Inter City Bridges

 See It On A Postcard's Thursday Postcard Hunt in search of iron and rail...

Loco 57311 'Parker' hauls a Glasgow to Euston Pendolino service through Settle station

This cast iron bridge makes a perfect frame for an inter-city passenger train travelling south.  Settle is a busy market town in the Yorkshire Dales.  Although the bridge looks as though it has been here since the 19th Century its originally location was at  Drem Station in Scotland being moved and rebuilt at Settle station in 1993 when the Scottish line was electrified. Before the bridge passengers accessed the station platform over the lines, a so called 'barrow crossing', still used by people in wheelchairs.

Electric loco NS 1600 series inter-city, Moerdijkbrug

In flatter Dutch terrain an inter city train crosses one of the Moerdijk Bridges connecting Dordrecht with the province of North Brabant across the Hollands Diep rivers and estuary. Apparently this area was formed in the floods of 1421 when the dykes failed and altered the geography of the area for ever. It looks very watery

Now I've shown a diesel and an electric train its time for

steam. Alas the Bela Viaduct is no more, a victim of short term thinking and the road lobby in the 1960s when a lot of  branch lines were closed and in this case the viaduct was also demolished. When steam power was eventually removed from the lines all the locos were sent to the scrapyard but some were rescued by enthusiasts and included the  Black Five class shown on the postcard.  Today six of them are certificated for main line running and if lucky one or two of them can sometimes be spotted on the Settle to Carlisle line featured in my first postcard. 

Stone Bridges

See It On a Postcard's Thursday Postcard Hunt is crossing bridges and today mine are sturdy stone ones

Culbone Lodge Pottery, Exmoor

This inherited card has a fine postmark which  shows me it was posted on the 29th May 1985, all that is missing is a stamp!  The people who had not affixed a stamp were my aunt and uncle who were enjoying a walking holiday in Exmoor and possibly the reason they chose this card is because the inscription on the back describes the many paths that can be taken to Culbone Lodge. The sandstone building was constructed in the late 19th century in an arts and crafts style, the adjoining bridge crosses over a sunken roadway.  

The card's inscription also says the picture shows the pottery, house and garden display of pots with Waistel and Joan Cooper and their tame ducks. These names meant nothing to me but discovered Waistel Cooper was a renowned potter. Even better I discovered the Culborne newsletter article "Secluded Culborne" which has a paragraph about them - "Two of Culbone’s best known inhabitants were Joan and Waistel Cooper. Joan, an American, with a Doctorate in Psychology married Waisel a potter in 1957 and they lived in a cottage in Culbone by a stream. Joan practised and taught Yoga for West Somerset Community Education. She was also a Lay Reader. She died on June 2nd 1982 and was buried in the little church’s cemetery. The whole area was packed for her funeral and a little dog sat by the edge of her grave during the service. Waistel, born in 1921 in Ayr, was instrumental in the introduction of modernism into ceramics and was a major figure of the studio pottery scene. He set up in Culbone on his return from a commission in Iceland and worked in his studio there for 25years. Following Joan’s death he moved to Penzance in Cornwall and remarried. He died in 2003. His work commanded very high prices"

Travelling north to the England's most northerly town, although not in the period when it was part of Scotland. The last time it changed hands it was in 1482 and despite the border change today the football and rugby teams play in the Scottish leagues.  

