The Peak District

I like the Peak District so it was with pleasure that I turned my railway poster calendar to September and found a picture of this Derbyshire (mostly) area.

This poster, for the old London, Midland and Scottish Railway was first published in 1923 with art work by R S Wyatt

It features a viaduct with a train in LMS red passing over it.

I suspect this represents the viaduct at Monsal Head – now a walking/cycling trail. I snapped a photo of it in 2008 when I was in the area.

I note from what I wrote at the time that I was unwilling to pay to park near there so was unable to get a good photo but I can certainly find photos of elsewhere on the Monsal Trail.

It is a very pleasing area.

The Monsal Trail is clearly a former railway – once part of the third way between London and Scotland.

Kew September

Kew September

My September Kew gardens poster dates from 1927 and shows a plant archway.

Now I like that artwork which is by Clive Gardiner. He wasn’t familiar to me but having looked him up I shall keep an eye open for his posters.

Now here’s an archway in my garden.

This arch is very utilitarian for it is covered with our fig tree. The steps are out to pick figs. It was an entry from this tree that won my wife the best horticultural exhibit in our village produce show at the August bank holiday. Blackberries also earned a prize.

I’m sure the arch at Kew was more beautiful. After several weeks of moderate neglect our garden needs attention, but it is being productive. The dinner I ate earlier had a grand collection of veg and fruit from the garden – fresh, tasty and as healthy as can be.

Eric Ravilious – September

Now who’d have thought it? A double dose of interest for me this month. Not only a Ravilious wood engraving, but it is of a train.

This was an illustration for a book called ‘The Hansom Cab and the Pigeons’ published in 1935 by Cockerel Press. This company specialised in handmade books with art work by well-known exponents of illustration.

In terms of the train there is really nothing much right with it, except an overall effect.  The loco appears to have no water or coal storage and those 12 wheeled carriages would struggle on curves. And why did the bridge engineer make the train have to go up and over a hump.

But despite all this I enjoy seeing this image.

Visit Old World Cornwall

That’s what my railway poster calendar is suggesting for this month – July.

This poster was made for the Great Western Railway and was in use from 1924 to 47. The art work was by S I Veale.

The actual location is not given but it looks typical Cornwall with a steep narrow street leading down to a bay. It isn’t Charlestown but that’s the place to go if you hope to see tall ships around the place – even in thick sea mist!

This was 20^th February 2009 – a lovelyplace.

 

Kew (and elsewhere) in June

The Kew Calendar for June has a really cheerful piece of art by Betty Swanwick. It dates from 1937.

Once again we are implored to get there via Kew Gardens Station and informed that it’ll cost us one penny – an old penny – to gain admission. These days, typically, the cost of entry is £14. This is a huge increase. If we look at the highest conversion of the old penny to current times at comes out at just over £1. Let’s just say that it used to be very cheap.

My own garden isn’t at its best in June but here are some blooms from my patch.

I think these are granny’s bonnets. They grow like weeds but who cares. I think they are lovely.

Whatever these are, they do well.

These remind me of the bells I ring, complete with clapper.

 

Lovely!

Now if only I could be more artistic I reckon I could turn them into a Kew quality poster

Another calendar

Another calendar

Well, well! A third calendar for 2016 which I can feel is worthy of a comment. This one is actually about a garden and was given to my wife. But it also has a railway context for this one features posters of Kew Gardens, encouraging people to get there by Underground.

You can just think of it as lovely poster art and here is the January image.

This is a 1939 poster with artwork by Edward Bawden.

For added nerdiness it even tells you which trolleybuses can get you there.

I like poster art. It has no hidden symbolism designed to allow experts to spout on about it. It may attempt to glamorise the absolute truth but it does give an idea of reality. If you go to Kew these days you can still see cacti as shown in this poster.

This was on a 2014 visit.

And of course, the huge glasshouses are still there too.

Wonderful!

 

Another January Image

I like calendars for they offer a chance to see a different image each month. Indeed, I have made one of my own for close on 20 years now, using my own (or my wife’s) photographs. But ones other folks kindly buy for me, following interests, are always well received gifts. We have already seen I have an Eric Ravilious calendar for 2016. Today we’ll take a first look at another which features British Railways advertising posters.

Now in case any people say, ‘oh no! Not railways again!’ then I’d say, well not really. This is more about art work. I’m quite good at not looking in advance at what the images will be, but as far as the January image is concerned, there is not a train or a railway in sight.

What we see here is some lovely art work by Jack Merriott for British Railways Eastern Region in 1955 with the suggestion that you might visit by train.

