Castle Aching

[Regularity]

Why not “loan” the marbles back to Greece, and they in turn loan their replicas to us - they have their own story and their own historic interest.

[Bill_J]

My apologies, no offence was intended, and I did take the item out of context just to raise a point that holds a great deal of emotional and cultural importance to all greeks.

 

Britain has long been a close supporter of Greece and the Greek people in general - (HRH Phillip (The Greek)). As evidenced by the efforts of Lord Byron and others. The Greeks at that time were in a constant state of insurrection to throw off the Ottoman yoke. My wife has family in both Athens and in Crete and their memories are long 

 

To bring all this back to railways:

 

The Acropolis Railway.   Niko Lipsanen - posted under Creative Commons Licence.

http://www.domnik.net/topoi/commons/GR/attica/athens/acropolis/

 

Bill

 

[Nearholmer]

People, governments, institutions, conquerors, plunderers, empires, entire cultures even, come and go, and through all that a few buildings manage to remain largely intact. It seems to me that the best each generation of people can do is to act as custodians of these hardy bits of architecture, and pass them on to the next generation, ideally intact, andideally in situ, because that is how they were intended to be, and that is how they can best be understood.

 

If Lord Elgin acquired some bits of The Parthenon as a way of preserving them, then now is as good a time as any to send them back, because they will surely be well cared for by the present institutions in Greece. 

 

That, of course, opens-up the thought that maybe lots of other things that presently rest in museums half a world away from their origins should also be returned from whence they came, and my personal take on that is that, in principle, they should be, provided that:

 

- in their place of origin they will be well cared for for the foreseeable future; and,

 

- if they are of a kind that is so common that education can be served by having representative samples distributed across the globe, then let it be so.

 

Of course, colonists have plundered since time immemorial, so maybe each former imperial country needs to retain a few bits and pieces, to put in the museum that it should create to record its imperial phase, once it has calmed down and grown beyond that sort of thing (Britain, IMO, hasn't managed either yet, and would do itself a big favour if it got some therapy and "moved on" sooner rather than later).

 

And, if the argument for holding onto things is the scholarship that they become the centre of in the countries that hold them, then perhaps the answer is to ship the scholars and the resources that support them on the same boat as the booty - diffuse knowledge, skills, and funds, rather than accumulate artifacts.

 

[Woops! Posted after the "time to wrap that one" posting from Bill.]

Edited March 20, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Edwardian]

1 hour ago, Bill_J said:

My apologies, no offence was intended, and I did take the item out of context just to raise a point that holds a great deal of emotional and cultural importance to all greeks.

 

Britain has long been a close supporter of Greece and the Greek people in general - (HRH Phillip (The Greek)). As evidenced by the efforts of Lord Byron and others. The Greeks at that time were in a constant state of insurrection to throw off the Ottoman yoke. My wife has family in both Athens and in Crete and their memories are long 

 

To bring all this back to railways:

 

The Acropolis Railway.   Niko Lipsanen - posted under Creative Commons Licence.

http://www.domnik.net/topoi/commons/GR/attica/athens/acropolis/

 

Bill

 

 

No I should apologise. I was grumpily (the dogs gave me no rest last night) picking up on what I thought was an indifferent argument in favour of a broadly sympathetic cause. In other words, I was giving in to an occupational hazard; arguing needlessly.  By the way, I mentioned the Byzantine horses plundered for St Mark's basilica without realising we had arrived at page 1204!

 

And I dated a Greek Cypriot long enough to know that there are past wrongs that are nonetheless very live and present.   

[Bill_J]

1 minute ago, Edwardian said:

 

No I should apologise. I was grumpily (the dogs gave me no rest last night) picking up on what I thought was an indifferent argument in favour of a broadly sympathetic cause. In other words, I was giving in to an occupational hazard; arguing needlessly.  By the way, I mentioned the Byzantine horses plundered for St Mark's basilica without realising we had arrived at page 1204!

 

And I dated a Greek Cypriot long enough to know that there are past wrongs that are nonetheless very live and present.   

 

[Bill_J]

Okay, we can apologise back and forth when it appears that we are actually in agreement, in the main.

 

I understand the grumpies, I'm working through some black times of my own and used your thread as a somewhat cathartic release. At least you have continued with Castle Aching while I have done no modelling for over a year.

 

I hold nothing but respect for you and the other contributors to the thread, it has been my safe haven during the dark times and for that I thank you all...

[Compound2632]

18 minutes ago, Edwardian said:

And I dated a Greek Cypriot long enough to know that there are past wrongs that are nonetheless very live and present.   

 

... and that was without discussing history, politics, or religion?

[Edwardian]

9 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

... and that was without discussing history, politics, or religion?

 

She was a feisty one. We lived in Bloomsbury, so every so often I'd walk her round to the British Museum and stand her in front of the Elgin Marbles until she'd settled down.

 

I often wonder why that relationship didn't last  

[Hroth]

We're almost into 1205

 

Back then it was the reign of King John

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1200s_in_England

 

A fairly quiet year...

