Castle Aching

[Schooner]

The corner of West India Docks served by South Dock station (NLS-provided chart map, although a perhaps better selection at https://www.old-maps.co.uk/), in 1880 - the year of through steam workings on the Millway Extension Railway - is a particular focus.

 

The GER-run passenger service seems fairly well documented, but the particulars of how the dock railways themselves were organised and operated seem harder to come by. This whole dock underwent significant change 1870-1890, as did they all. so there's a lot to learn about the entire dock system and how it interfaced with the rail network. I wouldn't exclude information on any part of the whole. It's been an area of fascination for years, and I realised a few weeks ago that instead of trying to find an excuse to marmalade a quay and Victorian locos into every planned layout* I should give planning one myself a go. I had been under the impression that modelling docks well simply wasn't possible, but several layouts large and small have shown I was most mistaken!

 

I don't wish to take up any more space here as I've little to contribute, but over the weekend I hope to post a provisional plan and supporting info. Perhaps this sub-forum would make a better home for it than 'Layout and Track Design'. More then, then 

 

Thanks again all, take care

 

Schooner

 

*Hypothetical, early days, baby steps etc

 

EDIT: If I've done this right, there should be some pretty pics that I found evocative (and hope to find useful one day) at the bottom of this post.

EDIT 2: NLS link updated to indicate rough scope of intentions

Edited April 2, 2020 by Schooner
Apologies for slow response and poor links, my internet has cut up rough and become positively Edwardian of late

[Nearholmer]

The MER is a brilliantly interesting thing to choose to model!

 

Please build 'Ariel's Girdle', please!

[Schooner]

and/or 

 

Yes please

 

 

Edited April 2, 2020 by Schooner

[sem34090]

Well in 4mm and 7mm the Manning Wardles are easy enough to obtain, but I'd love to see a model of Ariel's Girdle! You could even get yourself an L&B tank...

 

(L&B in this context being 'London & Blackwall, as opposed to the WCML and a Devonshire Narrow Gauge venture) 

[Malcolm 0-6-0]

 

What is the vertical pipe mounted on the left front corner of the loco next to the smoke box?

[Edwardian]

I've toyed with a docks/Blackwall/MER layout idea; it would be great to see one modelled.  I was going for an 1880s setting, with ugly, black rivetted Bromely tanks on the Blackwall.  Perhaps a Coffee Pot on the docks, in green.

 

And on the MER do include the Kitson steam tram the GER used for a time!

 

 

And, for this morning's beard, I thought we should celebrate Michael Flanders.

 

 

[Nearholmer]

3 hours ago, Malcolm 0-6-0 said:

What is the vertical pipe mounted on the left front corner of the loco next to the smoke box?

Reckoned to be a detachable extension for the tank fillers, which are at running plate level and which supply a well-tank.

[Malcolm 0-6-0]

45 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Reckoned to be a detachable extension for the tank fillers, which are at running plate level and which supply a well-tank.

 

Thanks - that makes sense.

[Hroth]

3 hours ago, Edwardian said:

And, for this morning's beard, I thought we should celebrate Michael Flanders.

 

After starting* this beard thing, the "beards of the day" are keeping mine in place. Over the past couple of days I've been looking at it and thinking "perhaps not such a good idea"...

 

* I think it was me, though if anyone else wants to take responsibility, they are free to do so!

[Nearholmer]

Any chance of a pre-raff/beard-of-the-day/JA crossover picture?

 

Did JA, for instance, appear in any role that required her to emerge naked from a pond while wearing a false beard and glasses? Not being a really close follower of her work, I could easily have missed it.

[Edwardian]

12 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Any chance of a pre-raff/beard-of-the-day/JA crossover picture?

 

Did JA, for instance, appear in any role that required her to emerge naked from a pond while wearing a false beard and glasses? Not being a really close follower of her work, I could easily have missed it.

 

I should think the nearest you get to that, Kevin, is Gwyneth Paltrow in Shakespeare in Love, and, I have to say that, as a 'look' for women, it's appeal is pretty niche.  

 

[runs as required]

13 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

At Buxton, the LNW and Midland Railways were coterminous - or co-terminus?

 

 

Photo by Ben Brooksbank, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10878906.

Ah !  Quite brought a lump to my throat this (late 1950s ?) pic.

My last - and current - pair of Vibrum soled* Bogtrotting Boots bought at the ex-army store on the ramp down to the Turner Memorial at the back beside the Midland station.

All buses terminated/called on the station approach during Well dressings week when the TM area in front of the crescent was closed off.

edit

This might be of interest to some

It is a composite panorama I drew for wife's mother and stepfather after they moved from Buxton (just above the L NW station) to Norfolk to be near my sister in law and young family.  StepfatherTommy Litchfield was from Peak Forest, an LMS signalman since the late 1930s until retirement in the 1980s 

It returned to me from hanging in their living room. I tried to draw as in the 1950s from in front of the Town Hall (but forgot the old Empire Hotel)

dh

 

* they were/are absolutely lethal on wet upland 'pavement'  in limestone districts .

 

Edited April 3, 2020 by runs as required
predictive text

[Malcolm 0-6-0]

30 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Any chance of a pre-raff/beard-of-the-day/JA crossover picture?

