Potters Bar 1955 film

[Mickey]

Here is some Pathe film featuring the then new Potters Bar station in 1955 shortly after being re-built.

Potters Bar station is located about 12 miles north of Kings Cross just inside the south Hertfordshire border and fringing with the extreme northern fringes of north London a mile or two to the south.

The new 1955 Potters Bar s/box is briefly seen and from memory on about three separate occasions during the summer 1973 I had a cleaning job on a Sunday in the box for several hours as overtime from my weekday job as a box lad (telegraph lad) at Welwyn Garden City box. Again from memory I believe s/box eventually closed sometime during the first half of 1974.

http://www.britishpathe.com/video/new-p ... ar-station

[manna]

G'Day Gents

Good one Mickey

Now see if you can find one of the old station

manna

[Mickey]

Yes an interesting short piece of Pathe film manna.

I presume because it was filmed in 1955 the completion of the quadrupling of the Greenwood-Potters Bar section to the south of Potters Bar station was still four years away.

Note the five block bell tappers built into the panel?. I am guessing that four block bell tappers were for the Up slow, Up fast, Down fast, Down slow lines to & from Marshmoor box to the north and the fifth block bell tapper was for the Up & Down main lines to & from Greenwood box to the south.

The panel shown in the film was replaced by a smaller temporarily NX panel at the same time Marshmoor box was closed in November 1972.

Thinking back to my Sunday cleaning shifts at the box during 1973 I reckon I must have unknowingly overstayed my welcome with the signalmen who were on duty on those Sundays because I would show up around 10:00am and stay until around 5:30pm basically 'train spotting' after only spending about 45 minutes actually cleaning the box but all the signalmen were kind old boys and none of them told me to leave and go home at anytime.

Funny the box that I am currently working has a small NX panel just like the Potters Bar NX panel had back in 1972-74.

[thesignalman]

It looks like there were three lines to the south at that date, the westernmost being an extension of the Down Goods at Greenwood. It might have only been used as an engineers siding at that date but at some point it was used as a goods-only line before the final arrangements.

The film and a still shot (below) seem to carefully exclude the telegraph instrument from the views. No doubt it was thought that to include a piece of victorian equipment in film of such a modern place was inappropriate. Telegraph code was "PO".


Photographer unknown, collection of Dr J W F Scrimgeour/John Hinson

I worked just one shift there as relief telegraph boy in the early 1970s. If I remember rightly the train describers to New Barnet North simply displayed the appropriate bell signal, e.g. 3-1 or 3-2-5, which seemed frightfully primitive. Bells were still used for anything that couldn't be displayed.

The panel was an unusual form of the NX type where you rotated the entrance button and pressed the exit. The exit button was often in the centre of the entrance button for the next section of route. On the main diagram behind, metal sections actually moved to show the set poisition of the points.

John

[Mickey]

It looks like there were three lines to the south at that date, the westernmost being an extension of the Down Goods at Greenwood. It might have only been used as an engineers siding at that date but at some point it was used as a goods-only line before the final arrangements.

I would say that your correct with your assumption John.

The film and a still shot (below) seem to carefully exclude the telegraph instrument from the views. No doubt it was thought that to include a piece of victorian equipment in film of such a modern place was inappropriate. Telegraph code was "PO".

Yes when I was at Welwyn Garden City box as a telelgraph lad during 1972-1973 it was the usual practice during the weekday mornings around 6:35-6:40am for Potters Bar to 'send on' on the single needle telegraph a light engine that was always a Brush type 2 (class 31) that came along the Down slow line that originated from Finsbury Park/Clarence yard and would arrive at WGC around 7:00am and was then crossed over to the Up side to work back up to London a morning 'peak hour' service that started from the old Hertford line platform (formerly no.4 platform) with a train of inner suburban non-corridor stock (block enders) that was one of three sets of inner suburban stock that was stabled overnight in the Up sidings at WGC from the previous evenings peak.

I worked just one shift there as relief telegraph boy in the early 1970s. If I remember rightly the train describers to New Barnet North simply displayed the appropriate bell signal, e.g. 3-1 or 3-2-5, which seemed frightfully primitive. Bells were still used for anything that couldn't be displayed.

