General Chat

I remember going by steam train every other Wednesday from my home town down to brighton ,with a cousin ,we would just look at the shops and walk down to the front , no money to spare for shopping. :-)

The last memory of traveling on a scheduled steam engine pulled train was sometime in the early 1960s. Ladies still wore gloves, regardless of the weather, if they were ‘dressed up’. Mother expressed surprise that a steam engine was still in operation & grumbled about the smuts. She closed the window so we sweltered rather than get grubby.

Fast forward to 2003. Youngest, then 17, & I had to change at Clapham Junction London. A tannoy announcement was made along the lines of stand clear of the platform, the next train is not stopping. In crept the Flying Scotsman. Everyone, including platform cleaners, had a wide grin on their face :-D

When we moved up to Middlesex because of dads job on the railway every summer holiday the day after we broke up mum and dad would put me on the train at waterloo in charge of the guard and being picked up at Padstow and then back home the day before I went back to school part of the holiday was the train journey with the smoke billowing out when we went under a bridge or through a tunnel

I remember a family outing to Hampton Court, I would have been 7ish, travelling by steam train from Clapham Junction.

Coming home the train was more than packed, a bank holiday, and we ended up travelling in the luggage van (remember them?) with many, many others packed in like sardines.

It was sweltering so all the windows were open so the smuts flew in.....I don't think many of us didn't have the corner of hankies shoved into our eyes to get rid of them :-D

Chris

When my dad came out of the navy in 1952 he started working for British Rail at Padstow station we would travel up to London to visit English grandparents or sometimes travel up north to catch the boat over to Ireland to visit the irish family. One new year we were returning from spending Christmas with our grandparents in London, dad did not travel back with so mum had three children eight, five and my sister was two, she had all the luggage Christmas presents and nan and granddad had bought my sister and me a hola-hoop each mine was a big one sisters was a small one. I don't really remember the journey but between Wadebridge and Padstow where the railtrack cross the river camel the Engine caught fire and we all had to climb off the train and walk into Padstow station. It not put me off the steam trains I loved traveling on them

Ah you might have waved to me 2 years ago then Gwyn as we were in Kent and riding the line :-D

Dad was a steam train enthusiast, who managed during my childhood to find picnic spots in view of a main railway line.
Each year too, we travelled from Hampshire to Wales on a steam train in order to visit my Welsh grandmother. My sister and I each had a little notebook and we would collect the numbers of other engines seen on the journey. I remember being fascinated by the telegraph wires alongside the track, because they seemed to move up and down between poles as we sped along.

When I went to secondary school, we always looked out for 'the Bubble Train' as we called it. I don't know where it came from, but this goods train travelled each day from the Portsmouth area and went westwards loaded with bubble cars, which were very popular at that time. We'd wave to the driver, who waved back to us.

Nowadays I often walk on a footpath near the track of a nearby steam railway. The drivers often wave and passengers too, as they chug past and pass on the delights of steam travel to the next generation.

We lived in Wolverhampton during the war, and I used to travel to school on a trolley-bus. They had points, like railway lines, and my great ambition was to be a "clippie" (conductress) so that I could jump off the bus, run alongside it to change the points, and then jump back on!! Elf and Safety hadn't been invented!

The thing I remember about steam trains was that if you were near a railway line, you always waved to the driver. And they waved back. Also my mother saying "don't put your head out of the window, you'll get smuts in your eye".

We came down to England from Scotland on the Flying Scotsman in 1962 or 63, with our two cats on harnesses :-S
My sister and I were 'charged' with walking them on the platform at one stop.
I'm amazed the poor things survived.
After arriving in London, we got another train - to Cornwall.

My Grandfather was a steam engine driver, legend has it he drove the first diesel in Scotland.

Last memorable time I recall using a steam train was in Jan 1960, to Carlisle,returning from Embarkation leave (was en route to Germany.) middle of the night very much a stop/go journey, on one stop there was a trudging of feet, alongside the track, and voices asking " do you know where we are? how much further?"

Our trolley buses in Walsall went on until 1970 LaGooner.

Our bus home ran from a bridge at the edge of the bus station in Walsall, it was a bridge over the railway. My sister and I would find a foothold so we could just see over the top and watch the steam trains.:-D

We lived near a canal where well into the 1960s canal boats - some pulled by horses, delivered the coal from the railway shunting area to the 2 nearby power stations.

One of my earliest memories is of being in Pompey when it was dark. I don't know why we would have been there but I was not very old at all and of seeing a trolley bus arcing with all the sparks and of being very frightened of it.

Maybe that was put me off towns.

The most fond memory of steam was standing on the footplate of the Flying Scotsman at the age of about 5. It was in one of the London Stations but I can't remember which one now. I remember the size of it to me it seemed absolutely huge. Not having a car we used the tube and the main line trains all the time. OH and I have travelled on most of the heritage steam railways as we both love the age of steam. Who remembers Trolley Buses too :-D

I would be sitting in a maths lesson in an upstairs classroom and, naturally, I would be gazing out of the window.

Across the playing field was the station and the shunting yard and I was always intrigued to watch the steam being let off from an engine because it would go up in the air and become a cloud.

I still don't understand binary!

Use to travel to St Helens Junction to see my grandparents on a Steam train loved them fond memories .of years gone by x Barbara

There are heritage lines mainly manned by volunteers, but steam trains were phased out on regular services.

Do you have special memories of them?