Kings Cross Model Shop

[Peter Kazmierczak]

The CCT came out in 1978/9 if I recall. The GUV appeared later.

[highpeak]

The ballast was quite good, at least to my juvenile eyes, but extremely tedious to lay. I remember using a very small screwdriver as a sort of trowel to carefully put it between the sleepers of my new Peco streamline track, I think I could manage about a foot at a time before the tedium of it all got to me.
 

[travelintrev]

Memories, memories,  !   I was one of the Brown coated assistants at HA Blunt in WGC,  in around 67 - 68, (until I got a "proper job"!)   I still have the Unimat lathe I bought at Ponds round the corner....

 

I seem to recall the manager got a fairly severe "dressing down" when he sold ( on two seperate occaisions)  Riverossi H0 "Big -Boys" to a chap whos cheques bounced........ 

 

There was another shop that was above a department store in St Albans, (walking distance from school at lunch time) that ISTR was a "hot -bed" of not only Midland / LMS modelers but where also were helpful  when the schoolboyI started scratch building a Cambrian (ex Met tank) 4-4-0 in EM.

 

 

Trev

[Brian Kirby]

Hi again Larry,

  The Anbrico bus rads and DMU engine castings were exquisite, however the one's in the small display showcase were no doubt buffed up and polished to concert pitch. I seem to vaguely re-collect bogie sideframes for Type 2 diesels and DMUs as well? Some of the bus radiator castings had an incredibly fine "mesh" look and even the odd name legend, where appropriate, so the masters were created to a very high standard.

 

High Peak, we sold two types of "4mm" grade ballast, one was the original King's Cross self-adhesive ballast, the other was the Eames loose granite ballast, i think you were referring to the former. The KX self-adhesive ballast was tricky to apply, it was also a devil to keep in stock at the shop, cos during a hot summer it would tend to dry out and go rock hard ! Sometimes we could re-soak it and re-package it, often it had to be chucked. It was also horrible when fresh, like holding a bag of dog poo, which it also looked like. The Eames ballast was much nicer, but a box-load weighed a ton, quite a feat to cart up to the first floor. Stupidly, we also kept the very heavy bus kits bulk stock on the top floor, all good exercise for us staff.

 

                                          Merry Christmas to you both and all on RMweb,   Cheers, Brian. 

[highpeak]

Yes, it was the self-adhesive stuff, and your description is pretty accurate!

[roythebus]

Yes, I had to help Simon Kelly pack that self-adhesive ballast many times! It was HEAVY!!

 

I remember Bert Collins when he invested money into the shop, when it was MRAS. As Brian says, he was a fireman at KX and was I believe made redundant when the diesels came in. He was always known as Uncle Bert.

[Andrew Emmerson]

Hi Everyone,

Another member has brought this thread to my attention, as Roy and Bernie mentioned, i worked there full time from 1976 to 1986 and before that as a saturday boy for a few years, who needs university when you could work here! I'm currently racking my brains, to work out who Captain Kernow was, i vaguely remember a 1334 loco being built. As Roy has probably already said, by my time, most of the production had been switched to sister company Eames of Reading, which was another Aladdin's Cave, sadly now demolished.

Eames bought "OO Scale Models" of York Way and it became MRM Co.Ltd. (which stood for: Model Railway Manufacturing Co.Ltd). Bob Treacher, now owner of Alton Models (or AMRC)used to work at EAMES and famously he once had a customer claiming a discount "because he was a member of the Eames family". Sadly, the customer didn't realize that EAMES stood for "Electrical and Mechanical Engineering Supplies".

For the record, Tony was Tony Dyer, the directors were Ted Morris, John Gauld and Ted's son, David. Alan Brackenborough was based in Stroud, although we later gave more and more work to a young Larry Goddard of this parish. RMweb's "PMP"- Paul Marshall-Potter was also full-time for a few years. There are loads of funny stories to tell.

Cheers, Brian.

