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I have thought long and hard about whether to rename the layout. Originally it was set where the real Pott Row is but looked nothing like anything connected with the place. Since I ripped all the buildings out it has become much more fen like and takes much of its inspiration form the Wisbech and Upwell and Stoke Ferry branches. However, the M&GN got nowhere near Stoke Ferry but did have a station at Wisbech.

 

Maybe I had better rename it!

 

Just to even further confuse the issue the station buildings are based on prototypes in Essex and Hertfordshire.

 

Well certainly not on my account!  It's a brilliant layout, wherever it's set.

 

Pott Fen?

 

Pott Drove?

 

Pott Drain!

 

 

Adverts below, two Emu wines, the red one being part of the station that I sourced for PC, plus a savoury snack, made from snippets of old bicycle tyre (I don't like prawns, especially since I discovered that they are aquatic woodlice).

 

K

 

Brilliant.  May I use the white sign for the layout in due course?

 

I might have known that you would come up with these.  I don't know how you do it, though! 

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True; the first version is in much better condition, but is from a book, and I didn't want to tangle a lawyer in possible breach of copyright.

 

Look out for RM this month - good article about Fen Drove.

 

(I'm slightly skiving-off from my morning bike ride exercise, loafing in a coffee shop to read it!)

 

K

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True; the first version is in much better condition, but is from a book, and I didn't want to tangle a lawyer in possible breach of copyright.

 

Look out for RM this month - good article about Fen Drove.

 

(I'm slightly skiving-off from my morning bike ride exercise, loafing in a coffee shop to read it!)

 

K

The first version is a bit wonky though. I tried straightening it, but the straight lines aren't straight. A bit of editing is needed.

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Whilst it was mainly the hobbledehoys hanging around, (why weren't they indoors watching telly?) the one reminder of the wealthy classes in that movie was the liveried servant in his top hat driving the smart carriage along, I'm guessing he was the driver, and not the owner?

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Whilst it was mainly the hobbledehoys hanging around, (why weren't they indoors watching telly?) the one reminder of the wealthy classes in that movie was the liveried servant in his top hat driving the smart carriage along, I'm guessing he was the driver, and not the owner?

 

Yes, I spotted that, with great interest.  I felt that was certainly a liveried coachman.  I will have to go back and look at the carriage type.  Very often these open carriages were designed for gentlemen to drive themselves - the sports cars of their day - an idea that goes back at least as far as the Regency barouche.  In 1905, something like a Mail Phaeton would have fitted the bill.  On the other hand, a family open carriage like a Victoria was probably driven by a servant.

 

Trouble is, I focussed on the driver, not the carriage, so would need to have a another look! 

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I'm not very up on coaches, but I think it was a either a Brougham, or a Growler.

 

I'm pretty sure that they were commonly used as hire vehicles, and owned by hotels, as well as being owned privately, so it might be that the Scotsman was simply "taking a cab", but choosing a large one, to accommodate his luggage. The modern equivalent would be a minibus-cab, which about a third of the cabs on the rank at our local station are.

 

K

 

https://images.ehive.com/accounts/4580/objects/images/m4t52f_2u19_l.jpg

Edited by Nearholmer
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I'm not very up on coaches, but I think it was a either a Brougham, or a Growler.

 

I'm pretty sure that they were commonly used as hire vehicles, and owned by hotels, as well as being owned privately, so it might be that the Scotsman was simply "taking a cab", but choosing a large one, to accommodate his luggage. The modern equivalent would be a minibus-cab, which about a third of the cabs on the rank at our local station are.

 

K

 

https://images.ehive.com/accounts/4580/objects/images/m4t52f_2u19_l.jpg

 

One of the three of us, possibly me, is at cross purposes.

 

I was talking about the open carriage in the Rochdale tram film, which appears to be driven by a coachman in livery.

 

The historically fascinating, but rather offensively stereotypical Comedy Scotsman film, boasted a closed carriage if I recall.  Again, I would have to give it a second look, but it would not surprise me if it turned out to be a Growler or Brougham, as these were used as cabs as well as private carriages.  

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I am now banned from our local museum, after politely asking the lady on the information desk if she had a growler could look at...

 

Just as well you did not go on to ask if you could get up on her box and take it for a spin.

