When I was young trains were still pulled by steam engines. That’s right, I’m that old!

Our town station had a circular wooden booking hall and you walked down steps to the platforms. It was eventually demolished and a concrete station was built to replace it. If we wanted to go anywhere we had to go via Birmingham New Street. Apparently our town was almost chosen for the main station in the Midlands but Birmingham got it.

Our trips included travelling to Blackpool and to the Isle of Wight. We didn’t have a car then so any distances would have to be on a train or on a coach (coaches were better in some ways because they came back later than trains). I remember the Blackpool trip because we went up Blackpool Tower (looking a lot like the Eiffel Tower, but on top of a building). When we got to the viewing platform on the top the waves on the sea looked almost stationary. It looked weird. My mom told me she had once taken a plane ride around the tower in a tiny plane! I remember Blackpool pleasure Beach. Its the funfair on the ‘front’, including a ghost train and a big dipper roller coaster at that time I think, it has probably changed a lot now.

Then home on the steam train and a trolley bus (powered by overhead electric cables) home. I don’t remember arriving at home, I must have fallen asleep.