An old friend of mine who I subsequently lost contact with almost 40 years ago now named Alan Dollimore and who was at onetime a telegraph lad at Welwyn Garden City box between 1962-1963 I believe told me that he had also been a telegraph lad at Potters Bar box which may have been after his time at WGC (1962-1963) and I vaguely remember him telling me that the single needle telegraph instrument in Potters Bar box wasn't an old GN wooden type of instrument but a modern instrument either built into the panel or made to complement the panel anyway he told me that information 50 years ago now so hopefully I have got that correct?.

The panel was an unusual form of the NX type where you rotated the entrance button and pressed the exit. The exit button was often in the centre of the entrance button for the next section of route. On the main diagram behind, metal sections actually moved to show the set poisition of the points.

As previously posted a couple of time several years ago I was told that the 1955 Potters Bar panel was at onetime placed in storage at a S&T Depot at Temple Mills in East London back in 1979 but where it is these days is anyone's guess although there is a chance it is in storage at the NRM at York I presume?.

[R. pike]

I have this bit of the panel..

This would have been replaced when the full job was commissioned through to New Barnet.

[Mickey]

By comparison the temporary NX panel that replaced the one in the 1955 film and John's photograph was a much simpler affair obviously because I believe it may have only lasted from November 1972 to the first half of 1974 before the box was finally decommissioned and that is the panel that I saw on three separate occasions during 1973 when visiting the box on Sundays. I can't recall if that panel face had either a grey or green background but it faced in the same direction as the older 1955 panel with the signalman sitting at the panel with his back facing the running lines outside the box also I have a feeling all the box windows had slightly dark smoky glass to them to cut down the glare of the sunshine outside.

[Mickey]

Taking a closer look at John's photograph of the 1955 panel in fact the signalman's console appears to be quite a simple affair in fact the track diagram above the console appears to be slightly more complicated (to me at first glance) although after becoming accustomed to the diagram probably after a few shifts it wouldn't look to complicated after that.

The box that I am currently at at Upper Holloway (in fact I was originally at this box when it first opened in 1985 and have been resident here on three separate occasions between 1985-1987 1990-1992 & 2004-20?? and also working the box on the relief between 1987-1990) also has a small NX panel built by SWISSINCO and installed in 1985 of the 'mosaic type' with small metal/ceramic square tiles that slot together that eventually builds up into the completed panel face. The idea is simple if there are any alterations to be made to the panel face an individual of several mosaic square tiles can be removed and replaced by a new mosaic square tile(s) showing the new alteration(s) without having to change the entire panel face or 'paper over' the effected area of change on the panel where the alteration was made.

[EddieBN]

Mickey, the signalman in the picture I'm sure is Stan Colbert. I think he was the Hatfield relief signalman at that time. When I was Finsbury Park relief tele-lad in the mid sixties I worked quite a lot of 12hr shifts at PO days and nights.On Saturday nights the shift actually finished at 4am Sunday morning. You'll probably remember the tele-lad's desk was behind the signalman just out of shot in the picture. I think there were four telegraph circuits at the time housed in a cabinet on the desk (quite modern looking for the time). Block bells only were provided to communicate with New Barnet North for use in emergency only.
EddieBN

[Mickey]

Mickey, the signalman in the picture I'm sure is Stan Colbert.

You could well be right Eddie regarding the bloke sitting at the panel being Stan Colbert I saw him about three or four times in the person when he happened to show up in WGC box on LDC business and talking with whoever the signalman was in the box at the time although by 1972-73 he was as bald as a snooker ball!!.

Stan gets a name check in an official accident report regarding a 'high-speed derailment' just south of Hatfield station in early 1966 when a Down Cambridge buffet hauled by a Brush type 2 and a rake of B.R.Mk1 coaches went over a broken rail in the Down fast line very near to Hatfield No.1 box where Stan happened to be on duty at the time and was derailed running through the Down fast line platform before coming to a stand at the north end of Hatfield station.