When we were up at Balcombe last week, there were a couple of photos in the booking hall of the station in previous years, with a contact name and phone number for copies. Well, I rang this gentleman and what a diamond and fountain of knowledge he has turned out to be! He's lived in the village all his life and appears to be the community archivist, and has all sorts of other views and anecdotes as to how the place developed, filling in a few details that we couldn't work out.

He has already forwarded on some other photos (by mail, for free) and even his 88 year old mother has contributed some thoughts! He's not a railway modeller, although he spotted as a kid, but just seems to be pleased that someone is showing an interest in his village and is mad enough to want to build a model of the station.

A pub lunch at least for him next time we go up there!