been easy for them, it's not their fault that they don't appreciate the sacrificies made for our future, thats the way it is.
My big boy is 22, he's graduated from Nottingham Uni and now learning to be a teacher at Clifton, he's had to suffer everything thrown at him about this from both me and his grandad, the lucky boy went to the 50th anniversary of D-Day at Arromanches, when father died in 2005, I broke the news to my son, who's first words were,'But I'll never be able to walk the beaches of D-Day with grandad ever again', it had me in tears as it does now, but will the bu99er wear a poppy and go down to his local memorial on Rememberance Sunday, I doubt it, thats the way it is.
It's not just kids either. I used to be a Scout leader in Finchingfield. Every year we had a parade on Rememberance Day at the War Memorial. We had a change of vicar who didn't want to suffer the outside elements and shoved the service totally in the church instead. I blatantly told him that the poor buggers in the trenches didn't have a choice, it fell on deaf ears. I refused to go and stood alone on the Green for 3 years on my own, every one of those days was stunningly beautiful but no-one else turned up, except once, 2 young cyclists were passing and when the clock started to chime 11:00, they got off their bikes and bowed to the memorial, it was very touching, I'll never forget it.
I went to Duxford last year for their service, we were blessed with current USAF combat F-15 pilots and members of the Anglian Regiment who received medals for bravery in Afghanistan, that was something else, I was also able to go in the Land Warfare Hall and have a few moments of thought in front of the silly D-Day figure with the motorbike that my old man thought was based on him, I shall be there this year, even if I have to walk, it means a lot to me in many ways.
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As an expat, I'd like to know what the mood is up in the city about this day.
Do you all wear your poppies, do you have any relatives who were involved in any conflict, what does the city do to remember, in fact do many people care anymore. Do you think it's a waste of time in this day and age to carry on with this, despite the fact that British troops are dying everyday on foreign soil, political judgements aside, do you respect their memories.
Does the establishment grit it's teeth and try to make us think about it, or have you personal memories that you wish to quietly think about.
I have, but then I'm an old git with family heroes that put their lives on the line for us. Looking at the current Lord Mayor, it must be a bit wierd for him to participate in any ceremony, I don't mean that nastily, it's a consequence of our 'wonderful' multicultural society, it can't mean much to most of them, and fair enough, their ancestors were probably not involved. Despite the fact that people like my father put their lives at risk to save them from the efforts of the 'Ultimate Aryan Nazi Society' to wipe them out in the death camps, which they would have surely done, I think that they forget about that, sad, but prove me wrong please.
What are your comments.
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Well, it wasn't bad while it lasted, but I'm afraid that the BBC have replaced Railway Night with Barbara Cartland Night, should appeal to the same people, obviously.
Poor Julia and her Railway Walks is sandwiched between savagery on the Western Front and a pink monster.
Anyway, it looks a good one, on the old Portland branch from Weymouth. If you've not been there, it's a good place with lots of history and things to see.
I went on holiday to Weymouth in 1961, train from Midland to St Pancras, think it was a Jubilee, taxi to Waterloo, then a WC class to Weymouth. What a place in those days, our boarding house was just down from the station and I used to sit on the bank overlooking the line at the shed road. Hardly any diesels, a shunter that served the Portland Naval base and railcars from Cardiff, everything else was steam, SR, GWR and once I even came across an LMS 8F while sneaking round the sheds.
On the way home we had to catch a holiday relief which was pulled by a Schools class 4-4-0, fabulous engines, we took the late lamented avoiding line through Ringwood and during a signal check in the New Forest, the guard and I were feeding the ponies alongside the track, happy memories of a long lost era.
My next visit was to catch the evening Boat Train to Weymouth to connect with the ferry to Jersey in 1965. We were pulled by MN, 'United States Lines' from Waterloo, BR had cocked up the seat reservations and we had to sit in the restaurant car, but we were given a free evening meal as an apology.
It was quite exciting to be pulled through the streets of Weymouth late at night to the ferry terminal, I can't remember whether it was one of those GWR Panniers, it may have been, but I suspect it was a diesel.
We travelled back on the overnight ferry, 'Sarnia', the sea was extremely rough, fortunately we have good sea legs, I recall standing on the front below the bridge with the waves crashing over us, didn't sleep a wink.
On boarding the boat train at Weymouth Harbour, very early in the morning, we were boarded by Customs and Exise officers, my father had bought me a divers watch and persuaded my mother to wear it up her arm in the hope she wouldn't be searched, she was c######g herself, but they didn't bother looking.
On getting home I tried it out in Highfields Lido, it promptly filled up with water and never worked again, it must have been the quality of the water in Highfields, not!!!!
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Can anyone remember a band at the Imperial called 'Almost Grown', they used to do a regular Saturday night slot in the late 60's early 70's, their lead guitarist was phenomenal, used to do Cream type stuff. They packed it in because of family commitments and finished off with a blazing last concert, culminating in much guitar and amp smashing at the end, was anyone there at the time.