Apologies for nit-picking but I am sure that the S in E.A.M.E.S. stood for Services. When Ted Morris was demobbed after the war he chose a trading title that would cover the broadest possible range of activities. That's what I remember him telling me anyway. I was a Saturday Boy as well during the early 1970s, when Ken Jones was manager (and used throw out time-waster customers bodily!). Occasionally I was 'lent out' to work in the Reading shop, which although under shared ownership was run as a separate enterprise.

Andy Emmerson.

[Andrew Emmerson]

I went to Chuffs once when waiting for a train from Marylebone as it wasn't to far away. I remember it being in a basement? Piles of stuff all jumbled up on tables? Met a guy from my cycling past who I hadn't seen for years! It took us a few minutes to realise that we knew each other. Also went to Kings Cross when train waiting. Seem to remember them being a bit 'off hand'.

There were in fact three Chuffs shops. The original one was in Broadey Street, with an old enamel sign saying GENTLEMEN over the door. It was owned jointly by Peter Hunt (now of Perfect Miniatures in Sudbury) and Dave Fuest (who died soon after I joined the staff). The shop manager was a guy in a hippy fringed leather jacket called Terry and another staff member was Jon Mackechnie-Jarvis. I'm still in touch with him after all these years.

 

As business expanded a larger shop was bought in Lisson Grove. Regular visitors/associates  included Royston Carss (a cerebral guy who later had a business called Metal Models, I think --- is he still around?), Simon Goodyear (now Train Time, Huddersfield and seen regularly at the Rugby Vintage train shows) and Allan Levy (then of Philips Electrical but later to run New Cavendish Books). 

 

A City branch was opened subsequently in Bucklersbury, run by a Scotsman we knew only as 'Jock'. This shop did have a glory hole of a basement; the others didn't. Iain Rice was associated with the City branch, as I recall.

 

At some stage the Broadley Street shop closed and the Lisson Grove establishment was renamed The Dolls House (pronounced doals house) and run by Peter's wife. Happy days! When Chuffs closed, I was hired by the King's Cross model shop.

Andy Emmerson.

[Andrew Emmerson]

Kings Cross Models was also the last place I saw a friend who I suspect Stationmaster must have known - Tom Linfoot. Must have been about 1988/9, and Tom - 50-ish - was already ill.

Affectionately known as Nitfool and several other anagrams, Tom was a marvellously likable  character, He ran the Excursions section in the Divisional Office at Reading, when I was in Passenger Development there. He organised many beer-drinking outings introduced me to CAMRA when it was still new. Much missed by his friends and colleagues (we had plenty of secret railway enthusiasts on the staff at Reading!).

Andy Emmerson.

[Oldddudders]

Affectionately known as Nitfool and several other anagrams, Tom was a marvellously likable  character, He ran the Excursions section in the Divisional Office at Reading, when I was in Passenger Development there. He organised many beer-drinking outings introduced me to CAMRA when it was still new. Much missed by his friends and colleagues (we had plenty of secret railway enthusiasts on the staff at Reading!).

Andy Emmerson.

Don't forget his 1954 Riley...... The same age as his sports jacket, he proudly announced on one jolly in the '70s.

[Andrew Emmerson]

>The nameplate ranges are apparently still available from a Mr. Burton of 6 Stratfield Park Court, Winchmore Hill, London, N21 1BU, but the website for this went down recently after the BT Web Hosting Service was discontinued.

 

Now residing at http://uk.groups.yahoo.com/group/kingscrossplates/ 

AE.

[Andrew Emmerson]

Don't forget his 1954 Riley...... The same age as his sports jacket, he proudly announced on one jolly in the '70s.

 

Ah, I never saw the Riley. But I do remember a pub crawl co-arranged by Tom and Gerry Daniels in a motor coach having a dorsal fin at the rear. Dorsal fins are seriously cool!

[Oldddudders]

Possibly a Harrington fin - it seemed to be their trademark. Deb and I had a number of trips out in similar circs, including Pendon on one occasion in Jan '75. GDD went on to start Crookham Travel, outwith his day-job, which must have been AM at Salisbury, I think, when he organised steam fests on the WofE main line. He'd been ASM at London Bridge on my shift in my Control days.

[Andrew Emmerson]

 many well known modellers and a few slebs came through, including Mr R Stewart who bought a Samhongsa Pannier from the showcase from a colleage one year. 