 

 

Well in regard to our very own plague I have one of a young lady very clearly prepared for it.

 

 

[runs as required]

Well in regard to our very own plague I have one of a young lady very clearly prepared for it.

 

My daughter sent these to us which may amuse:

 

https://www.sadanduseless.com/recreated-art/

https://www.sadanduseless.com/happy-killing/

 

one of the re-creations is a John Martin (painted in Newcastle/Haydon Bridge/London according to CA passim)

dh

[Nearholmer]

Don’t for goodness sake let Northroader see that - we don’t want him recreating any of his Hilda art collection and posting photos!

[St Enodoc]

39 minutes ago, runs as required said:

 

My daughter sent these to us which may amuse:

 

https://www.sadanduseless.com/recreated-art/

https://www.sadanduseless.com/happy-killing/

 

one of the re-creations is a John Martin (painted in Newcastle/Haydon Bridge/London according to CA passim)

dh

The recreated art is just brilliant. Thank you!

[Hroth]

2 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

Did JA, for instance, appear in any role that required her to emerge naked from a pond while wearing a false beard and glasses?

 

Is this Social Distancing/Stay indoors thing getting to you?

 

2 hours ago, Edwardian said:

I should think the nearest you get to that, Kevin, is Gwyneth Paltrow in Shakespeare in Love, and, I have to say that, as a 'look' for women, it's appeal is pretty niche.  

 

But the perfect look for the "Young Lady Pretending to Be A Pageboy" look that Shakespeare appeared to be so fond of...

 

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

Don’t for goodness sake let Northroader see that - we don’t want him recreating any of his Hilda art collection and posting photos!

 

We need a new sequence of terror..... 

 

I've just been to the shops, got the important things, but the hens teeth items are still just that...

 

However, the queues outside Sainsburys, Morrisons and Aldi are apocalyptic!

 

[Joseph_Pestell]

2 hours ago, Edwardian said:

 

I should think the nearest you get to that, Kevin, is Gwyneth Paltrow in Shakespeare in Love, and, I have to say that, as a 'look' for women, it's appeal is pretty niche.  

 

 

And then there was "Bob" in Blackadder Goes Forth.

[Nearholmer]

‘Bob, you young roister-doister!’

 

One of the best ‘girl dressed up as boy’ comedies around.

 

Another favourite of mine is a folk song called ‘The Female Highwayman’, but not the ‘proper’ one, the version by The Kipper Family, which contains so much cross-dressing that even the singers become confused about the actual genders of the protagonists.

 

As a treat, here are the lyrics - you’ll have to make your own tune up if you don’t know it:

 

It's of a female highwayman all on a summer's day
She said a frolic I will have and dress in man's array

And I'll ride out along the lea
And hope my true love I shall see
And there I'll test his constancy
With a female highwayman.
With a female highwayman
With a female highwayman
--last two lines of verse--

And so this female highwayman has mounted on a horse
And she's rode out and there she's met her own true
love, of course
" Stand and deliver sir", she said,
" Or if you don't I'll shoot you dead
Or would you rather come to bed
With a female highwayman?"

So they jogged on together till they came unto an inn
And there they called an ostler and boldly they walked
in
They called for liquors of the best,
They went upstairs and got undressed
What happened next can ne'er be guessed
To the female highwayman

For she's pulled off her breeches and likewise her
jacket red
She's taken off her velvet cape and lay upon the bed.
Her true love in amazement stands
It seems the end of all his plans
For she has proved to be a man
This female highwayman.

Her true love stands like one amazed and at her did
stare
But when the joke he did find out he loudly did
declare:
" Fear not my love, it's time to smile"
He threw his clothes down in a pile
He was a female all the while
For the female highwayman

Edited April 3, 2020 by Nearholmer

[Curlew]

6 minutes ago, Joseph_Pestell said:

 

And then there was "Bob" in Blackadder Goes Forth.

or Juliet Mills as Midshipman in Carry On Jack?

[Edwardian]

46 minutes ago, Joseph_Pestell said:

 

And then there was "Bob" in Blackadder Goes Forth.

 

Point being, beards.

 

Gabby Glaister did not sport whiskers as "BoB"

 

 

And neither did Juliet Mills ....

 

 

Do, back on topic (beards, Edwardians, Edwardian beards) ...... complete without Radio 4-sponsored pre-Me Too inappropriate sexual politics warning .... 

 

 

[Compound2632]

3 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

Did JA, for instance, appear in any role that required her to emerge naked from a pond while wearing a false beard and glasses? Not being a really close follower of her work, I could easily have missed it.

 

We did discuss her early family theatricals - or was that on another thread? - who knows what went on in 1780s Hampshire.

 

EDIT. Sorry, on second thoughts, probably the wrong JA. I'm becoming confused. The pond should have given it away.

 

Edited April 3, 2020 by Compound2632

[runs as required]

 

37 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

One of the best ‘girl dressed up as boy’ comedies around

 

I thought last night's NT U tube screening of  'One Man - Two Guvnors'  in that genre (the rewrite of 'The Servant of Two Masters' )  very uplifting

dh

[Northroader]

This ones called “Rising to the Bait”, Kevin.

[Northroader]

And here’s a map for Mr. Schooner,