Scriv

Members
  • Content Count

    361
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Everything posted by Scriv

  1. I know; couldn't resist a leg-pull though.
  2. You should've bought it. Handy place to hide a stash of dodgily-acquired railwayana.
  3. On the left as you came out of the station, no more than 150 yards from the Carrington Street bridge. Memory's a bit faded now but ISTR it was a black sign with white writing.
  4. I wouldn't bother unless it's over thirty years old! Modern vehicles baffle me nearly as much as computers do; too many gizmos on them. Every time my lorry breaks down it's never something simple, more often a sensor has failed rather than the actual part itself.
  5. One sign that always used to interest me was visible for many years when travelling from Nottingham Midland station in the Loughborough direction. It read, "Furniss Bros. Hog Salesmen"; don't know if it's still there, I always assumed it was some sort of livestock business associated with the Cattle Market. Can anyone shed any light on it, and does it still exist?
  6. Does not surprise me one bit. My son-in-law is a Ford technician, and a very good one too; but it was me who showed him how to fabricate a gasket with a small ball pein hammer and an old cornflake packet. i served my apprenticeship in the Royal Electrical & Mechanical Engineers as a mechanic; don't practise my trade for a living any more but all the skills I was taught have come in useful for one thing or another.Still got the adjustable spanner I made when I was 16 and it still works too!
  7. Nah.... we'd just gi'n up waiting. Nowt we didn't already know anyway; even the rats go round in pairs up there.
  8. I haven't worked there for quite some time mate; I'm told by a good friend of mine who still drives there that it's changed a lot from those days, but having said that it's still a superb railway and I'm sure someone with your depth of experience would be welcomed no matter where you wanted to help.
  9. Been there got the t-shirt.... or chef's whites anyway! GCR Loughborough, 1982 IIRC; the "Edwardian" dinner train with me as chef. The other chap is the inimitable John Jenkinson, one of the railway's great characters. I can assure you it's great fun, and volunteers are always welcome.
  10. Pity some people have to hijack a thread about an interesting subject to vent their own inverted snobbery.
  11. I suspect Hornes were neighbours of theirs in Tollerton, before they moved to Thurgarton in the mid-1960's; Dick designed the house himself as you'll remember, unfortunately his timing was poor and the oil crisis in the early 1970's made it horrendously expensive to heat. I lived in Thurgarton for many years and knew everyone in the village; Celia was a close friend of my parents and I, and I can assure you that there was no Horne family in the village. Dick died suddenly in his office, in 1983 of a heart attack, he'd not been well for some years . He did have a Lotus, a Europa; he was a bit
  12. According to most period photos they're black and white. And if it got a few kids interested in steam it could be ginger pink for all I care.
  13. i do know Jim, he's still there. And the Dicks, that'd be Celia who was my Dad's next door neighbour. Her husband (Arthur, but always known simply as Dick) was an architect. Horne doesn't ring any bells though.
  14. Post it up by all means Dennis; my memories only go back as far as the early 1970's really, be interesting to fill in the blanks.
  15. I've never heard anyone described as looking like a pox-doctor's clerk, but in my younger days the term "stinks like a pox-doctor's clerk" was used to describe a man who wore too much cheap after-shave. I daresay it comes from the days when perfume was used to disguise bad smells.
  16. I mentioned Watts earlier in the thread; I knew Dave Watts slightly, very nice bloke.
  17. My late mother lived at 11, Hillside Cottages, Main Street until she married my father in 1948; the house was her grandmother's, and she'd have lived there from about 1928 to 1948. Her grandmother was a Mrs. Shaw, later Mrs. Rowbotham when she remarried after being widowed around 1930; her second husband was Joseph Rowbotham, a local baker. Having just glanced at the Streetview image, I can offer the following information; the white house on the opposite corner of Hillside Drive was, during the 1960's,a grocer's shop, owned by a chap called Neil Page who was a friend of my mother's and lived
  18. I am not in any way a civil engineer; but my guess would be that it was considerably cheaper to demolish it and build a new one, than to rebuild the existing bridge to the acceptable standard. Remember that it had received no structural maintenance for the thick end of half a century. Despite those structures looking incredibly solid, like anything else they need looking after or else they deteriorate beyond economical repair. Doesn't mean I think the new bridge is better though. You're right, it does look cheap and nasty.
  19. Not a 50's Yank but i owned this brute for eight years; 1963 GMC Fleetside, with the original 5 litre (305 ci) V6 engine; incredibly over-built, the chassis was rock-solid steel channel,not the poxy box-section rust trap stuff they use on modern Ford Transits etc. As you can guess it was used as much for its intended purpose as anything else; I loved it and only sold it when it effectively outlived its usefulness. Still in Wales actually, mate of mine in Newtown bought it, and like me uses it as a hack and runabout. It never let me down either; could leave that thing outside for six month
  20. If you grew up around the Lowdham area you'd have known my uncle and aunt, Len and Jean; they lived in the end house on Victoria Avenue. They had two sons, John, who sadly passed away a couple of years ago, and Richard, always known as "Fred" who worked at Harrisons for many years and now travels the world working for an endurance racing team.
  21. You can't judge it by today's standards. Remember that in those days there were a lot of inner city kids who had never even been to the seaside let alone spent a few weeks there. For many of them, a regular bath may have been a luxury; see thread on "Roughest areas".
  22. Similar origin is given to the phrase "Was yer born in Warsop?" which me dad used to say if we ever left a door open.
  23. Hyson Green was considered rough when the flats were there (although Balloon Woods and Basford flats were considered to be rougher, this in the early 80's) but apparently it was half decent a generation before. Normanton, in Derby, was similar; I lived just off Normanton Road in the mid-1990's and it was no worse than the Green, but on a return visit a couple of years ago I walked down there and felt distinctly uncomfortable. Maybe it's because I no longer lived there and maybe because I'm now 20 years older and wiser, but there was an air of distinct menace and I did not linger. Incidentally
  24. No, sorry mate, still no joy. I rarely went into the garage, used to meet Trev in the Fox.