Ah yes. Apparently he was a fairly regular visitor and came in one Saturday. I missed seeing him as I was on my lunch break (not at Renzos but the Groan Indian restaurant next door). He was served by the redoubtable Ken Jones, with not much deference, and after RS left, the other staff asked Ken, "Do you realise who that was?"

 

"No and I don't care," came the reply. To be fair to Ken, he had no favourites and was rude to everybody! One day he noticed a customer lifting books off the bookshelf one after the other, flipping through them and then putting them back. After ten minutes, Ken couldn't stand it any longer and said, "You're clearly unable to find what you are looking for. We have the best selection of railway books in London, so what is it that we don't have?"

 

"Don't worry," the guy said. "My train doesn't leave The Cross for at least an hour, so I thought I'd read your books."

 

"Out!" screamed Ken, kicking open the front door and lifting the customer physically onto the pavement.

 

Ken had come from the camera trade and used his previous employer's secret code for price-labelling the goods in the second-hand and commission sales window. I don't think I am breaching any confidences now in revealing it to be MECOBLITZA, with M = 1 and A = 0. Each loco was labelled with its price plus a code indicating what the shop had bought in for, so £50 was BA. If a potential customer liked an item but wanted to haggle over the price, the alpha code told the salesman how far he could bargain. This was explained to us underlings (Jeff Kosta and me) but any negotiating was handled by Ken, not us Saturday boys.

 

One of the likable customers I remember was called 'Wee Fergie'. His day job was a signal designer for the London Midland Region at Stephenson House but he was also a good scratch builder and bought his supplies at King's Cross. Many Model Railway Club people bought their bits at KC too.

 

many of the trade came in, as mentioned and we were often sent to Hamblings and W&H to collect or deliver supplies, I often wondered why so many of the brass turnings we sold looked identical to W&H's, even though we didn't get them from W&H. Ted Morris explained that everybody bought them from Anglo-Swiss Precision at West Drayton, so they were not exclusive products.

 

I must put on record what good guys John and David Morris were. Totally honest and decent people.

 

Happy days.

Andy Emmerson.

[Horsetan]

 

>The nameplate ranges are apparently still available from a Mr. Burton of 6 Stratfield Park Court, Winchmore Hill, London, N21 1BU, but the website for this went down recently after the BT Web Hosting Service was discontinued.

 

Now residing at http://uk.groups.yahoo.com/group/kingscrossplates/ 

AE.

 

Looks like it's disappeared again:

"Document Not Found

Sorry, the document you requested is not available.

Please click here to visit the Yahoo! Groups home page."

[Andrew Emmerson]

I've just looked and it's there all right. Maybe your ISP suffered a 'blip'!

 

Or else, if you may not be logged into Yahoo Groups. If the latter, go to https://edit.yahoo.com/registration?.intl=us&new=1&.src=ygrp&.v=0&.done=http%3a//groups.yahoo.com

 

Good luck,

Andy Emmerson.

[roythebus]

Wee Fergie was probably Ian Fergusson who appeared at the MRC circa 1967; he was indeed a signal engineer. I last saw him at an MRC exhibition about 1979 when I was downstairs at Central Hall wiring up Dyers End. ISTr Fergie was from Hawick or thereabouts.

 

Mike Shepard, who worked upstairs in the workshop at no.4 once said of AG Thomas: if he went to work for Bec Models, would he be known as Thomas O'Beckit?

[Il Grifone]

I've just looked and it's there all right. Maybe your ISP suffered a 'blip'!

 

Or else, if you may not be logged into Yahoo Groups. If the latter, go to https://edit.yahoo.com/registration?.intl=us&new=1&.src=ygrp&.v=0&.done=http://groups.yahoo.com

 

Good luck,

Andy Emmerson.

It's there OK, but seems semi-moribund. You need to join to get any details.

[Warsop]

I noticed several comments on the Kings Cross range of number and nameplates.

The original two websites were withdrawn by BT , the replacement one on Yahoo was not at all popular so I am pleased to say there is now a conventional website on

www.gcrsociety.co.uk/kingscrossplates.html

 

For those of you who like to know the history of Kings Cross Plates, here it is.