Top  - the 'Old Bridge' which replaced a wooden one in the 17th Century when I suppose it was just called Berwick Bridge // Royal Tweed Bridge or the 'New Bridge' built in the 1920s but as it is built of concrete it is an interloper in this post

Bottom - The Royal Border Bridge and as I am a fan of railway viaducts here are more pictures of Robert Stephenson's bridge

Watendlath Bridge in Winter

One of the many packhorse bridges in the English Lake District crosses the stream in the little hamlet of Watendlath. I remember people ice skating on the nearby tarn but we rarely get those sort of winters anymore. The bridge is from the 18th Century but

Coniston Foxhounds on Sweden Bridge, Ambleside

Sweden Bridge is 17th Century packhorse bridge but  isn't Swedish as the name comes from the Middle English word 'swidden'/Old Norse 'svithinn'.  I see there are two lakeland terriers that have joined the hounds in this bridge photo-shoot.  Foxhunting in the Lake District was done on foot (not a horse in sight), but in the present time after a long battle foxhunting with dogs is banned in Britain.  The hounds have never gone away for a popular countryside pastime for a couple of centuries in the Lakes is Hound Trailing. The dogs race a scented trail over the fells.

World Heritage Sites

2001: National Parks (Design - Studio Mean)

I'll start off in my home county with a view of the English Lake District which was recently awarded a UNESCO designation in 2017.  The lake is Crummock Water and a larger aerial view can be seen here.  There is nice low level walk around the lake and its companion Buttermere, perfect in summer  when one can picnic at the half way point or take a trip into the Fish Inn.  Some stamp collecting wags have called the National Park series of stamps the National Car Park set.

2020: Roman Britain (Design - Up)

Head for the wild frontier and  Hadrian's Wall, or what remains of the 84 miles of wall and forts across the country built in an attempt to keep out the Picts and Scots.  There is still lots to see.  I wonder what those Roman soldiers thought in the middle of winter up here, probably wishing they were home by the warm Mediterranean so lets grant them their wish and sail into

2015: Sea Travel (Design - Andy Tuohy)

Venice although this city came of age in the maritime era and in Roman times was just a marshy lagoon inhabited by fishermen.

1961: Tourist Publicity

Travel on to Greece and the magnificently situated Delphi We would all probably welcome someone like the Delphic Oracle to divine the future at the moment, or maybe not depending what is in store.

2008: World Heritage Sites

A satisfyingly large stamp from South Africa showing a mountain ridge in the dramatic Drakensberg Park..

 

1961: Tourist Publicity - Olympia

 

Sunday Stamps theme this week is World Heritage Sites - travel to See It On A Postcard

Pass the Post

Postbox LA8 39, Levens, near the Strickland Arms, Cumbria

The arrow of the coast to coast National Cycle Route 70 from Walney Island (the Irish Sea) to the Wear (the North Sea)  points the rider onward.  The perfect opportunity to post postcards in the wall box on the way past.

The Postal Picture will be quiet for a few week as I'm heading to an island of green postboxes, taking pictures and twirling the postcard carousels.   

Rivers in Season

An autumnal day with the mist lying on the fells obscuring them from view and the peat bog lying brown and benign above the waterfall, unless the unwary walker treads in the wrong place. This wet area gives rise to three rivers including the River Eden of which Hell Gill Force is its first large waterfall as it starts its journey dropping through a limestone gorge.  Like many rivers the Eden forms a boundary and this is one between the counties of Cumbria and Yorkshire.

What is nicer than an amble along a river on a summer's day? Here is the River Dove in Derbyshire where I suspect there must be a large car park nearby from the crowds of people taking pleasure from the day in all in one spot.  This is a Dennis postcard, a company who are credited with being the first producers of postcards in Britain (1894), but of course we are way down the line from that date.  They started to produce 'Photocolour' cards (of which this is one) in the 1960s and there is no doubt that our river walkers look to be from that era.  

Postcards for the Weekend theme - Any Water Form - splash around at Connections to the World 

Happy Easter

An Italian card wishing Buona Pasqua, Good (or Happy) Easter which I also wish everyone. Italian Easter Eggs tend to have sweets or a surprise inside and the surprise in this one must be the laughing baby. The sailor suited boy carries a bunch of flowers and the girl a basket, in which I guess are eggs.  The blossom on the tree is suggested above them

and the blossom can be seen here in flower at Yew Tree Farm in the English Lake District. 

