Bernard Lamb

My daughter made an interesting comment this morning. As it is Ramadan a lot of people were still up having just finished their meal. On a different date far more people would have been in bed and the death toll would probably have been much higher. Bernard

The two buildings used a totally different method of construction. London used concrete. NY was a steel frame. One stood up, the other twisted with the heat after receiving a massive impact. Bernard

This time from the Harpenden to Hemel Hempstead branch. Roudwood Halt with platform and signal. I think the signal is original. Beaumot Halt. Site of with road crossing but no sign of any remains other than a slight widening of the track bed. Godwin's Halt. Named after Shadrach Godwin, a local landowner. A friend of mine lives in one of his former farm houses. There was a siding here that was used to unload manure. Shadrach had a contract to clear the streets of London from the stuff left behind by the horses that pulled Hansom Cabs. The bridge and cutting beyond the halt has been used as a dump and little remains. Heath Park Halt. Unusual in that it was at one time a terminus for the passenger service. The halt was on an embankment and ran roughly by the first trees across the picture. The road is Corner Hall and if you continue for around 400 yds you will reach my house. Not as glorious as some examples but I hope they generate some interest. Bernard

I now file on line. However I found out by accident last year that if you file on line you can change or add a paper version of various sections at a later date. Quite handy if you find the on line system complicated and prefer to make notes on paper. Bernard

I get that every time I type certain things. 11 or ll and HO or H0 I am afraid my poor eyes and brain can detect no difference, yet still some people have to make sarky comments. Bernard

For some reason the previous post appeared before I had finished writing. Photos are from Halts on the Hatfield St Albans branch. Salvation Army Halt. I love that name. Just a few timbers in the undergrowth. Nast Hyde halt. Renovated and improved by the local Postman. Lemsford Road Halt. Just the steps left. Bernard

Nothing has changed. I leave it without punctuation, emphasis, stress or tone, as there are a multitude of variants from the same source. Discuss. My first comment will be a question as to how one can change "nothing". Bernard

Your reference to German and British accents reminds me of a story from WW11. There was a secret propaganda radio station at Milton Bryan and they needed a female announcer with a good German accent. A young girl of 15, the daughter of one of the people who worked there, took on the task. Her name was Agnes Bernelle and she had come to England with her father from Berlin in 1938. She convinced thousands of German troops that she was broadcasting on "their" radio. After the war she applied for a job with the BBC overseas service and was rejected on the grounds that her German was unsuitable for use on the radio as Germans would not be able to understand her accent and intonation. Of course she could not say a word about what she had been doing for the last three or four years. She went on to have a career in the theatre. On the subject of changes over time. Yesterday I received an email signed off with the phrase. Your loyal servant. That is going back a good few years. Bernard

Don't bother with a RAL chart as there is nothing anywhere near what you need. My screen is quite good in respect of colour and I am checking against a printed chart I had from my working days when I used to check paint finish. You are correct about the lemonish tinge. Nothing near on the two BS charts either so I can't come up with a suggestion. Bernard

What do you mean by "still"? Mine powers my oval test track and has seen off several more modern controllers on various layouts. Nothing quite like it and for certain it will never be equalled let alone bettered. A short on a coach that had lighting the other day did make it growl a bit but usually it works fine with all types of motors, including those used in DJH locomotives. Bernard

When it was introduced it did set a high standard. However it is a case of lacking details rather then errors that put it lower down the list today. A few extra bits of pipework and adding the fire iron guards will improve it. As will some finer tender wheels. Bernard

They are if you model continental stock, where all four wheel wagons and vans have been fitted with close coupling cam devices for around the last twenty years. Bernard

Will they do one like this? Bernard

It was very much by chance where the stations were built. Historical accidents so to speak. If the railways had arrived about forty years earlier the situation would have been very different. Euston could have been built best part of a mile nearer to the centre of town. Without that perishing canal in the way all the lines leading out of London to the north would have had very different approaches. To say nothing of the extra cost of complicated engineering solutions in crossing it. Bernard

