First rail memories

What is your earliest childhood memory of something rail-related?

Mine is a, possibly heritage DMU, trip on the Romford-Upminster line in 1993. I think I still have the ticket.

 

1950s 3 SUB EMU with a wide bodied trailer added to make a 4 SUB at Catford Bridge

 

probably earlier than the 50s I'd say....ah you mean that's when you saw it.....gotcha

 

mine was a holiday to somewhere in the west, (Minehead probably) when I was miffed that our shiny new diesel failed en route and was replaced with a grimy steamer

 

1950s. Watching trains at Arlesey with my Dad while dropping of the fish offal at the nearby pig farm. In the same era journeys to Sussex on green trains without an engine on the front.

 

I am old but not that old

 

Seeing the bloodhound missile site between Hull and Scarborough from the slam door stock when we went on our holidays in the early 60's.

 

Being about 2 or 3 and seeing a big black steam engine (43106 or 5000 I think) on a Santa Special at Arley, in the gloom, the glow of the fire and it being very steamy. A few years after that it was seeing big blue 37's whilst on holiday just outside Twywn and going to pick up my Dad from Sandwell and Dudley from his evening commute and seeing what I now know to be things like Peaks, 85's, 86's and 87's. From little Acorns...

 

About 1948, standing on the footbridge over St.Botolphs goods yard, Colchester, waiting all afternoon for the station pilot to come and shunt the coal sidings. Also saw a couple of "Clactons" and the Brightlingsea branch train. Didn't know what the locos were (Mum wasn't expert enough to tell me!) but they were probably J69, "Claud" or B12 and J15 respectively. Mum didn't realise what she had started!

 

I can't specifically remember it, but at some point at a very young age (probably aged 3 or 4) I must have travelled on the miniature railway at Jocks Lane in Bracknell (3" and 5.5" gauge) which involved sitting astride the carriages (the track was raised on pillars).

But it must have affected me, because the first rail trip I can definitely remember was on the Bluebell, and I remember being terrified that we would have to sit on the roof of the carriages! I would have been about five, i.e. mid 1970s. Can't remember the loco, but I remember seeing a huge brass dome through the booking hall window, so I guess it would have been the H or the C.

Tom

 

Watching J.T.Daly and Henry Cort go up Foxfield bank in the early 70's.

Jon

 

Sorry to shatter your fond memory, but I fear that it was a 321 EMU! I rode on the last DMU on the Romford-Upminster, a Craven's 104, in 1987.

 

Watching (and travelling) on the Great Northern Main Line out of Kings Cross - we lived not far from it in North London. I can remember the A4s and A3s giving way to Deltics. Being scared silly at King's Cross suburban when exploring and finding a quiet platform tucked out of the way at a lower level - looking around the corner expecting to see buffers like every other platform and finding myself looking into a great bid tunnel mouth (the widened lines from Moorgate - I was aged about 5).

Then it was holidays near Minehead as steam gave way to DMUs, and then the Bluebell in 1965.

Steve B

 

Sorry to shatter your fond memory too. Cravens were Class 105, the 104s were BRCW units.

 

They were fun times at the Foxfield.

 

Kendal goods yard in '68 on the long footbridge over the tracks and running in and out of the smoke and steam as the locos shunted below. IT57 at Shotlock Hill when my father dragged me through a field of long sharp grass in short trousers (and legs...). I understand that the Oomighulli tribe of pygmys gained their name in similar circumstances..

 

Paddington station in the very early '60s. For a young lad it was very exciting to see big steam locos close up as we lived in a small village without a railway nearby. The smell of oil and steam and the sights and sounds stayed with me ever since.

 

You're right, of course! There were so many classes of DMU then that it's easy to be a digit out. The last Cravens on the Romford-Upminster also did the last Wickford-Southminster DMU service the same night- there was a slight panic because the relief signalman at Romford did not know how to get the train off the branch and a signalling enthusiast/commuter friend of mine had to do it for him! The unit had been specially re-painted in it's original BR green at Stratford and many of us hoped that it would be preserved, but asbestos put a stop to that!

 

This tribe was presumably related to the Fkawi tribe who were 4 feet tall & lived in grasslands which were 5 feet tall. They jumped up & down shouting 'we're the Fkawi'
Anyway , earliest railway memory - on the footplate of a Black 5 at the buffer stops in Birkenhead Woodside station around 1958.

Bob.