Once the daffodils appear we know that spring is well on the way and here they are brightening up the Horton-in-Ribblesdale station on the scenic Settle to Carlisle railway line.  The small station building of 1876 was renovated in 2002 and the gardens are tended by volunteers.

Postcards for the Weekend theme -  spring, flower buds, blossom and green foliage - celebrate the season at Connections to the World.

Northern Maps

My town just sneaks onto this card at the bottom left (Barrow).  It is on the edge in more ways than one as it is on a peninsula surrounded by water which some comedians say is  'the longest cul-de-sac' in the country. The council prefers the line 'between sea and mountains'   The lakes of the Lake District span out like the spokes of a wheel and to feel completely surrounded by mountains then nothing is better than to head to the centre, Grasmere.

To give some context lets pan out a little to show where I am on the west coast 

with this card which shows a long distance footpath, The Pennine Way, which runs down the spine of the north of England.  Most people take three weeks to complete the walk however in July 1989  Mike Hartley ran the route in 2 days, 17 hours, 20 minutes and 15 seconds without stopping for sleep.  Mike only  rested only twice on this record breaking run and one of those was an 18-minute fish and chip break in Alston (which can be seen on the card near the man with the binoculars).

I think I would rather take a trip into the Lake District for the day

perhaps head for the Langdale Valley.   On a winter's day like this one could take a choice of stopping in the village on the postcard and sitting by the Britannia Inn's open fire in Elterwater or continue on for a walk up the Langdale Pikes whose names are Pike O'Stickle and Harrison's Stickle. The distinctive shape can be recognised from any direction.

Postcard's for the Weekend theme - Home Country - Go home to Connections to the World

Delivering the Mail

Coming out of Holker Hall gardens having enjoyed the rhododendrons in full flower I stopped to take a photo of the Victorian postbox and with perfect timing postie parked his van across the road, walked down the hill  and towards the door of this house in Cark post in hand.  My cup runneth over.

Postal Round

Postie on his rounds in the Cartmel Valley, Cumbria. . I'm not usually fast enough to retrieve my camera and snap but on this occasion I was ready.  Not only that but we continued our walk down this road through the woods (which as it was May were full of bluebells), over the hill and  fields and voila

  it seems we were following postie's round. 

Nestling Box

Post Box No LA12 54, Bardsea Post Office, The Yews, Bardsea

A late Spring so the hedges are looking bare but the blossom has arrived so things are looking up.  Post your letters here, carry on up the hill past the church and  turn left and down the hill and head for Roy's Ice Cream van and  his 29 flavours, two new for this year.  Gaze out over Morecambe Bay while you lick, the suns warm and alls well with the world. 

All Directions

LA11 118, Windermere Rd, Grange Over Sands

Cafés to the left of them, cafés to the right of them, cafés in front of them. No perhaps just not in front but a nicely positioned wall box between the railway station and car parking, and being Grange Over Sands, lots of tea shops.  A walk along promenade, a twirl around the park with its ornamental ducks, buy postcards, have tea and cakes then

Post Box LA11 118, Windermere Rd, Grange Over Sands

  pop the postcard in the George V wall box

Coastal Clocks

An entry to Sepia Saturday "Using old images for new reflections"

"The Floral Clock, Southsea Castle Gardens"

I was surprised when I noticed how many clocks appear in small parts of my postcards but here is one which takes centre stage, a wonderful floral clock.  This was a card sent to my mother from Margaret who used to work for her when she ran a wool shop. My mother was a keen gardener and had a wonderful eye for shapes and colour so no wonder she kept this card. It is obligatory to mention the weather on postcards and Margaret did not disappoint saying it was very hot and crowded in Southsea. It was neither when I visited a few years ago, torrential rain and a gale blowing off the channel so a cosy coffee shop with the windows steaming up was our destination rather than a floral clock, if they still plant it. We were just marking time while waiting to go into Portsmouth to board the ferry to France so my next view of Southsea was from the sea as we arrived back in English waters and the sun was shining and the crowds were out

Southsea Seafront

as in this card of Southsea.  Today there is a small funfair but it looks as though the only ride c1905 is the one on the cannon. The Victorian seafront still consists of a long promenade, open green spaces and a shingle beach so ideal for a constitution walk so beloved of the Victorians whatever the weather.