This would still be reasonably possible using the line between Newcastle and Carlisle. And what dramatic scenery there is to see. And those Romans were no idiots using the natural cliff to build their wall on.

 

A calendar from 1995

I was recently involved, just a little, in clearing my sister’s house. It’s not a happy job but I was doing my little bit alongside my sister’s daughter – sort of mutual support. She had found a box she thought I might like. It contained letters I sent to my sister back in the 1990s.

If you are my age you can cast your mind back 20 years. There’s a fair chance you had a computer but quite possibly you didn’t have internet access or email. I know I didn’t. I used to write letters on my Acorn A3000, print them off, put them in an envelope and post them. I had no idea my sister had saved them.

Amongst this pile of papers was a calendar I made for her for 1995. Of course, back then we didn’t have digital cameras. By luck of job I was the first person I knew who had and used a digital camera and that was 1998.  I didn’t have a scanner. So my monthly images were not photographic. They were drawings created by me using computer software. Here’s my page for April 1995.

Back then the A3000 was a fantastic computer. The Acorn machines were way ahead of PCs back then but they never captured a broad enough market to make a good profit for the company. They all but vanished. But I reckon I produced a tidy item for twenty years ago.

And that picture is a stereogram – a sort of magic eye picture. If you have two good eyes and can look at the picture whilst you focus on a distance, the image turns into a sunken bowl. It might help if you click on the picture to see a larger version.

My Calendar had 12 fun pictures with no particular meaning but I enjoyed creating it. I still enjoy creating them and at the moment I am pondering on a theme for 2016.

The Firle Calendar – 2001

I didn’t visit Firle, in the 21^st century, until 2003. I think (memory does fail at times) that I bought the 2001 calendar very cheaply at the village shop. It contains twelve pictures of old Firle and one, in particular meant something to me.

But let’s start with the front cover.

Firle Beacon is the high point in this part of the world. It’s a nice image, but it was one of people that particularly interested me.

This is the Firle School football team of about 1952. I am related to one person in the photo and I knew another. Here’s the caption with the photo.

A Firle school football team c 1952.

Standing, 1 to r: Roy Quick, Ron Jordan, John Backshell, Mr Sheather, Roger Clayton, Cyril Toms, Dave Jones.

Front Row: Brian Ness, Ron Crouch, Ray Gravett, Mick Botting, Maurice Boxall, Emie Kemp, Julian Freeman.

I am related to Cyril Toms. He was the grandson of my Great Aunt Nellie

Cyril lived with his mum, dad and a couple of brothers at Crossways in Firle  but his mum died in the early 50s and his gran moved from her Wick Street house to help raise the family. I can’t say I knew Cyril well. He was ten years older than me and a 6 year old me had little in common with a 16 year old youth. His interests were normal for a person of his age but they meant little or nothing to much younger me.

The other person I knew was Julian Freeman. In fact he has featured before on this blog (click here).

Julian was the son of George Freeman, farmer of Glynde. He was part of the dynasty that had both Station Farm and The Furlongs – as tenant farmers.

Julian was always a rather quiet and shy youngster and although he must have been a similar age to Cyril, I felt more at home with this sensitive person who seemed to live for farming. Like his dad and his uncles, Dick and Harry, Julian has now died. He was very much part of the scene when we had our annual family camp at Furlongs.

As an aside, we can notice how much printing has improved in the 21^st century!

Eric Ravilious – September

So what has my calendar had to show me this month?

Well to be honest it isn’t a favourite and it features a place I don’t know.

An unknown lady sits on a park bench. The park is on the edge of Eastbourne and is called Hampden Park. It is a pencil and watercolour piece of work and dates from quite early in Eric Ravilious’s all too short career – he produced this in 1928.

Eric lived in Eastbourne as a lad, and some of the time that was at Hampden Park. He attended school and art college in Eastbourne so this is very much his home.

I said I didn’t know Hampden park, but one bit of it was familiar to me. Guess what? It was the railway station.

Virtually all trains went there twice as they made their way between Lewes and Hastings. Eastbourne was down a short branch and as a major town it needed the express trains from London and the stopping services from Brighton. Hampden Park was on that branch and as a result got a fantastic service of trains to Eastbourne.

There was an avoiding line that allowed a rush hour train to miss Eastbourne and travel direct on to Hastings. It was always a treat to travel this rarely used mile or so of line. The track was not polished by frequent trains and when one did pass, it made awful grating noises. I find it hard to believe that the line was closed. It probably indicates the end of loco hauled goods trains in the area.

Over the month, I have learned to love that Ravilious picture and almost wish I had actually got off a train at the station to visit the park.