Returning to Grantham

[52D]

BR 90510 was LNER 3189 and WD 79236.

[61070]

Re. 90510, 52D kindly sent me a listing of WD/LNER/BR numbers for the engines that the LNER acquired (O7 they were) and, as he says above, the last two digits being '75' don't fit with either former number of 90510, so I think we are left with the presumption of a cab swap during ovehaul. Looking closely at the uncompressed version of the photo (to get them onto the site at the original scan dimensions I have to compress the files quite mercilessly), I agree with giner that the underlying number is most likely to be 90175; I think also that there are three different inscriptions of that number (there are certainly three '9's), each offset from the others. The centre numeral is right over the vertical rows of rivets, but I think we're suggesting '1' because it's probably the only digit that would fit the spacing of the others.

Having looked at the model of 90189 on ebay the 'weathering' really is uncannily similar to the condition of the loco in the slide A little bit too much red still showing on the buffer beam, though! Thanks for mentioning that 60129.

I've never seen an Ian Allan abc so old as to have the WD numbers in it - a real archival hand-me-down, Firbeck. No worries about Britannia not being at Grantham. In fact your mention of 70000 being cabbed extensively has given me the excuse I needed to post this – yours truly at a smokey Crewe North mpd on 22 April 1965 (correct year - the 1964 on the image ref is an error), on the only occasion I saw it in service. I don't think I stopped smiling for days! Back to Grantham next, I promise.

[61070]

All these pictures were taken on Thursday May 24th 1962 (I think – see caption 3). I have included much of the text from notes I wrote for an exhibition at Grantham Museum, so apologies if it is general knowledge to members of the forum.

1. Spotters and a porter chat in the early evening sunlight on platform 5. So what would they have seen that afternoon?
(N.B. This photo has been posted on the forum before, but is now removed from its former topic.)

2. D9021 on a southbound express. Although what I presume is the beginning of the train title (The) Eliz(abethan) can be made out on the end of the first (BG) carriage this cannot be that service as it only ran during the summer timetable, which commenced on 18th June.
The locomotive's head code panel has been blanked off, so it is carrying an oil headlamp above each buffer to denote its train’s express passenger status.
In the left background the tank locomotive with two carriages might be preparing to add them to a northbound train, or to propel them into the bay platform No. 4 (now 3) to form a Nottingham service.
D9021 was later named Argyll & Sutherland Highlander, on 29th Nov 1963.

3. Sparkling clean Sayajirao is heading north on an express passenger train. St Margaret’s A2s were a rarity at Grantham – in fact I don’t have any record that we saw another A2 there on our visits. Perhaps it had been 'borrowed' after an overhaul at Doncaster?
My date for these photos – 24th May 1962 – is based on a piece of circumstantial evidence in this picture. I know the film dates from spring 1962, and all our visits were on Thursday afternoons. My supposition is that the Union Flag seen flying in this picture from the station flagpole (near the telegraph pole) was in celebration of British Commonwealth Day (formerly Empire Day). This was always on 24th May (Queen Victoria’s birthday) which, in 1962, was a Thursday. This detail has enabled all the photographs known to have been taken on that visit to be dated with (almost) certainty. Any evidence that confirms or disputes this will be very welcome.

4. Train 1B21, the 15:20 from Sheffield to King’s Cross The Sheffield Pullman, enters the station from the north hauled by D0280 Falcon.
This locomotive was a prototype built at Loughborough in 1961 by Brush. At this time it was based at Sheffield Darnall (41A) and was under test on a range of duties.
Behind the front of the locomotive is a banner repeating signal which gives a warning to drivers of the aspect of the Yard Box up starting signal at the platform end, the view of which is obscured by the platform buildings due to the curve of the line. Before it was replaced by a colour light signal, the starting signal was a semaphore signal which had co-acting arms, on a very tall post, that were visible above the station buildings from a distance.