"Ramsden Square & Duke Street, Barrow-in-Furness"

Heading north is the town of  Barrow in Furness which is where I set off from when travelling the 330 miles down to Portsmouth/Southsea.  The tower in the distance houses the town hall clock which chimes across the town.  The view as shown has not altered much over the years, apart from the introduction of zebra crossings, the floral display on the roundabout is bigger and brighter, and it would be unlikely there was not a car in sight. It looks rather peaceful there. The card was produced by Millar and Lang of Glasgow who published from 1903-1941 and in latter years hand coloured their black and white photographs like this. The senders (Ethel and Bob) sent the card from the seaside resort of Blackpool to the Ellis family in Nelson in Lancashire saying "Pleased to get your letter and that you enjoyed your holiday. Well we shall be pleased to see you both on Wednesday hope the weather keeps up".  The puzzle is that the card was sent in 1966, bears no relation to Blackpool (apart from the fact on a exceptionally clear day we may be able to see Blackpool Tower from Barrow which is on the other side of the bay).  Perhaps Ethel just used an old card she possessed, like a homing pigeon, it has now arrived back at the place it portrays.

I could not resist showing the postmark because by coincidence this weekend is  Blackpool illuminations big switch on (6 miles of lights) and the people who will be pulling the switch are 6 of Team GB's Olympic medal winners .

"Town Hall, Barrow in Furness"

The Town Hall tower complete with clock glimpsed hazily in the previous card takes centre stage in this card published around 1900.  Barrow's first library, on the left, was in what was described as an iron building, to me it looks more  like a tin shed.  The Town Hall itself is built of red sandstone but during the build in February 1885, with the tower three feet short of being finished,  disaster, there was subsidence and cracks in the masonry. The Borough Surveyor hoped it was no more than "natural settling" but he was too optimistic.  The builders had cut corners to save money, their tender to build had been the  lowest but the council had insisted on the local, and more expensive, red sandstone be used .  The tower had to be rebuilt (after many stormy council meetings and enquiries) but to reduce the weight it was built 13 feet shorter and came in at 164 feet, despite the delay it still retains its 1885 date stone.  When it was finished, for the second time, it dominated the centre of Barrow its only rivals being the shipyard cranes. From the top of its 156 steps a panorama of the town appears with views taking in (on that exceptionally clear day), Wales, the Isle of Man, the Lake District hills and of course Blackpool Tower, which was opened seven years after Barrow's, and is considerably more famous,

Photo Stephen Middlemiss - Creative Commons

but it does not have a clock on it.  This is the view never shown on postcards and is always referred to locally as the back, but is actually the front. 

Wedding Days

An entry to Sepia Saturday. "Using old images as prompts for new reflections"

Wedding of William Swindlehurst and Isabelle Hewitt

 The bride and groom are making a run for it in this photo, no gently floating confetti like at today's weddings but some serious rice throwing, no wonder William is fending it off with his bowler hat.  I have the man by the bush with the large moustache to the left down as the thrower. He looks to be enjoying the moment.  The children are all gathered at the far left.  At this point as was going to show a postcard of of the church path entrance but it is hiding somewhere in my collection so I will resort to a photograph

Beetham Church photo by Anne Bowker

of the floral archway of Beetham Church. The old postcard I have shows the archway much more luxuriant and completely covered by growth but this is what it looks like at the beginning of the 21st century rather than the 20th.  Getting back to my wedding postcards; the happy couple do not travel far for the wedding breakfast

William and Isabelle Swindlehurst

and pose in a more traditional and formal way at Hazelslack Tower Farm and like the church arch there are climbing roses.  I never met Aunt Bell but my Grandmother must have been fond of her because she had a lot of photos of her in her collection. Lastly another slightly informal portrait

The Hewitts

 of Isabelle with her brother whose name I do not know but I find it a charming photo, both with white gloves, her hand on his shoulder and his around her.  Meanwhile half seen in the doorway is the flat capped boy from the church photo.   