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Sorry, Kermit Weekes nicked the only flying Sunderland in the early 90's, it used to be kept on the Medway near Rochester and I was lucky enough to see it at Biggin Hill about 20 years ago before it went across to the Sunshine State. His Fantasy of Flight Museum claim to use it for trips, but I've heard it hasn't flown for 12 years, at least it's inside the museum, but even the museum building got badly damaged in a hurricane about 10 years ago.
Thinking about it, it probably got damaged in the storm along with a lot of his other stuff and it's taken a while to get it up and running again.
You must have seen our DX Catalina or possibly the one that flies out of Holland, the only others I can think of is one that was stashed away at North Weald ( oh dear ), though it might have now gone, and the former DX one that crashed in the Solent a few years ago and now resides in bits in Ireland.
You do get the odd Grumman Goose around though.
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Loads, I won't go into that, I'll just tell you a funny story.
I used to be very pally with John Holmes, who I gather is back on the local radio, is that right?
When Kid Jensen, who I met in the chipoil on Maid Marion Way, was having a special party, back in the 70's, and I can't remember why, John Holmes told me all about it and where he lived, which was in a big house down Lenton somewhere. So me and 'Erbert wandered in, helped ourselves to a drink in the kitchen and were immediately pounced on by some rinse haired old bag who asked who we were, on explaining that we were pals of John Holmes, she said 'He's on the other radio station, we have nothing to do with him' and were asked to leave, feeling very guilty and much intimidated by this Barbara Cartland lookalike, we downed our pints and left, never saw Mr Jensen or Mr Holmes, who I reckon was in there but was no doubt cracked up laughing at our misfortune, he never let on.
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The Lancaster that Kermit Weekes purchased is, indeed, in a number of shipping containers at his "Fantasy of Flight" museum in Florida. However, the parts are not rotting, and he does have plans to rebuild the aircraft - the problem he has is too many aircraft, too little time, but he does do a good job of grabbing rare stuff if he feels it is about to disappear forever.
Apparently, he often does the "back lot" tour himself too! He also owns the only "all original" flying spitfire in the world - and he flies it! It even has original spec paint - he claims that was the most difficult part to find!
The tale of Lancaster KB976 is very tragic. It was owned and flown by the Strathallan Collection in Scotland until the 80's then purchased by Charles Church. Despite it being in airworthy condition he decided to employ BA to give it a good going over in their facility at Woodford. Work got to the stage where it was being repainted and prepared for it's test flight when the hangar roof collapsed on it killing 2 roofers and breaking the back of the aircraft. At this point Church was killed flying his hybrid MkV Spitfire and his estate wasn't interested in the a/c so parts of it ended up all over the place. Somebody over here attempted to buy it but Kermit stepped in and salvaged what he could, quite frankly, if he hadn't done that, I doubt whether there would be much chance of any of it being seen again, so I applaud him for that. Large sections of the aircaft still remain over here, mainly in Yorkshire, including the tail and parts of the fuselage back of the mid upper turret.
To make up for that, Kermit obtained the missing bits from KB994, which coupled with bits from the hybrid Lincoln were hanging around at North Weald.
The problem is that these parts have been sitting in 7 sea containers, in the Florida climate for about 10 years now, I've seen a picture of the cockpit area taken inside one of the containers and it's a bloody mess, especially when you consider that the a/c was still flying only 20 odd years ago.
I like to think that Kermits heart is in the right place, but he seems to take on to much, I'll never forgive him for allowing to let the Mossie become unairworthy, which had a lot to do with the Florida climate, nor pinch the last flying Sunderland away from us, I was lucky enough to see it fly over here and it was awsome.
As for his MkXVI spit being the most original, I would suspect that the Shuttleworth Collection and the BBMF would strongly dispute that, he hasn't even had it painted in it's original colour scheme!!
There are at least 10 flyers ahead of the game, the Israeli MkIX, a much older a/c, seems to be a serious contender for the most original, I gather it's been constantly in the air since it was built.
The most original non flying Spit in terms of it's age, appears to be the example displayed at the Chicago Museum of Science and Technology, so it's one up for our American friends at least.
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The 'Broxtowe' line runs out to Kimberley Colliery, it's branch goes to Awsworth, I can remember now a bridle path from the Cossall to Kimberley road that had railway tracks running down it as recently as the late 60's.
The map clearly shows the junction of the Newcastle branch with the Trowell line and the position of the coal wharf off Ilkeston road, which must be under those University accomodation buildings now.
Fascinating map, I really must go out now.
Twitchers!
in General Hobbies and Interest Chat
Posted
Possibly selling Otter pelts to boost the family income, thanks a lot, I'm really down today and that little posting really cracked me up, thanks, I really appreciated that.
Actually, to be fair to our Tony, I've had issues before and I've actually found Mr Newton to be very nice bloke, helpful and on the ball, unfortunately madam is just a cow living on his reputation, not the way to run a council is it.