bamber

The latest edition of Private Eye features the Majestic in its Nooks and Corners column.

I could have sworn that the G and H Atlanteans had two mirrors in the rear window. A quick look at 23 seconds confirms this.

. I know them. They look as if they have been built as cheaply as possible. They certainly lack the style (and gardens) of the pre-war houses in MP.

Carlton nick was not a PFI build. The big drain on the force's budget is the policing hub, on the Queen's Drive industrial estate, which is a PFI scheme. National policing priorities are ring fenced by the Home Office. So if you have to make budget cuts local policing gets the chop.

Do you mean those at the top of Mapperley Rise? I have heard that some of the flats are unoccupied but busy.

Carlton police station was a victim of changing fashions in the Home Office. When it was built they wanted forces to close small, local nicks and move to fewer, larger stations that could be built like mini-fortresses. Now the Whitehall mandarins want policing hubs with officers working out of their cars with as little public facing facilities as they can get away with. It is ironic that Carlton nick is going to be converted by those former kings of the doors the Bailey brothers.

I came across this article browsing the interweb. Corporation Tramways Insignia What does strike you is the obvious pride in the undertaking when you look at the quality of the insignia they issued to drivers, conductors and inspectors. Nowadays a cheapo sticker is deemed "sufficient".

Cracking photo. Very quiet: probably taken on a Sunday.

There is a second, identical, plaque a little further on just beyond the modern security gate.

Does anyone recognize the make of car from this close-up? I think it may be a BMW. The car in question appeared briefly in a film promoting Germany's new autobahns.

It used to be Derby, but they now print just the one edition in Brum. Truly "Yesterday's news tomorrow."

The Post's latest Audit Bureau of Circulation (ABC) figures are very bad. Daily sales have collapsed -28% to 11,777. Combine that with the continuing loss of advertising revenue and my original prediction of five years max for the Evening (sic) Post to survive looks about right.

That should be CCF. The OTC was abolished in 1948. Can you imagine the blue funk nowadays if schoolboys, with rifles, boarded a train?

That's the High School's OTC contingent. The officer on the left was a history master with the nickname Slob: it was very appropriate.

It might be a good idea to get in touch with a number plate enthusiasts club. They will probably have someone who can explain why a Nottingham dealer, in the late 1950s, would register cars in a neighbouring county. http://www.registrationnumbersclub.org.uk/links.htm

Is it possible that the numberplate has been misremembered? RR was a Nottinghamshire suffix until 1974.

Nottingham City Police had used Standard Ensigns and Vanguards before the company's merger with Triumph. Nottingham City (as usual!) had cars that were unique. They were the only force to put their city coat of arms on the doors and while every other force in Britain was happy with tinkling bells they specified American style sirens.

I would have thought Mitchell's registered their new cars with Nottingham City plates (TO, TV, AU). RA was a Derbyshire County Council suffix until 1974 which would tie in with them having a dealership at Etwall.

When did NCT stop running Football Specials?

Until 1974 the City Council was responsible for allocating plates for all newly registered vehicles in the city. So they could provide sequentially numbered plates for the city transport and other departments. All City fire engines had 999 in their registration number. In 1974 the DVLC took over responsibility and they didn't provide the same facility.

I was in Seville over the weekend and noticed two mid-70s-vintage NCT Atlanteans still in harness on the city's tour bus service. Was there a reason for the popularity of old NCT vehicles with this kind of operation?

Funny how over the years the area has gone from being called Bakersfields to Bakersfield.

Rita, you need to take out a subscription to ancestry.com. That way you will be able to search for any possible marriage, birth and death certificates where a Peter Thomas Marshall is listed. The more information that cross references the less difficult it will be to trace him or members of his family.

They missed this matching pair of city boundary markers on Northdale Road. Boundary markers

Cloughie was confused. He thought they were demonstrating for alcoalhole. The NCB spent the first 40 years as a nationalised industry lying about the extent of Britain's coal reserves: it ensured government investment was always available. The truth was that by the early 1980s the economically viable reserves had been exhausted and the game was up. The NUM didn't face reality.