jhb171achill

Someone told me at some stage that the presenter, the excellent Anne Cassin, had relatives on the railway herself........... yes, she seems to have travelled on a 29. Mad things to put on the Enterprise - why not an ICR? RTE included a shot of Inchicore Works, footgae of T & D cattle trains at Castlegregory junction, and interior shots of a driver in a West Clare "F" class diesel. Typical lazy research. Airfixfan, of this parish, was of course featured, along with several of our good colleagues from the Donegal Railway Heritage Centre and RPSI Whitehead. Why, oh why, oh why, though, have they a black dome on "Drumboe"! Fix it, lads, fix it before I run outta smelling salts..........!

As a happy owner of a Midland 2.4.0 I highly recommend it!

Well worth awaiting!

Wouldn’t have thought so - the GSR stripped all of its maintenance equipment bar the odd screwdriver!

Even Ennis, narrow gauge, until Feb 61!

If you mean sheds, lots, though in many cases roofless but still used. If you mean loco works for heavy repairs etc, York Road (NCC) for one. Limerick was also still doing some heavy work. Cork, Dundalk and Waterford were still doing minor repairs. If you mean steam, the above applies until late 1962 or thereabouts. If you mean diesel, later in the decade, pretty much only Inchicore & York Road.

At one time - but had also been double at some stage earlier, I believe. Correct!

Exactly the same as other green steam engines - if you look at modern photos of "Maedb" (800) in the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum in Co Down, you'll get the actual paint - better still, go to see it. The green - with black and white lining, eau-de-nil "snails" on the tender and numerals on cabsides, is the same green applied to coaches prior to the "light green" period of 1955-62; and also allpied to buses 1945-63. Prior to 1945 thyey were plain grey all over, with cast number plates (grey too!). They would never have been black.

Looking fantastic! Most interesting track layout...... perfect for 009.

"......an' de Achill branch was a narra gauge line built to take emigrants to Scotland, and shure the Connemara express ran along it...somewhere.....an' the last train carried all the dead of Mayo after the famine......."

Perfect back story; straight out of a mid-60s IRRS Journal!

Superb - the music too! One of your compositions?

Love the "troubles" stuff! At the 25th anniversary of the GFA, a timely reminded of how far we've moved away from all that...........

Absolutely fantastic stuff, Ernie. As others have said, it is very greatly appreciated by all here and beyond.

Let's hope it's better researched than some of their railway-themed programmes in the past........ Look out for an authentic clip of a 141 class with ferts leaving Stranorlar in, oh, I'd say some time in the 1850s, as the colour in the film isn't great..... or a nice view of the Wexford Goods in the Barnesmore Gap, to the tune of "Are ye right there Michael are ye right"......... and learn how, as the last narrow gauge railway (with just three yards between the rails), it closed down on 31st December 1970..........

Anyone travelling on this next week?

This is true. Deserving as it would be, you’d find Irish enthusiasts inexplicably short of change….. When I was RPSI commercial officer in the late 70s / early 80s, I worked closely with galteemoreSenior. Upon questioning why, as a railway society, we tended to put more effort into selling teddy bears and plastic Thomas-the-Tank flags, I was told that Irish railway enthusiasts were - to put it mildly - very adept at keeping their wallets SHUT. In contrast when the May tour came about, on which the vast, vast majority came from Brexitstan, THEY couldn’t wait to empty their wallets towards a good cause. Manning the bookshop showed this up well. Six Irish enthusiasts would appear, read the new-issue books cover to cover, and when we tried to persuade them to either BUY, or get out of the way and let their English colleagues behind them get a look in, they would fish out a few washers and coins from a neat little wallet, mumble something about the price, or they be back later……and th’oul dog ate their homework. Cue Dave from Manchestah behind them. In two minutes he’s scooped up a pile of books, the then equivalent of a couple of hundred euros. He’d pay you, and stick a £20 note in the donations box. Down the train, raffle time. 1. British visitors: waving tenners in the air. Don’t care what the prize is - likely to donate it back anyway. 2. Irish No. 1: leafs through all the book prizes before announcing that he has the book or doesn’t really want it. Buy a ticket? “……eh, I don’t think I’ve any change…” 3. Irish No. 2 hears you coming and sticks his face to the window, watching a thorn hedge passing by with intense interest. Don’t believe me? Ask GalteemoreSenior, now raising on-train funds for almost sixty years……

Hand-me-downs from the GNR, courtesy of jhbSenior, who unofficially gave much assistance to the SLNCR, knowing they had no money. A consignment of ballast for the SLNCR arrived in Enniskillen one time from Goraghwood, following a bad embankment slip somewhere down the "country lane" - which was a description used by Enniskillen PW staff to describe the SLNCR. I understand that the financial department in Amiens St. was not put to any trouble regarding sales invoices for same to the SLNCR. The track above is ex-GN, from the same source. I doubt very much if Amiens St. were well-appraised of this arrangement either. Correct.

There's a story behind the railbus being here. These were not used on the Bundoran branch at this time, as might seem a possibility. Jhb171Senior used this yoke as his personal runabaout when conducting track and bridge inspections in the 1950s, when a spare loco and saloon 50 weren't available. In the case of the latter, he had a set of steps made for it so that when stopped in the middle of mowhere he was able to get up and down via the (open) end gangway..... Railbuses 1 & 2 were used by him for the same purpose. If this is June 1957, the reason this vehicle is parked here is due to a comprehensive survey he had to undertake to advise Amiens St of the likely quantities and quality of materials that would be recovered following closure of so much of the INWR.

Yes, I think three of them had - in the case of No. 4, on this side ONLY! The other side retained its UTA crest to the end. Quiz question: anyone know of any other locos (or coaches) running with the logo of one company on one side, and its predecessor on the other? I don't........ though in one of mine and Barry's books there's a diesel with a CIE logo on the end, and an IE "set-of-points" on the side!

Precisely. An excellent quality photo, showing very clearl;y how the dark grey livery (in which this example is still clad) got dirty and weathered. But look to the right; that's a very interesting wagon! An old two-plank with mismatching extra sides? I don't know! I think he gave a talk* to the IRRS some years ago on the nitty-gritty of this modernisation scheme, but I do not have his notes (that's if he made any!).... (.....or, in the curiously antediluvian archaic IRRS-speak, "gave a paper"!)

All in all, Ken - the loco and the (MUCH needed) horse boxes - this is absolutely stunning craftsmanship. Top class stuff. Hope the treatment is going well. Best wishes.

Looks a bit haphazard. I thought the new passenger emntrance on that side included complerte road access.... if so, that suggests the above is a bay platform facing Mallow? If it goes the whole way round, then the tracks will cut across the current new entrance, will they not?

All steam.......

No, no, no - it was when Adam was a boy! That's long before the GSWR............. they had silver spoons then, and the dining car bogies were made of gold, frankincense and myrrh.