5. An express passenger train speeds toward the station from the south the driver, wearing beret and goggles, sounding the whistle as a warning. The locomotive is Golden Fleece, based at King’s Cross (34A).
Retired Grantham Driver Ken Willetts told me in November 2008 that when he was a 17-year-old Cleaner he was asked to fire this locomotive, then based at Grantham, to Newcastle on an express train after the booked Fireman reported sick. When it was explained to the Driver that the only spare men available were two young Cleaners he said "I'll take Jim Willetts' lad," as he knew Ken's father, also a Driver at the depot. Thus began Ken's main line career on the footplate.

[lincolnian]

5. An express passenger train speeds toward the station from the south the driver, wearing beret and goggles, sounding the whistle as a warning. The locomotive is Golden Fleece, based at King’s Cross (34A).

Fabulous photo's again, 1070 - I'm certain that the driver with the beret and goggles has graced another of these pages fairly recently.

Paul M.

[Flamingo]

Re photo no. 5 above, I wonder if the chap looking out from the cab of 60030 really is the driver. Does anyone recocgnise him? Dark beret and light coloured overalls - that combination is one I think I've seen before in a published photograph ('author on the footplate' type of picture caption). He's someone who wrote railway books and articles, I can't put a name to him, but it doesn't look like Ossie Nock.

[Firbeck]

Was D0280 only ever used on Pullman workings!
I took these at Grantham during a very wet Easter in 1963, clearly the 'Big Freeze' had finished. I had just had an Ilford Sporti 4 camera for Xmas, quite frankly it was the worst camera I ever owned, if you looked through the viewfinder, it didn't give you the correct image, it was always off to the left or right depending how you held the camera, it ruined many fine shots. In the end I cut cross hairs on it, but parallax tended to make that a poor solution:





Down and up Pullmans, I note the reporting number is different, would this be the Yorkshire Pullman?

Just for the record, here's a photo of Falcon being built at Loughborough during an open day at Brush works that we went to in June 1961:



And a later shot taken through the fence at Brush in 1966.



I gather it spent it's final days pulling coal trains out of Cardiff Canton.

Incidentally, with regard to your pic of Britannia at Crewe, we also went on a trip around Crewe North and South around that time, I have a picture of 70000 looking the worse for wear with a bent smoke deflector, I also recall the roundhouse having a Britannia on every road, it was an impressive sight, but we'll stick to Grantham though.

[Flamingo]

D0280, is that the one which became TOPS class 53? It did finish up on Western Region freight jobs and I even saw it once in Cornwall. Why did they need so many grilles on the bodyside?

The Type 4 prototype I never saw was the all white one, I think it was called Lion. It did work Pullmans on the ECML, has anyone got a shot of it?

[Firbeck]

1. Spotters and a porter chat in the early evening sunlight on platform 5. So what would they have seen that afternoon?

Relations between staff and spotters were not always so cordial, it wasn't uncommon for kids to be cleared off the platform, they were either removed from the station or worse, I recall the Nottingham contingent was sometimes bundled unceremoniously on to the next train back to Nottingham.
If you were with your father, as we were in the early days, it wasn't a problem, but later I would go with my teenage brother and that wasn't a lifeline, until he worked out a cunning plan.
I don't blame the staff, some of the kids were appalling, running into passengers and even once pushing a luggage trolley onto the tracks at the south end of the station, I like to think we were well behaved!
My brother was a bit of radio enthusiast and built a small portable transistor radio from a kit, such things were rare in the 50's, it looked pretty smart too, in a contemporary plastic case.
We were sitting near the south end once when a cull of spotters was declared and the staff went round to remove everyone from the station, my brother meanwhile was intently listening to the Test Match on his radio. When the staff arrived to remove us, they were very taken with this and were keen to know the score. It must have been an important match as we ended up with half the station crew standing round us at which point the station master intervened and said we could stay if we behaved and kept them informed of events in the match. In the end we had the station to ourselves for the afternoon, being pointed out to southbound engine crews and having to shout the score across the tracks above the roar of safety valves being blown off, great stuff, it could only happen here, or perhaps Delhi!



