Memories of dark, and bright, times

Items appearing in NG Extra continue to have readers searching their archives for interesting material and yet again this month’s item features the North Bay Railway at Scarborough, seemingly one of the most photographed lines around judging by the amount of views we get of it!

Regular NGW correspondent and narrow gauge historian Peter Johnson got in touch regarding Mark Greenwood’s letter in NGW152 about the accidents on the North Bay Railway, with more images of the 1932 incident which sadly killed the loco driver, one of which we print here.

“I purchased the negatives on eBay – the vendor did not know what they represented but I, and another bidder did,” Peter told us, adding that the flare is on the negatives.

Peter also confirmed Gerry Balding’s comments in NGW153 that while marketed as ‘postcards,’ these images were home printed on Kodak postcard-back photographic paper.

“I have seen other brands that served a similar purpose – their use does not signify a commercial product, which confuses some postcard dealers who are convinced that it does. Most pictures printed on such paper will be one-offs; a few will have been printed in small numbers to sell to friends or to give away.

“I have seen advertisements in issues of Railway Magazine from the 1950s and earlier, placed by enthusiasts offering to sell copies of their photographs of shed visits or similar, six postcard-size prints of LNWR 4-6-0s for 1s plus 3d postage, for example.

“Some of these images would have been printed on plain-back paper, others would have been on Kodak postcard-back paper, but they were not commercial producers. eBay was invented for them!”

News that the private Lytham Motive Power Museum locomotive ‘Jonathan’ was to appear at the Statfold Barn Railway’s Trangkil 50 Gala on 12th-13th June, detailed in NGW157, had Peter Johnson again delving into his extensive archive collection and coming up with this image, which he says is the only photo he has of the former Dinorwic loco in action on the Lytham Creek Light Railway, a running line laid outside the Lancashire museum. “The film was slow, the light was poor and the image was crooked until I straightened it,” Peter said, adding that when he acquired it the photo bore no indication of when it was taken. Laid around the premises of a manufacturer of helical springs, the Lytham museum has been a private collection for some years and we believe the running line has been long unused, though a check on Google Maps shows that it still exists. Do any other NGW readers have photos of the Lytham line operating they would like to share?