When the Kings Cross Model shop and Eames of Reading shut down , the assets were bought by Brian Emberton of Firsby in Lincolnshire, he lived in the former station house and had plenty of land attached. Brian also at the time owned Nu Cast , K's  Pirate  and several other brands.  His main business was making face masks for North Sea oil workers. from high quality plastic.   Brian's sons did not share his interest in model railways so in 1993 he decided to sell his railway business. Alan Gibson bought one white metal brand and Autocom bought NuCast and K's.  .  

I bought Kings Cross Plates and the large collection of books from the two shops.  .  Having catalogued the books I sold off the bus books wholesale to a place in Friar street Reading but I kept most of the railway books.  I dont speak or read German so a small number of the books are of limited use to me. 

 

Now back to today : I have added a few plates to the range and in particular to the 3mm range,: the 3mm Society members have been good customers for me.  I dont do my own etching , it seems a somewhat dangerous process if you dont know exactly what you are doing , so I have used PhotoEtch in Brownhills near Walsall to do the work.  You still have to cut the plates out , it would take too much time and money to move over to a tab based system..

 

If you are interested in buying plates , just follow the instructions on the website and call or email me

 

Geoff Burton

[RANGERS]

I noticed several comments on the Kings Cross range of number and nameplates.

The original two websites were withdrawn by BT , the replacement one on Yahoo was not at all popular so I am pleased to say there is now a conventional website on

www.gcrsociety.co.uk/kingscrossplates.html

 

For those of you who like to know the history of Kings Cross Plates, here it is.

When the Kings Cross Model shop and Eames of Reading shut down , the assets were bought by Brian Emberton of Firsby in Lincolnshire, he lived in the former station house and had plenty of land attached. Brian also at the time owned Nu Cast , K's  Pirate  and several other brands.  His main business was making face masks for North Sea oil workers. from high quality plastic.   Brian's sons did not share his interest in model railways so in 1993 he decided to sell his railway business. Alan Gibson bought one white metal brand and Autocom bought NuCast and K's.  .  

I bought Kings Cross Plates and the large collection of books from the two shops.  .  Having catalogued the books I sold off the bus books wholesale to a place in Friar street Reading but I kept most of the railway books.  I dont speak or read German so a small number of the books are of limited use to me. 

 

Now back to today : I have added a few plates to the range and in particular to the 3mm range,: the 3mm Society members have been good customers for me.  I dont do my own etching , it seems a somewhat dangerous process if you dont know exactly what you are doing , so I have used PhotoEtch in Brownhills near Walsall to do the work.  You still have to cut the plates out , it would take too much time and money to move over to a tab based system..

 

If you are interested in buying plates , just follow the instructions on the website and call or email me

 

Geoff Burton

I wondered what the connection between Kings Cross and deepest Lincs was! I'm presuming Brian had the retail shop which opened in the filling station at Irby in the Marsh (Chris Crawley Models?), the next village up from Firsby. When I went there in about 1988, there was a pile of items which had obviously come from Kings Cross, most notably some of the built bus kits which once resided in the display case at York Way, a Dominant 111 from a Pirate kit was one I particularly recall. IIRC there was a woman in the shop at the time who told me that they'd moved from North Lincs, Brigg area I seem to remember it was.

 

A year or two later, the retail side had combined with the manufacturing side and Irby had closed, the two being combined in the outbuildings of the former Station Hotel at Firsby (it wasn't the Station House, that was adjacent to the former station). I visited one gloriously sunny afternoon and bought several bus books, one about Sheffield United Tours the most memorable.

 

Almost a couple of decades later, 2004/ 5, I bought some items on Ebay which were located in Skegness. As we were there regularly at that point, I asked the vendor if I could collect and when they gave me the address it was the same place. It turned out the seller was the daughter/ daughter in law (Brians presumably) and they were clearing the last of the stock, I seem to think the place was for sale and they were moving. I think I asked what the connection was but she didn't know.

 

I seem to think Brian Robinson (Brians Kits and Bits) ultimately ended up with some of the stock.

