The Broadway Group borrowed one of the railway's pick-up trucks today and 5 hardy volunteers headed off in a northerly direction to collect the GWR platform lampposts that we purchased at auction on Saturday.
The first port of call was Cradley in the West Midlands and after a little local difficulty in finding the exact address we were relieved to find the vendor waiting for us. Fortunately the post was lying in the garage right next to a side road.
We are just getting ready to lift the post on the bed of the truck, those of us nearest the truck are completely unaware of Brian's predicament in the centre of the post. Luckily the vendor was there to save him from a severe case of eye watering.
The vendor with the top of the lamp. On the journey to Cradley we thought that the top was certain to be still attached to the post and were wondering how we would get it apart if it was well rusted. Great relief to find the job already done.
As soon as the box of glass was on board we bade a farewell to Cradley but not without saying thank you to the vendor for his help and encouragement. We now know the provenance of this lamp, Old Hill railway station.
Next stop was Evesham to collect the second lamp. The obvious question has already been asked, "how many men does it take to lift a lamppost?", well, in common with everything else on the railway, they're not light!
A definite bonus in store for us at the second stop where we were given the sack truck in the foreground and a BR(W) ground signal seen on the truck behind Roger in the GWSR jacket. By this time both posts were safely on the truck.
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