| Trainspotting
Memories of a Sixties Teenager
(T.J.Powell) |
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| I
sometimes wish I had been born
some ten years earlier so that I
would have had more time before
the end of steam! I would also be
26, instead of16, when the end
came. I would have had wages to
spend on steam excursions plus a
half decent camera and sound
recorder Just think of all the
knowledge, memories and
photographs I could have amassed. My
first forays into trainspotting
without family chaperones was
along the Liverpool and
Manchester Railway at Huyton, at
the end of school, Saturday and
school holiday mornings. In the
summer holidays, we could go down
to Huyton to see the Newcastle
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Lime Street Express roar through. Just
after, a 9F Coal train would pass through
towards Wigan. These frieght trains
showed us what happened when you put an
old penny on the line. How we never got
hurt is a mystery to me still, more luck
than judgement! |
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| We
had two big excursions each year on the
Liverpool Boat Train and the Welsh
Chieftain Express westwards from Rhyl.
One time, inexplicably, my Mum took me
and my brother on a train from Mossley
Hill to Crewe, sandwiches already packed.
Mum kept a watchful eye on us after she
saw loads of boys being ordered off the
station. They all appeared a few minutes
later on the top of a retaining wall in
front of a huge pub! We never knew what
inspired her to take us, but we had a
grand day out on Crewe's platforms. |
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By
now, I was in my first year at
the Boy's Grammar in Prescot. Six
or seven us met up at Huyton for
our first trip together to
Chester General from Liverpool
Lime Streer, via Runcorn and
Helsby. This was my first taste
of Western Region action and
later at Birkenhead Central when
there was still a WR through
train to London Paddington. This
route gave the original GWR a
foothold in the River Mersey
docklands.
Our group travelled quite often
to Wigan and the West Coast Main
Line. All sorts of locos and the
burgeoning diesel traffic, Spring
bank sheds and even a stroll down
to the nearby ex-LYR Wigan
Wallgate Station. We were not
really aware of pre-1922
companies and the 'Big Four'. We
were the children of BR
Nationalisation Days, blood and
custard coaches and of course our
Ian Allen spotter and loco shed
guides |
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| We
wanted to roar through Huyton Station on
the recently introduced Class 124
Trans-Pennine Express DMUs. This led to
shed bashing excursions to Manchester and
Leeds. At the old Leeds Central station,
we saw our first Deltic on the buffers, a
magic moment! |
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| We
were now 'seasoned' shed bashers and
Billy O'Brien always seemed to have a
supply of Sunday morning passes for Crewe
Works! One visitor to the Works was A4
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley. Sadly, I never
saw a ‘streak’ in action until
the early 2010s. Lying on the footplate
was a large rusty nut. I took it home,
cleaned and painted it with Humbrol
silver paint. It was also about
this time that I was shown how to 'borrow
oiling box drip keys'! Our group became
quite adept at this nefarious activity
even when the loco was in service
especially at Wigan Northwestern where 9F
hauled coal trains would stop for crew
comfort stops. I bought an exercise book
and mounted some seventy plus keys. We
always took a packet of shaped pipe
cleaners to replace the keys.As time
passed, we found more often than not
somebody had beaten us to the prize, but
we always fitted thepipe cleaner!
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| I
was not able to see the Fifteen
Guinea Special even though it
passed through Huyton on Sunday
11th August 1968. My older
brother was twenty-one the day
before and we were evicted for
his house party. We went to my
aunt’s chalet in Prestatyn
on the Friday afternoon! I had
thought that my weekend was going
to really rock as I had a ticket
for Manure versus Everton at Old
Trafford and great spot to watch
the last official train pass by
at my local station. We lost 2-1
and Sunday was a day out in Rhyl
with my seven-year-old brother!
My older brother was at Rainhill
though! I am not bitter, though! Later
on, I gave my Gresley nut and oil
drip keys to one of the group. I
wonder where he is now and can I
have them Back?
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