Prior to the mass eviction that day, an adoring fan admires Mallard.



Two legends in one day, at least the lack of other spotters allowed me an uncluttered shot of Flying Scotsman, heading north.

[stembok]

61070: 60530 was indeed just ex- works after a general repair at Doncaster and reportedly began her return home on 26/5/62 heading the 10.40 K/X-Newcastle Tyne Commission Quay, so you probably saw her a couple of days before, probably "pinched" by Doncaster 36A. Unfortunately, on arrival at Newcastle on the 26th she was obviously not feeling too well and lay on Gateshead shed until 28/7/62, returning home, after repair, on the late afternoon Berwick 'stopper' from Newcastle.

[rob237]

Relations between staff and spotters were not always so cordial, it wasn't uncommon for kids to be cleared off the platform...

Regular event in the 50's too...
Many of the displaced lads would then decamp through the tunnel beneath the platforms, and congregate by the shed exit area - only to be moved on again by a shed official, left unimpressed by "pennies on the rail"! The station view from there was relatively clear, but less 'dramatic' than being on the platforms.

Does anyone recall the mid-50's Grantham Station-Master, who was built like a double wardrobe... Gilbert? Seemed very strict with the urchins at his platform ends but who, on reflection, was quite tolerant - given what some of them got up to...

Enjoying all the pics and memories immensely, do keep 'em coming...

Can vividly remember the terror when Sugar Palm became the first ever straight-through sighting for an impressionable 10 year old, Summer 1953...

Cheers
Robt P.

[manna]

G'Day Gents
More great pic's, certainly getting spoilt now.
Fairly lucky at Wood Green,never had that many problems, provided you had a platform ticket and behaved yourself, they did let you have your hour? Thats why I used to buy a Half return to Hornsey (3d) that way at least you could be on the wrong platform when the train came in. Platform 4 was the best platform at Wood Green as it was next to the up main, everything seemed to come through at about 70mph, and if you were a bit to close the wind would almost bowl you over and the noise under the platform awning was tremendous, deafened until the next one
manna

[StevieG]

Going back several posts, to the photo of Britannia with that white box on the track with the large number 512.
This would almost certainly be York or Newcastle, because each such white box contained equipment (air valves and such, I expect) for the adjacent set of pneumatically-operated points (of the displayed number), and these two locations are the first that spring to my mind which were so equipped.

[52A]

It is indeed the operating equipment for the pneumatic points and it almost certainley York. Newcastle 512 points were on the goods lines at the west end of the station.

[Firbeck]

Regular event in the 50's too...
Many of the displaced lads would then decamp through the tunnel beneath the platforms, and congregate by the shed exit area - only to be moved on again by a shed official, left unimpressed by "pennies on the rail"! The station view from there was relatively clear, but less 'dramatic' than being on the platform.
Cheers
Robt P.[/quote]


On our last spotting visit to Grantham in 1964, the staff came round to chuck us out and we beat a hasty retreat down that tunnel, it proved a good thing as we managed to sneak round the sheds without any trouble where I photographed this scruffy A4, can anyone identify it, 60025?:



I recall that we went back on to the station, hid ourselves in the buffet and got away with it.

To get some early diesels in focus, you might like these, D248 on the Queen of Scots, August 1960, note the complete lack of yellow warning panels:



Then back to Alycidon, the first production Deltic I saw:



Here it is, all ex-works and gleaming, those front buffers had never touched a thing, 22nd August 1961, pity I didn't capture a shot of that Chinese technician.

Have you noticed by the way, everytime I went to Grantham the weather was crap!!!

[Firbeck]

It is indeed the operating equipment for the pneumatic points and it almost certainley York. Newcastle 512 points were on the goods lines at the west end of the station.

It was York, never went to Newcastle until that hideous Cup match against Forest in the 70's, and never been back on principle since.