HOW THE WATERBURY CHILDREN FIRST FOUND OAKWORTH
Edith A Nesbit’s novel has over the decades become part of literary legend – a story that yearns to be retold to each new generation. It appears to be set in 1905, with references to the contemporary RussoJapanese War. The Waterbury family, comprising a mother, daughters Bobbie and Phyllis and son Peter, move by train from London to Three Chimneys, a house near a railway, which may be in the north of England – perhaps Yorkshire, as Edith visited her sister on the North Yorkshire Moors, staying at a house also called Three Chimneys nearby, or maybe in or around London and the Home Counties, where Edith grew up.
The father, who works at the Foreign Office, disappears in mysterious circumstances and a few days later the family moves to a poorer home in the country. In reality he is imprisoned after being falsely accused of spying. At their new home, the children become friendly with station porter Perks and delight in watching the trains go by.
They become acquainted with the Old Gentleman who regularly takes the 9.15am train near their home. He is able to help prove their father’s innocence and the family is reunited. In the meantime, the family have several adventures. They take care of Mr Szczepansky, a Russian exile who came to England looking for his own family, and Jim, the grandson of the Old Gentleman, who suffers a broken leg in a tunnel.
The novel was popular for almost half a century before BBC TV – which then had a monopoly on Britain’s one-channel television service – adapted it in 1951, produced by Dorothea Brooking, with eight half-hour episodes.
A second TV version was then produced, using some of the footage from the first but with a few cast changes and new material. It had four hour-long episodes.
BBC TV produced yet another eightepisode version in 1957, again produced by Dorothea Brooking. Location filming was carried out at Baynards station in Surrey, on the old Guildford to Horsham line. It even made the front cover of the Radio Times!
In February 1968, the Keighley & Worth Valley Railway Preservation Society received an enquiry from BBC TV about the possibility of using the line for location filming of another dramatisation of the story. The KWVR had all the necessary ingredients – period builds, no regular trains and passengers to get in the way, and most importantly, steam locomotives.
The director, Julia Smith, who had been busy working on Doctor Who and 1960s soap The Newcomers, and later produced Eastenders, and her assistant Nicolas Johns arranged to visit the line. With the agreement of British Rail, a works train consisting of a diesel railbus was provided.
On Monday, March 25, 1968, the BBC unit arrived and set up headquarters at Oakworth station.
Spruced up
Oakworth station had eight broken windows replaced and was repainted for the occasion. The majority of the fence was given a coat of white paint and the gas lamps, long since smashed, were given glass globes. The platform edge was adorned with the traditional white stripe, and the whole area was cleaned and weeded.
The BBC provided contemporary noticeboards and station signs, and Oakworth became ‘Meadow Vale’. Bushes were also planted on wooden bases to give the whole station an authentically neat, tidy, and well-groomed appearance. Coal in the nearby yard was cleared by local coal
“The Railway Children reminded them that the magic of steam was still casting its spell for newly-emerging heritage lines.”
merchant Norman Feather to permit a long shot free from pylons.
Three days were allocated for the use of steam engines and Sir Berkeley, Joem, and No. 31 were rostered.
The cast featured Joseph O’Conor as the Old Gentleman, Ann Castle as The Mother, Gordon Gostelow as Perks the porter, Brian Hayes as the stationmaster, John Ringham as the doctor, Mary Healey as Ruth the parlourmaid, Stefan Gryff as The Russian, Frederick Treves as Father, Gillian Bailey as Phyllis, Christopher Witty as Jim, Neil McDermott as Peter… and Jenny Agutter as Roberta (Bobbie).
The first episode was screened at 5.25pm on Sunday, May 12, 1968, in the BBC’s slot for serialisations of classic novels of the day.
Years later, this adaption was placed 96th in the BFI’s 100 Greatest British Television Programmes poll of 2000. Of the four BBC TV versions of Nesbit’s novel, this is the only one known to survive and was decades later made available on DVD.
Not only that, but its nationwide screening brought swathes of publicity for the heritage line and when it officially opened on June 29, 1968, it no doubt played a significant part in drawing the crowds.
The legend begins...
Also watching was English character actor and screenwriter Lionel Jefferies, who was so impressed with the BBC series that his daughter persuaded him to buy the film rights and make his debut as a director. The KWVR and the world of railway preservation would never be the same again.
Jeffries wrote the script for the movie version of The Railway Children and submitted it to Elstree Studios where one of his former associates, Bryan Forbes, had become chief executive, and allocated a £350,000 budget.
The autumn of 1969 saw Jeffries and producer Bob Lynn visit Brontë country to inspect the line. Again, it was chosen because at that time it was the only heritage railway that could offer a sizeable collection of locomotives and rolling stock. Not only that, but there were also a large number that fitted the Victorian and Edwardian period.
Jeffries was persuaded to let Oakworth station retain its true identity rather than become Meadow Vale again. That in itself was to give the KWVR a huge publicity boost, for filmgoers would remember the name and then set out to visit the station in real life.