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The model may have moved location (I know it is deliberately not based on anything that actually existed in Pott Row), but the Norfolk village of that name is certainly not in the Fens. It's actually in the rolling countryside that surrounds the chalk stream* of the River Gay (yes, really).

 

Paul

 

* Off-topic meander: there are apparently only 210 chalk stream eco-systems in the entire world; the vast majority of them - 160 - are in England; and 20, no less, are in Norfolk.

 

 

Including our own dear Glaven!

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Some early 1900s colour photos that I think are useful for painting women, and for the general atmosphere. Most of them seem to have been taken in Britain.

http://www.vintag.es/2015/11/women-in-autochrome-breathtaking-color.html

http://mashable.com/2016/05/21/warburg-autochromes/

http://mashable.com/2015/04/23/autochrome-photos-ogorman/

 

These two from the first link I think are really useful, as they show that Edwardian Britain wasn't spotlessly neat.Women%2Bin%2BAutochrome%2B%252814%2529.j

 

Women%2Bin%2BAutochrome%2B%252815%2529.j

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Some early 1900s colour photos that I think are useful for painting women, and for the general atmosphere. Most of them seem to have been taken in Britain.

http://www.vintag.es/2015/11/women-in-autochrome-breathtaking-color.html

http://mashable.com/2016/05/21/warburg-autochromes/

http://mashable.com/2015/04/23/autochrome-photos-ogorman/

 

These two from the first link I think are really useful, as they show that Edwardian Britain wasn't spotlessly neat.Women%2Bin%2BAutochrome%2B%252814%2529.j

 

Women%2Bin%2BAutochrome%2B%252815%2529.j

 

 

As one used to say at dance halls 'Don't think much of yours'

 

Don

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I think it is easy to forget how much dirtier things were, I assume before such things as the clean air act though I would assume even this only had limited impact outside of cities (I'm not old enough to remember though I am 52). I remember when first travelling to London as a child how many of the buildings were black and then when I lived there between 82 and 85 then carried on visiting, how different they looked once cleaned though it was a very long process as much of the grime must have built up from new. Liverpool Street for instance was very grimy and the entrance to the Metropolitan/Circle lines seemed very dark. Outside, that part of London seemed very run down.

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Looking at more colour photos, it's not clear which were actually taken in Britain, but I think that any that look like Britain, even if they're not, are a big help in showing how things were, that doesn't really come out in black and white.

 

I'm not sure that the first photo is in Britain. Scroll down the page a bit and there's a winter scene taken a little bit further back at the same location. Those shutters on the left look a bit foreign to me. But even if it's not Britain, I think you could model that scene on a British layout and it would look just right.

 

There are lots of interesting historic photos web sites with Autochrome photos, that you can spend hours looking at. It's also worth seaching for Autochrome in Google Images. The colour of many of them is very convincing.

 

Women%2Bin%2BAutochrome%2B%252814%2529.j

 

Women%2Bin%2BAutochrome%2B%252821%2529.j

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Looking at more colour photos, it's not clear which were actually taken in Britain, but I think that any that look like Britain, even if they're not, are a big help in showing how things were, that doesn't really come out in black and white.

 

I'm not sure that the first photo is in Britain. Scroll down the page a bit and there's a winter scene taken a little bit further back at the same location. Those shutters on the left look a bit foreign to me. But even if it's not Britain, I think you could model that scene on a British layout and it would look just right.

 

There are lots of interesting historic photos web sites with Autochrome photos, that you can spend hours looking at. It's also worth seaching for Autochrome in Google Images. The colour of many of them is very convincing.

 

Women%2Bin%2BAutochrome%2B%252814%2529.j

 

Women%2Bin%2BAutochrome%2B%252821%2529.j

 

I thought both were likely France.  The wider shot above seems to support that view with regard to that location.  It matters not, I think, for our purposes.  Smashing photographs.

 

 

I suppose this would have been typical of public roads in those days (this, admittedly is the 1890s). Would this just have been compacted dirt?

14091257360_206b9271c0_z.jpgBrook House, Old Road, Barlaston. by Andy Kirkham, on Flickr

 

Andy's splendid roadside scene reminded me of the picture below, which I found whilst sitting in a caravan researching Merstham (hard to believe that this is close to a year ago). 

 

What is remarkable is that the children and dog are playing in the middle of the main London-Brighton road!

post-25673-0-21200100-1476520009.jpg

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