[Edwardian]

31 minutes ago, Hroth said:

We're almost into 1205

 

Back then it was the reign of King John

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1200s_in_England

 

A fairly quiet year...

 

King John was not a good man --
He had his little ways.
And sometimes no one spoke to him
For days and days and days.
And men who came across him,
When walking in the town,
Gave him a supercilious stare,
Or passed with noses in the air --
And bad King John stood dumbly there,
Blushing beneath his crown.

 

King John was not a good man,
And no good friends had he.
He stayed in every afternoon...
But no one came to tea.
And, round about December,
The cards upon his shelf
Which wished him lots of Christmas cheer,
And fortune in the coming year,
Were never from his near and dear,
But only from himself.

 

King John was not a good man,
Yet had his hopes and fears.
They'd given him no present now
For years and years and years.
But every year at Christmas,
While minstrels stood about,
Collecting tribute from the young
For all the songs they might have sung,
He stole away upstairs and hung
A hopeful stocking out.

 

King John was not a good man,
He lived his live aloof;
Alone he thought a message out
While climbing up the roof.
He wrote it down and propped it
Against the chimney stack:
"TO ALL AND SUNDRY - NEAR AND FAR -
F. Christmas in particular."
And signed it not "Johannes R."
But very humbly, "Jack."

 

"I want some crackers,
And I want some candy;
I think a box of chocolates
Would come in handy;
I don't mind oranges,
I do like nuts!
And I SHOULD like a pocket-knife
That really cuts.
And, oh! Father Christmas, if you love me at all,
Bring me a big, red, india-rubber ball!"

 

King John was not a good man --
He wrote this message out,
And gat him to this room again,
Descending by the spout.
And all that night he lay there,
A prey to hopes and fears.
"I think that's him a-coming now!"
(Anxiety bedewed his brow.)
"He'll bring one present, anyhow --
The first I had for years."

 

"Forget about the crackers,
And forget the candy;
I'm sure a box of chocolates
Would never come in handy;
I don't like oranges,
I don't want nuts,
And I HAVE got a pocket-knife
That almost cuts.
But, oh! Father Christmas, if you love me at all,
Bring me a big, red, india-rubber ball!"

 

King John was not a good man,
Next morning when the sun
Rose up to tell a waiting world
That Christmas had begun,
And people seized their stockings,
And opened them with glee,
And crackers, toys and games appeared,
And lips with sticky sweets were smeared,

 

King John said grimly: "As I feared,
Nothing again for me!"

"I did want crackers,
And I did want candy;
I know a box of chocolates
Would come in handy;
I do love oranges,
I did want nuts!
And, oh! if Father Christmas, had loved me at all,
He would have brought a big, red,
india-rubber ball!"

 

King John stood by the window,
And frowned to see below
The happy bands of boys and girls
All playing in the snow.
A while he stood there watching,
And envying them all ...
When through the window big and red
There hurtled by his royal head,
And bounced and fell upon the bed,
An india-rubber ball!

 

AND, OH, FATHER CHRISTMAS,
MY BLESSINGS ON YOU FALL
FOR BRINGING HIM
A BIG, RED,
INDIA-RUBBER

[DonB]

My daughter lives within walking distance of Runnymede, which I think gave John Rex some sobering moments.

[Nearholmer]

 

Pretty sure its not The Irish Mail, but fascinating nonetheless.

 

Edited March 20, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Edwardian]

1 minute ago, Nearholmer said:

 

Pretty sure its not The Irish Mail, but fascinating nonetheless.

 

 

It's not, IIRC it's a suburban set, but Stephen has the gen. He's been wagon spotting and everything.

 

It is a superb film, really clear with bags of detail. Just to see a Teutonic on the move ...!

[Annie]

An absolutely terrific piece of film.  Always good to see it again.

[Compound2632]

I've just been watching this several times over as I'm including it in a Zoom talk on early railway films for our club. 

 

James got there first! It's not the Irish Mail! It's a Euston-Watford set of 50 ft non-corridor carriages, travelling on the up slow at Bushey. The engine is quite something though - possibly the most famous locomotive of the 1890s, Teutonic No. 1304 Jeanie Deans, that from 1892 to July 1899 was the regular engine for the Euston-Crewe leg of the down 2pm "Corridor", working back in each evening with the up "Corridor". Here she is on Bushey troughs again, working her proper train, probably in the last week she was on it:

The Glasgow portion, with twin dining saloons, leads with the Edinburgh portion with its 65'6" diner at the rear.

 

The film was made by the William Kennedy Dickson's British Mutoscope and Biograph Company, using 68 mm film - which accounts for the superb resolution. For UK readers, there's an hour-long compilation on BFI Free including this piece and some other railway clips, along with lots of Dutch peasantry (it's a co-production with the Dutch film museum) and also Pope Leo XIII blessing the camera.

 

The LNWR had obviously spotted the advertising potential of the cinema, providing Dickson with not only the trains but possession of the up slow and up fast lines. A shame from their point of view that no-one though to stop traffic on the down slow, but I'm delighted!