I don't understand that situation. About an hour ago a packet arrived here in the UK from Amazon de. I have never had a problem with ordering from any Amazon site. I even have one click purchasing set up and it works perfectly every time. I too would prefer to buy things in a shop, but in this case no shop in the area that I have access to has any stock in Germany and I would think that shops selling German versions of DVDs are pretty thin on the ground in the UK. Did you just go by what it said on the website or did you contact them to check? Bernard

Has nobody heard of Minories? The good old London and Blackwall Railway. Bernard

I would go along with that. The funny thing is that they took some stick for the bend in the motion. However when you actually see the model it appears to be a very neat solution. However if you want some fun take a look at the Bachmann model and compare it with the one by Guy Williams. Bernard ps Pedants who don't do fun please ignore this post.

Thank you so much for posting that photo. As a very young child I was living in Bere Alston around 1946. To see a photograph of an actual carriage that I must have travelled in quite a few times is quite interesting, although I was too young to remember anything about it. Bernard

Thank you. I have no desire to post pictures of food or indeed of any other activity. I do find it amusing when people post pictures of me on the internet. My own peculiarity is I am controlled by time. If I am told an event is at a certain time I go ape if it is changed. The other day I was told we would be picked up by a car at 21;30. When we had not left at 21:40 I simply could not cope. Now to many people that sounds daft but believe me it is serious to me. Fortunately my daughter understands the situation. To the extent that when their was a hold up on the railway and I was late in meeting her she was really worried that some thing had happened to me. Ironically my "problem" was a great help in my job in QC as working on an audit I would never let up until I had all figures agreeing. In general on here the membership is very broadminded and understanding, however we do have the odd . Bernard

There was a group of artists known as The East London Group who worked in the late 1920s and 1930s. Being based in Bow they were surrounded by railways and their paintings include quite a few railway based scenes. I went to an exhibition a couple of years ago and have been on the look out for chances to see some more of their work since the. Various pictures can be found on line by searching for the group or by individual artists. They were all amateur artists but the general standard achieved was very high. Even if it had not been so I still find it interesting as a record of an area I knew as a young kid. At one time the Institute they attended was actually located in Bow station. Elwin Hawthorne, Albert Turpin and Walter Steggles in particular painted scenes with a railway content. Bernard

As you say they can move quickly when needs must. The classic case of that was the Falklands war. You want how many! You want them that quickly! You want them sent to *********! Ok . no problem. ... and lo it was done. By the reports sent back it all worked perfectly regardless of source so somebody in MOD procurement had got their act together. Bernard

To you that might well be the case. To a young lad I know who struggles to cope with life it is a very important task that he needs to do every morning. You are very lucky that you do not have such a problem. However please try to have a little more understanding in respect oft hose who have such difficulties in coping with every day tasks. Bernard

The ultimate irony in that field was Jessops, one of the key players, particularly in respect of film imports, who eventually went down because others were able to do what they did but do it better. I live a couple of hundred yards from the old Kodak HQ. Back in the period you mention I could buy Kodak film at the trade centre in Gadebridge Park but I could phone Jessops in Leicester who would supply me with Canadian made film at an even lower price. Kodak would threaten that if they had to destroy batches of out dated unsold film then prices would increase dramatically. In the end Kodak brought about their demise partly by their own policy. As you point out the retail shops had gone, with the big boys destroying the local shops and then destroying each other.. Bernard

I am a recent convert. It does have an advantage over email as a tool to keep in touch with people in a group who have various interests. You can check dates and times of meetings and any alterations show up immediately, along with comments that can be of value.. One group of over 300 local people who have various interests in common that I belong to use it. With daily activities involving around 10 to 30 people in different combinations it is a far better method of communicating than by using bulk emails that tend to be binned by many providers. Posting silly photos is a part of it that I just ignore. Same applies to any request to be a friend. I do find it rather odd that a few people I know to have died maintain their account from beyond the grave. Bernard