Line Up

Post Box Number LA20 35, Foxfield

All means of communication in a line up, post box, telephone box and bus stop by the side of the main road up the Cumbrian coast, the A595.  Opposite is Foxfield railway station but the main attraction is the location of the post box which is designated "Prince of Wales, Foxfield" and that welcoming pub is just to the right of the post box.

Cheers

Grizedale

Wall Box Number LA22 162

I always like the swirling scroll of Edward VII (1901-1910) on a postbox

although this one at the Grizedale Forest Visitors Centre looks as though it may be due a lick of paint

 The parked car outdoes it in redness.

Friars Crag

Jocelyn over on Cuckootree has starts a new meme today "Our Wonderful World Tuesday "to celebrate the beauty and diversity of the world" and also will be giving away a Mu & Me Postcard.  How could I resist.  I'll  start on home ground with a view from Friars Crag, a promontory on the shores of Derwentwater,  John Ruskin called this one of the three most beautiful scenes in Europe (no idea what he considered the other two to be).   He may have been biased because like me he lived in the county and also his earliest memory was being taken to Friars Crag as a child.  It is a popular place for tourist and photographers alike.  If you took your camera there this week there would be a lot more snow than the sprinkling on this card.

Our Wonderful World Tuesday has a neat little badge too

 

On With the Show

I've chosen the 'performance' part of Theatre for this week's Sepia Saturday theme. I have two copies of this photographic postcard so imagine Atherton Photographers in Barrow who took the picture  found the large cast a profitable venture.  My connection to the production is my father who stands on the back row in the clown costume, (he is the one on the left) and seems to have really gone to town on the make-up as Pete the clown.  I think this is probably the Emmanuel Church group, they put on many stage performances but this must have been significant because it had a programme which my father has clipped and pasted the cast list onto the back of the card  

and I recognise another two names, Cyril Pratt, my fathers lifelong friend playing the Dutch Boy and Tom Butcher who plays the Indian Chief, which fitted his flamboyant character (his nickname was 'The Count').

I wondered what Mrs Jarley's Waxworks was and discovered its name comes from the character in Charles Dickens' Old Curiosity Shop, proprietor of a travelling waxworks who employs Nell and her Grandfather.  This name was taken when theatrical groups, mainly amateur, dressed up and performed as waxworks with one of them appearing as Mrs Jarley, and others appearing as her assistants.  I notice on this photo that Mrs Jarley was played in the great British dame tradition by a man and imagine the clowns were her assistants. The 'waxworks' appeared on stage in groups. Each one was described in a humorous way by Mrs Jarley and was then wound up and oiled by the assistants to perform words and/or music. Such 'waxwork' shows were popular in late Victorian and the early 20th Century in both Britain and America, where we will journey to a smaller cast appearing on 

an artotype made by Albert Bierstadt from one of his many Adirondack photographs which I found on the Adirondack Museum site. 

"The image shows men and women posed on a makeshift stage in the parlour of the Prospect House in Blue Mountain Lake, New York.  A number of well-dressed men and women sit in chairs facing the stage. The hotel's chandelier hangs in front of the valance curtain.  Prospect House was situated at the foot of Blue Mountain, on a point of land jutting out into Blue Mountain Lake". The six-story, 300-room Prospect House opened in 1882. It had many modern conveniences that other hotels in the area did not have, such as a steam-powered elevator".

An entry to Sepia Saturday