Avocette

Clarifying my memory of my first visit to Scottie Bridge, some years before I started spotting there around 1960, I recall my father saying to me words to the effect of 'let's go to see the Talisman and the Golden Plover'. I didn't have a clue about the relationship between a train and an engine, the reasoning for naming an A4 Pacific after a bird nor the naming of the train after the Walter Scott novel, but I happily went along with him. I have the feeling that we arrived at Scottie Bridge just a bit too late to watch the Talisman go by, but my father, never held back by BR warning notices, then walked down the path from the bridge to the Little Benton South signal box and introduced himself to the signalman who showed us around the box between bells and phone calls and signal lever pulls. I hesitate to guess how old (young) I was, but noting that The Talisman ran under steam power from 1956 until 1961, I feel it may have been not long after 1956 (when I was 6) and perhaps BR were publicising the new train in the Newcastle Journal and Evening Chronicle. That said, I have spotted a BR photo/postcard of The Talisman pulled by 60031 Golden Plover (Flickr/David Ward) which crystalises the link between train and engine.

This excellent thread about Little Benton Sidings has both answered many questions about my trainspotting days and also set me on a search for more information. Memories fade after 55 years and although I trainspotted in the area of the 'Powder Monkey' many times, I no longer recalled the sidings. Selective memory I guess, and as you say John our desire to 'cop' a new engine number meant our focus on the ECML, and in the gaps between, riding around the Powder Monkey tracks on our bikes, the equivalent of BMX in more recent terminology. With the help of the National Library of Scotland website, I easily overlaid the OS Map from the 1960s with a satellite image, and this has helped me greatly to picture the area once again. Included are the Rising Sun Colliery tracks also now long gone from the 'Rising Sun Country Park', and the High Farm housing estate, and the Jubilee School which we attended. My sister bought one of the houses in 'Cheviot Court' newly built in 1982, and on many visits over the years I stared out of the back bedroom at the evolving ECML and could not quite picture where the Powder Monkey had been. This map image solved the issue for me. My sister's house is near where Little Benton North was, and the view from the upstairs window would have looked directly onto the signal box and farm bridge, which no longer exist. The sidings are now completely replaced by vegetation, trees and shrubs, and these effectively screen much of the ECML action, and with the electrification there is no significant noise. Many thanks to you John, for such a stimulating subject for your layout. Ed