 

From the timing between the signals and scaling distances off the OS 25" map, one can work out that if the film is running at true speed, she's doing about 40 mph. From the number of wagons, the down empty mineral train is about 900 ft long and takes 10 seconds to pass, so the relative speed is about 60 mph, i.e. that Coal Engine is trundling its load along the down slow at about 20 mph.

 

For UK readers, the real Irish Mail can be seen here: https://player.bfi.org.uk/free/film/watch-menai-bridge-the-irish-day-mail-from-euston-entering-the-tubular-bridge-over-the. This time the engine is a Dreadnought.

 

 

Edited March 20, 2021 by Compound2632

[Nearholmer]

Aside from the stock, I think its running on the Up Slow, filmed from the Up Fast.

 

The other LNWR film is at Bushey too, was there a seriously good film-maker based there?

 

{Crossed in the ether - perfect reply before I'd sent it!}

Edited March 20, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Hroth]

And the director said...  "When you hit the troughs keep the scoop down so it soaks the leading coach!"

 

Terrific film!

 

[monkeysarefun]

Water begins gushing  out of tender at 51 seconds, train passes bunch of blokes standing at trackside at 54 seconds.

Was that train driven by pranksters?

[Compound2632]

On 20/03/2021 at 23:17, Nearholmer said:

Aside from the stock, I think its running on the Up Slow, filmed from the Up Fast.

 

The other LNWR film is at Bushey too, was there a seriously good film-maker based there?

 

{Crossed in the ether - perfect reply before I'd sent it!}

 

The other Bushey film is by Charles Goodwin Norton (who features, along with his two children). No connection. I suppose Bushey was the sort of place such people lived in! It was made just a year after Louis Lumiere's L'arrivée d'un train en gare de La Ciotat (not, as is sometimes claimed, the first Lumiere film).

 

Bushey troughs was a favourite location for late Victorian train photographers. But as @Hroth points out, Dickson's film establishes several of the key tropes of the steam train film!

Edited March 22, 2021 by Compound2632
Two children, not two daughters - on re-watching, the smaller one is wearing trousers.

[Hroth]

3 minutes ago, monkeysarefun said:

Was that train driven by pranksters?

 

More likely slipped 10 bob for the driver and a half crown for the fireman.

[Nearholmer]

Not only all that, but a quick read-up on Dickson led me to this priceless sentence: 

 

The trial hinged on whether their butler could have seen Lady Campbell in flagrante with Captain Shaw of the Metropolitan Fire Brigade, through the keyhole of their dining room at 79 Cadogan Place, London.

 

(Dickson invented "What The Butler Saw" machines, among many other things.)

 

Would a practicing lawyer have access to the transcript of this case? I ask, because I think we really all need to know whether or not the butler could have seen.

[Compound2632]

Ah! Was he the Captain Shaw mentioned in Iolanthe? And was that before or after?

[Nearholmer]

The very same chap, apparently.

 

Knowing that, the words are pretty near the knuckle.

 

He was in the audience for the premier, sitting next to Lady Campbell, but the "Could the butler see?" case was a few years later.

 

London was a very interesting place in the late C19th, wasn't it?

 

Actually, reading on, it was a very sad case http://www.geriwalton.com/lord-and-lady-colin-campbells/

 

 

Edited March 21, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Edwardian]

9 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

I've just been watching this several times over as I'm including it in a Zoom talk on early railway films for our club. 

 

James got there first! It's not the Irish Mail! It's a Euston-Watford set of 50 ft non-corridor carriages, travelling on the up slow at Bushey. The engine is quite something though - possibly the most famous locomotive of the 1890s, Teutonic No. 1304 Jeanie Deans, that from 1892 to July 1899 was the regular engine for the Euston-Crewe leg of the down 2pm "Corridor", working back in each evening with the up "Corridor". Here she is on Bushey troughs again, working her proper train, probably in the last week she was on it:

The Glasgow portion, with twin dining saloons, leads with the Edinburgh portion with its 65'6" diner at the rear.

 

 

 

 

 

An idea that has been percolating for sometime , for execution when there is a long redundant outbuilding in my life, is to have a watch-the-trains-go-by roundy roundy, generic like the test track but a double-track mainline, in order to run the larger locomotives and longer trains ......

 

I would agree that Jeanie Deans, was the most famous locomotive of her day. It's the trick of preservation that she is largely unknown now, while others stand in the popular imagination as the icons of that period. Whale, though, didn't take to Mr Webb's more complicated essays, so, unlike the Jumbos, the Teutonics lacked longevity; only a small class to begin with. by the time of Castle Aching, Whale was determinedly killing them off.

 

Jeanie Deans was the only Teutonic not named after a White Star liner, so had that promotional idea come to the LNWR a generation later, or for a second time, we would have presumably had a Titanic!

 

The Menai Bridge film is one I've seen before, but will happily watch again when I have enough bandwidth. The Dreadnoughts were, I think, the precursors (pun-intended) of the Teutonics. 

  

 

[James Harrison]

Six 50-foot carriages and a diminutive 2-4-0.  A godsend for those of us who want to model a mainline but think we'd struggle to find the space.