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Was the weather clear? It doesn't say. If so, t-boning another ship is unforgivable!

There are, as far as I know, no suburban services on the fasts on the WCML at the moment. I recently used an LM long-distance service from Stoke to Euston and return (£30 return!), and even when we ran non-stop from MK to Euston, we were on the slows. The fasts are the monopoly of Virgin West Coast. Those VWC trains are the ones which will transfer to HS2, which will allow the LM semi-fasts onto the fast lines, leaving the slows for the all-station stoppers and freight. Why should existing VWC trains require a fare supplement?

When i were a lad, the family lived in North Kent; we moved away when I was 9. Since we didn't have a car, we went everywhere either by bus or train. On the trains, that meant of course the EPBs. They always seemed to have a swaying motion when moving, particularly round curves. That was 50-odd years ago. So there's nothing really new under the sun, is there?

The Saddleworth one is probably the Heaton - Red Bank parcels; a gorgeous picture by the way!

More properly, the Laws state that the ball must touch another player to count. If that doesn't happen, and the taker throws into his own goal, it's a corner to the opposition; in the opponent's goal it's a goal kick to the opposition

Are there that many coppers around now? There's your problem!

I'd forgotten what a 87 sounded like; gorgeous!

There are a few pages, with a side elevation, in the book Midland Steam by Professor Tuplin, which describe the Stevaert valve gear as fitted to the '990' class, and there is also a mention of the patent disputes.

There is a photo taken at Delph Junction of that train, in Larry Goddard and Terry ?s book on the Oldham to Delph branch; it might also be worth getting in touch with Peter Fox at Saddleworth Museum, to see if he has any info.

Given T&N's main product, no thanks!

This sounds more like Sunday League.

There were the remains of the South Yorkshire-Fiddler's Ferry MGR trains as well, IIRC, that had formerly run via Woodhead.

A gladioli is a group of gladiators " To market, to market with my brother Jim, When somebody threw a tomato at him, "Tomatoes are soft", I can hear you all sing, But this one were hard 'cos it came in a tin" Oldham Tinkers, about 1976

I always thought the burning question of the day was O'Rafferty's motor car

What does it all mean, though? Are we saying that there's no direct services between the GW and the GE sides?

Haven't seen a schematic as good as that since I left work!

I would have thought the refinery was more like a chemical works

More than just the railways; industry as a whole, I would have thought.

O.K., It's Ashton-under-Lyne, and I know that the tracks were recently realigned, but is it still like that?

I would say the Britain's economic problems started well before WW1; it's just that most people couldn't see it in a rapidly expanding world economy. We have all these industrial museums because there was an awful lot of ancient machinery about to be preserved.

Police do not charge innocent protesters or bystanders. Coming not long after the 199th anniversary of The Peterloo Massacre (16th August 1819), I can tell you that the forces of law and order, be they police, disguised police, or as in this case the local amateur cavalry, do 'Charge innocent protestors and bystanders'; in the case of Peterloo killing 15 and wounding about 600 others. In the case of Orgreave, 95 of the pickets were arrested and charged with various crimes of violence. Not one of them was convicted. Partially because the police had a unit checking arresting officers' statements and modifying them to suit, in a similar way as happened at Hillsborough.

No, it was the 'Mariner': closely related to the steamers in the calamity class, if by that you mean the infamous 65 000 ton 'C's. I did, a few years later, sail on the 'Centaur' which by then had had a bit of money spent on it, so that, apart from a couple of scavenge fires, she ran quite well. I was surprised to find out much later that she'd been sold by BP in 1984 to a company which wanted to convert her into a cattle carrier. But the deal fell through, and she was scrapped.

I was talking from the perspective of BPTC, where European crews seemed to settle out at 30-40 max, with, as you say, Indian crews on a 2 to1 basis over Europeans. One ship I was on though had, for the second part of the voyage, (Gulf to Portland Maine, but turned out be Falmouth DD) Chief, Second, two Thirds, three Fourths, three Juniors and three Cadets, including me, and we still couldn't keep up!

I can't ever remember wearing my steaming bonnet, except for the first photo in uniform, for mum/dad/girlfriend, etc. apart from that it looks typical for Merchant Navy practices at the time. One other comment; 53 sounds a large number of personnel to carry. Was this pre-GP days, when ships carried separate engine-room and deck crews; and what's a purser?