Kings Cross

[Mickey]

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[52D]

WW2 Micky bricks custom made to original spec, apparently there was a wooden temporary partition in place for 50 or so years.

[Mickey]

Deleted

[manna]

G'Day Gents

So there finally repairing the WW 2 damage ( insurance payout,) which begs the Question, have they reopened Fletton brick pits???

Ken Greig, once asked me 'what's Australia like' I wonder if I influenced him!!---anyone know where he is, it's a big place
manna

[52D]

Manna there are a few companys in the uk who specialise in custom making bricks for restoration projects as you will probably have figured the type of clay and length of firing determine final colour. This has been done at the Cross.
When the GCR London extension was being built a good source of blue clay was found when driving one of the tunnels so thats why a lot of the infrastructure is in blue brick. Similar when the NER built the Alnwick Cornhill line a brickworks was set up at a claypit near the only tunnel on the line with bricks for the lining being brought forward on a narrow gauge tramway.

[Eightpot]

One memory of KX in the late 1950s/early 1960's besides seeing the A3s and A4s at the buffer stops was one afternoon seeing Cliff Richard arriving off a train from the north surrounded by lots of lovely nubile females. Lucky sod!. Never thought to ask for his autograph, though.

[StevieG]

.... " There used to be one odd parcels working that came into KX from Bradford (?) at about half one, stay for half an hour and then go up to KX Goods yard. The last trains north used to be the Hitchin news and the late Leeds mail - they went off around 4 in the morning. " ....

3A01 immediately springs to mind as that Up parcels. Also in the '80s, The 02.15 Pass/News to P'boro' was 1B50, and the Hitchin went as 1B51* at 02.28. I think the Leeds went at 04.05 as 1L01.

* Interesting manouevre with this one at Hatfield, where it shunted back from the Down Fast to the Up Slow platform for unloading (easy road van access), then departed via the same route to Welwyn GC : Probably the main reason that the '70s resignalling layout retained a Fast lines trailing crossover at Hatfield. I don't think it lasted too long after that traffic ceased.

[Mickey]

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[hyperion]

The 3.10 'newspapers' job was put into the short, 5 week, 4A link which was formed in 1966/7 for some consolidating reason, with bits of 'empty coach' link 5? work combined with a couple of turns from the Cambridge, 4 link. I was in it with dear old Roy Head as my regular driver. At that time we called at The Park, Potters Bar, shunted a van off down side at New Barnet then went on to Hitchin, no performance at Hatfield in the '60s, where we swapped the 31, usually for a Baby Deltic, with which we ran LE to Royston, then a rousing gallop back to the Cross with a semi-fast commuter train. Incidentally, whatever's said about them I didn't mind a Baby Deltic on a train like that - but who was the sadist who rostered them on the loose coupled sand empties on the evening trip from Enfield Old to Cambridge ?

Foreman Gregg was ably assisted by Alfie Buckman, Charlie Hembra, Harry Burge, 'Siderods' Sid, and then there was Mr. Lootie (Lootey?), never did know, was allowed to know, his first name, he retired mid '60s, last of the 'old school', the mess room was always strangely restrained when Mr. L. was on.

And, yes, The Cross at Night, indeed, wasn't boring then was it ?

[Mickey]

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[hyperion]

Well, now, Micky, talk about what goes round comes round (or whatever they say), Len was my mate in No.7 link - not No.5 - the 'runround' as it was known, from 4 July 1966 'til new rosters came out in that September when I was with a much more dour character, say no more! But 4A was formed on 17October and I was pleased to find myself with Roy Head - who went to that old Top Shed in the sky about 18 months ago - Len and Roy were the best and taught me much - had I stayed. I was at the Cross from late '64 until 1968 when, to my eternal regret, I went back to booking offices, Hatfield actually, when Hatfield MPD closed and the men transferred to Hornsey or Kings Cross - which gained considerably more cross-London and local work instead of losing as I anticipated.

I have recorded every turn I worked from January '65, engines worked on, drivers with, booked times versus actual worked. Big foolscap diaries, I've just excavated them, blimey such nostalgia ! And so I find two mornings, 8th and 9th Feb''68, logged with Roy on 276 Diagram, 02.50 on, Hitchin newspapers which was then booked to :-

leave the X at 03.50 as 3B64, D5606 on the 8th, van off at Barnet, vans to Hitchin down yard 05.30 (05.38 actual, oh dear!). Booked to prepare D5907, we actually relieved Hitchin men on her, then LE to Baldock and ECS to Royston, run round, dep 08.35 as a 2B65, call Hitchin 09.00 (01) then Stevenage, WGC and Hatfield, due KGX 09.45 and sigs between the tunnels made this 09.50. Relieved by Kings Cross men, job done.

I suppose by the time you worked this, times would have changed and perhaps it had become a Hitchin job by then, all kinds of things happened just after I left. But, oh dear, they were the too too short days !

N.H.

[Mickey]

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[strang steel]

Wow Hyperion! You have a mine of information in your diaries, loco numbers, dates and timings included.

Sounds like a boon for modellers of that area in that era.

[hq1hitchin]

Foreman Gregg was ably assisted by Alfie Buckman, Charlie Hembra, Harry Burge, 'Siderods' Sid, and then there was Mr. Lootie (Lootey?), never did know, was allowed to know, his first name, he retired mid '60s, last of the 'old school', the mess room was always strangely restrained when Mr. L. was on.

Ken Gregg was the foreman on my shift when I was a young fella in The Control and was on the committee of the GN Sick and Funeral Fund. He recruited me and thereafter I paid 7 new pence a week as a paybill deduction. The benefits were about a fiver a week if you were off sick, less if you worked in Doncaster Plant. At the time of privatisation it was decided to wind up the fund to prevent any shysters getting their mitts on it to and share the money out amongst the members. We got a lot more than we ever thought we would - thank you, Ken!

The Mr Lootie was probably Jack Luty (I never met him, mind, although he became a foreman in later life) who certainly new a thing or two about firing A4s. He was Arthur Taylor's fireman in September 1935 with the press run of 2509 on the Silver Jubilee.

[hyperion]

'struth, Micky, I'M IN ME 70s, - well only just - but ol' Len Henderson, should he have survived, must have made 80 I reckon. Yes, he was a good mate alright, lived(s?) in Barnet. I always remember the morning we were on one of the pilots and about to make a shunt with a whole platform full of stuff, oddstock, coaches, vans, out of 7 and back into 8 (today's numbering) and Len decided he had to go up the room for something, leaving me on the Brush to single-man the shunt. Of course I'd made the move no end of times - but not ON ME OWN ! I remember his cheeky smile, pipe akimbo, as he walked nonchalantly up 8, and his equally cool return when he came back aboard again at the top of 8. Most of the young drivers 'gave us a go' and with Roy we often worked half a shift each, who did the first bit on early morning jobs depending on which one had been out the night before !

The name Scribner rings a faint bell but I can't really place him.

Yes, of course, hq1hitchin, JACK luty, a formidably fair gentleman and I do now recall hearing about his prowess on the shovel. He had a quiet and dignified manner but, oh boy, you never spoke to him without being spoken to if you were a mere diesel second man.