[Warsop]

I wondered what the connection between Kings Cross and deepest Lincs was! I'm presuming Brian had the retail shop which opened in the filling station at Irby in the Marsh (Chris Crawley Models?), the next village up from Firsby. When I went there in about 1988, there was a pile of items which had obviously come from Kings Cross, most notably some of the built bus kits which once resided in the display case at York Way, a Dominant 111 from a Pirate kit was one I particularly recall. IIRC there was a woman in the shop at the time who told me that they'd moved from North Lincs, Brigg area I seem to remember it was.

 

A year or two later, the retail side had combined with the manufacturing side and Irby had closed, the two being combined in the outbuildings of the former Station Hotel at Firsby (it wasn't the Station House, that was adjacent to the former station). I visited one gloriously sunny afternoon and bought several bus books, one about Sheffield United Tours the most memorable.

 

Almost a couple of decades later, 2004/ 5, I bought some items on Ebay which were located in Skegness. As we were there regularly at that point, I asked the vendor if I could collect and when they gave me the address it was the same place. It turned out the seller was the daughter/ daughter in law (Brians presumably) and they were clearing the last of the stock, I seem to think the place was for sale and they were moving. I think I asked what the connection was but she didn't know.

 

I seem to think Brian Robinson (Brians Kits and Bits) ultimately ended up with some of the stock.

 

You are right about the shop and when it closed and thanks for the correction re Station Hotel rather than station house.  Brian Emberton sadly died (of a brain tumor I believe) in about 1995 , his wife Ruth , who was the business accountant carried on with the oil field masks for some time.  She phoned me one day and invited me to call in and take away many odd white metal castings which she had found.  Her children were beginning to move away so I am not surprised that she put the place up for sale.   Incidentally the name Chris Crawley Models came from Tottenham in London . Brian must have bought them out earlier or he may have been a second buyer of that name because there was a buisness in Humberside of the same name for a short time.   

I dont know anything about Brian Robinson ; the chap who owned Autocom was Mike Griffiths , he bought NuCast and K's     Geoff

[Enterprisingwestern]

Chris Crawley operated out of Goxhill for a while in the late 80's early 90's IIRC. Nearly blagged an LNER dining table off him!

 

Mike.

[roythebus]

I happened to visit a shop next door to 14 York Way quite a few years back with my younger son to pick up some sound equipment from the top floor. Looking down out of the back window explained why we could always hear diesel locos at certain times of the day...the model shop backed onto one of the vetilator shafts for Hotel Curve! Had I bothered to look out of the top floor there I would have seen the trains going to Moorgate. Oh well...

[BrushVeteran]

I happened to visit a shop next door to 14 York Way quite a few years back with my younger son to pick up some sound equipment from the top floor. Looking down out of the back window explained why we could always hear diesel locos at certain times of the day...the model shop backed onto one of the vetilator shafts for Hotel Curve! Had I bothered to look out of the top floor there I would have seen the trains going to Moorgate. Oh well...

Although slightly OT, I recently had to make an overnight stay in the KX area due to work commitments and this is the view a had from my Travelodge room window just across the road from KX station in Grays Inn Road. .......................I didn't need the alarm to wake up in the morning!!! 319 on the Widened lines and S stock on the Circle nearest. A smoky Class 31 and Mk 1 subs can be imagined! Excuse the poor images from my mobile phone.

[RANGERS]

Chris Crawley operated out of Goxhill for a while in the late 80's early 90's IIRC. Nearly blagged an LNER dining table off him!

 

Mike.

That would be where I was thinking of, I suspect it was a bit earlier though, from where I was working at the time I visited, pre-1988 I'd guess. They published a couple of "catalogues", actually A4 duplicated sheets listing various items. One covered locomotives and rolling stock IIRC, another was road vehicle kits which contained, as well as the usual Langley/ Westward/ ABS etc, other kits I'd never previously come across including Mi-Kits. I'd say that the Goxhill and Firsby businesses were one and the same, quite how the Chris Crawley name came into it, I'm not sure but possibly it had passed with the stock when the Tottenham business closed?

Edited June 2, 2013 by RANGERS