recollections of a magical childhood

Here's a link to the West Moors Railway you mentioned in your first or second email. A bit of a clunky site but lots of information!

I know that we will, one day, describe in full the adventures that were our unassisted journeys down to Parley (still can't believe we did or were allowed to do them - see Page 21) but in the meantime, I do remember us once being collected by Nanna and Pop (or maybe just Pop) from Bournemouth Central. They had a taxi waiting. It was a sunny day and the taxi was a Vauxhall Cresta PA in black and green. I remember we were impressed by the ribbon speedo - a strip of colour that just increased in length from left to right as the car went faster.  

What did you think of the music sheet scans?  

I remember them well; sadly don't own a guitar anymore....singing voice more like The Singing Postman without the accent....play stuff on the keyboard though.  

More recent images of the building show it very much split into two shop units.  I also found this article................... 

Hurn Airport & other Plane Stuff

Hurn airport.....Silver City Bristol car transporter aircraft to the Channel Islands. RAF prop planes with wings that folded up when parked.. probably Naval aeroplanes.  

This was also on the list!  I remember the 4-engined Vickers Viscounts and Bristol Britannia's. There was a twin-engined one as well but can't remember the name - Vickers Vanguard? 

You had a cat called Sparky?

Yep - a tortoiseshell.  Was yours called Spot?

Spot, it was....we weren't so sophisticated with pet names in those days. 

Yes, I had a 1.5cc Frog model aircraft petrol engine like the one above!  I remember building a plane and trying to fly it in the field at Parley with my friend John.  It was one of those that flew around you on a control line.  Maiden flight ended in tears and the plane never flew again!!

Steam tank engines on the line from Chingford to Liverpool Street.....then electrification very modern. Blue tank engine shunter at Liverpool Street...running up the travolator at the Bank underground station.

Another one on my list but I'll cover these topics off later in one that describes our journeys to Bournemouth for our holidays. 

Train spotting at Kings Cross when A4s used to wheel-spin off into the tunnel....about the time Deltics were being introduced.

Yes.  We once went to the engine sheds there.  We had to walk along a road that ran parallel to the track and then across the tracks to the (huge) sheds.  We saw "Silver Fox" there.

I hadn’t made the connection that Deltic is a contraction of Diesel and Electric.

Actually, I have since established that the Deltic moniker comes from the name of the engine - "The Napier Deltic engine... (with) the cylinders disposed in a three-bank triangle, with a crankshaft at each corner"  The significant thing is that the name, "Deltic", was used because it means "in the form of the Greek letter Delta - Δ", referring to the triangular configuration of those cylinders.

Was it usually platform 13 at Waterloo for the Bournemouth train?

Yes - 11, 12 or 13 I'm pretty sure.

I do remember on one sunny evening journey down to Bournemouth between Basingstoke and Winchester, the train got up to such a tremendous speed that the coach wheels set up a humming resonance throughout the train; almost as though they were travelling beyond their designed speed limit and the track joints in that area were more frequent than usual. (I believe this was due to 30ft rails used instead of usual 60ft unless we were doing 120mph!!).

And on another occasion returning from Bournemouth on a Winter's night, there was such thick fog that the train was diverted and we spent ages crawling through the fog; we didn't recognise the station names after Southampton....I've since worked out that we must have been diverted from Eastleigh via Chandler's Ford and Andover round to Basingstoke. I think we arrived at Waterloo about three hours late...

Yeah, I remember that.   

The evening that our parents and Nanna and Pop went for a drink at the Horns Inn and left us alone for the evening. We were sat in the lounge and we both watched the door handle of the door that led to the kitchen (where Tony was fast asleep!) slowly go down as though someone was about to open the door. We froze and then it slowly went up again! We never did work out how that happened. Tell me I did not dream this!

I remember that evening.....we just left the mystery hanging in the air never to be solved. 

That reminds me of when we started to get into séances. Fingertips pressing on a glass in the middle of a table with letters on pieces of paper all around. Didn't you tell me about a girlfriend of yours who had taken a book from her school library on the topic but when she/you went back to try to take it out again there was no record of it ever existing? Proof - as if it were needed! 

Our compulsory visits next door to the Mitchell's.  We didn't understand why and no-one would explain to us.  This was because Marion was not aware that her true Dad was not Len, my Dad but was Reginald Mitchell.  He had died in the War and, so, Nanna and Pop Mitchell were his parents and, therefore, Marion's true Grandparents.  We had to go and couldn't wait to escape back to "Mimosa" 

Playing cars or Monopoly with Brian in the Mitchell bungalow...whom we never took to.  He had loads of duplicated matchbox toys. One of his phrases was..."Same difference!" 

Bournemouth Central - train spotting sheds with the sign on the wall "Please be quiet - residential area".

The residents are more noisy than the trains now. 

Just a little something prodded my memory this morning...of very little importance, indeed...but these glimpses of the past lurk quietly in the back of the mind. Do you remember there was a small settlement, I think it is somewhere in Dorset, called 'Ower.' (No, it's Hampshire...just checked.)  As we travelled along in the back seat of a parents' car we used to laugh and pronounce it as, "Oooh....Er!"  Now the question is, which comedy actor used to say, "Oooh...Er?" Was it someone from the 'Carry On...' films?  

I can't help you on this.  I remember the incident but not who said it.  Could be Frankie Howerd but I think he came a bit later.  Other than that I only have Charlie Drake!

I think it was the tall, skinny chap with the round glasses who spoke in a slightly 'gay' manner in the Carry On...films (I don't remember his name).  The important thing was that you remembered us laughing about it!  

Could it be Charles Hawtrey?  see - here.   

Didn't John Lennon introduce a song using that name (Get Back?).

Yes, that's the chappee! And, now you come to mention it, John Lennon did introduce something they recorded (Yes, Get Back I think) which he mentioned as being by Charles Hawtrey...but I never made that sort of connection at the time...I probably just thought it was a random name thrown in in one of his 'off the wall' moments.  Hmmm, but then.... I might have made the connection if 'Get Back' had begun with....'Ooooh...Errr!' That would have put a different light on it altogether, wouldn't it?! (I'm beginning to think I missed the point of that recording now.).

I had to go and check if it was Get Back.  It wasn't, it was Two of Us.  All the background to the song is here plus the description of the spoken intro'  

Well, very interesting.....but a shame, as I did have a chuckle at the thought of it being some kind of 'gay' reference!!!  Better put 'Oooh...Errr!' to bed again then.

Do you also remember how the road beyond the airport towards Hurn bridge used to split into a mini dual carriageway? Each carriageway was only wide enough for one car...always thought that a bit odd. It's not like that now.  

Yes, I do - didn't it have little trees planted in the middle?

Family card games and Nanna's constantly moving lips - chase the ace, sevens, rummy, pelmanism, whist, (whist drives), neighbours(?). Can you remember any more? (see Page 18)

Names that were bandied about - Mrs It(t) - already mentioned, Mrs Leg (or Legg or Legge) and the famous Mr Fox - others?