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60103

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(Saw this beauty yesterday on the NYMR. The whistle really does sound like an old kettle).

 

Steel and copper forged and cast

To bring to life a legend’s past

Snorting steam and smoke at last

A spirit now set free

The 60103.

 

Polished to a brilliant sheen

In LNER racing green

No finer loco has there been

Nor ever will be too

The 4472.

 

As he pulls from Pickering

His driver tells the whistle “Sing”

It’s like a kettle on the ring

In twinned-toned harmony

The 60103.

 

Steaming stately, steaming grand

Guided under oily hands

From London to the Scottish lands

Non-stop flying through

The 4472.

 

For sure his Flying days are done

Deserving more sedately run

Lest we forget the spurs he won

For all posterity

The 60103.

◄ PASTURES OF PLENTY

English ►

Comments

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John Coopey

Sat 19th Mar 2016 19:29

Hello MC. Like many I have a distaste for Dr Beeching. But I recognise it has its roots in nostalgia.
I have just bought a copy of his report so I'll be wiser shortly but I recollect reading somewhere that 90% of traffic travelled on 10% of the track. Financial measures were similarly skewed.
As travellers we aspired to cars and Beeching can scarcely be criticised for not predicting the case for rail travel in the 21st century (road congestion, carbon footprint).
In any event the full scale of rail cutbacks owed far more to the incoming Labour government than to Beeching's recommendations.

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M.C. Newberry

Sat 19th Mar 2016 17:26

JC - like you, I've got (somewhere!) share certificates for
a steam railway - in my case, it was "The Watercress Line"
in Hampshire, bought when the company put out ads.
of its prospectus inviting public investment. It is now one
of the more successful preserved railways and I wonder
sometimes if I will ever get any benefit from my shares
other than the satisfaction of knowing that dreams don't
always die. I imagine Dr. Beeching as being somewhere
tormented by the sound of continual wailing of dying
steam trains sent for destruction.

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John Coopey

Sat 19th Mar 2016 12:24

Thanks, Stu. The charity shops were certainly piggy-backing the Flying Scotsman. Their shop windows were crammed with railway books, DVDs, models, mugs, caps etc. I myself invested in a copy of the Beeching Report (£1.50).
Thirty years ago Me and Our Gert bought £100-worth of shares each, for which we get to ride the train for free. All very well and good but I am disappointed that the staff don't touch their fore locks at us and greet us with a cheery "Master Coopey!"

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Stu Buck

Sat 19th Mar 2016 10:45

pickering has the finest second hand bookshop in the world. its run by a loon but still.

i spent many a day at that railway station and on the track (on a train not standing there)

this is a beautiful ode and i love the numeric rhymes.

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John Coopey

Fri 18th Mar 2016 18:38

Thanks, Steve. We saw it in Pickering on Wednesday. The crowds wouldn't have been any bigger if it had been Elvis.

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steve pottinger

Fri 18th Mar 2016 17:57

Beautifully put together, this poem. A bit like the loco.

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John Coopey

Fri 18th Mar 2016 17:11

If you could bottle the scent of smoke and steam and oil and sell it as perfume, MC, you'd make a fortune.

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M.C. Newberry

Fri 18th Mar 2016 14:39

I recall the "Scotsman" some time ago when the single
track from Paignton to Kingswear was honoured with
its mighty presence.
These lines can only have been written by someone who
knows what it is to be a "steam buff".
"The haunting call of a steam train's whistle
Is written on the wind like an epistle".

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