1930s subway train makes rare uptown trip in NYC

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1930s subway train makes rare uptown trip in NYC

Following on from the New York Transit Authority's tie-up with HBO in 2011, when an original 1920s subway car was taken out of mothballs to mark the beginning of Boardwalk Empire's second season, a vintage New York underground train has once again made an appearance on one of the city's lines.

This time the eight carriages were of a slightly later 1930s vintage, but are no less æsthetically pleasing to look at!  What is more, it sounds as though their return to the tracks was something of a surprise treat - particularly for the commuters - as the New York TA took the opportunity to celebrate the reopening of a section of line previously damaged by Hurricane Sandy last year.  Quite a way to mark the occasion, I think you'll agree.  Well done to the Transit Authority for coming up with such a wizard idea, for anyone who just happened to be on that line at the time to enjoy.  Wouldn't it be something if London Underground ran some of its old '30s stock around the City once in a while, just for the fun of it?  (I know the London Transport Museum runs the occasional excursion on various suburban lines' extremities, of course - in fact there's one coming up next month - but it would be splendid to see some 1930s Art Deco on, say, the Circle or Metropolitan lines.) 

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Still it sounds like those New Yorkers lucky enough to experience public transport 1930s-style enjoyed the opportunity, even if some of them seemed a little nonplussed(!).  It's sometimes easy to forget that where we would experience a thrill at seeing an 80-year old train pulling into our local station, there are people out there for whom the whole thing would just be very odd.  I know - what's wrong with 'em, eh?  It's nice to see that it brought back happy memories for some folk as well, though - all the more reason to do it again!

Let's hope that it doesn't take another natural disaster (or period TV show) to encourage the New York Transit Authority to wheel out some of their classic carriages again.  In the meantime it's great to see these old cars given their head on a newly-restored line.

All aboard the song train

The starting of a new job seems to have coincided with a bit of a downturn in vintage news (not to mention my third cold in as many months!) - hence I have been absent from the blogging circuit for nearly two weeks, for which I must continue to crave forgiveness!  I still haven't forgotten about you all though (I read all your posts of an evening, or at the weekend, as something very much to look forward to) nor this blog of mine.

Sitting on the train during the commute into work I often find myself thinking of potential subjects for this site and, while listening to my portable i-gramophone last week, it occurred to me that the very mode of transportation I was using - and the music I had playing - would make an excellent topic.



The railway train has always had an instantly recognisable rhythm and one that naturally lends itself to a musical beat.  There have been countless songs over the years featuring trains and rail travel to some extent or another but it is the half-a-dozen or so favourites in my music collection that I intend to focus on here.

The first song, Choo-Choo, neatly sums up the steam train in typical Thirties onomatopoeic style and is wonderfully redolent of period rail travel.  Written and recorded by American bandleader Frankie Trumbauer in 1930, it was almost immediately cut by a multitude of other bands on both sides of the Atlantic.  While the original Trumbauer recording is excellent, my favourite from the U.S. is Paul Whiteman's version, above, made in the same year.



In the U.K. the two Jacks - Jack Payne and Jack Hylton - both recorded versions of Choo-Choo a year later in 1931 and again, while Jack Payne's version is wonderful, Hylton's arrangement just shades it for me.



Arguably a more famous "Choo-Choo" is Glenn Miller's brilliant 1941 record - Chattanooga Choo-Choo, a song that instantly conjures up images of transcontinental railway journeys in the 1940s and '50s.



A year or two earlier Glenn Miller had had similar success, reaching number 1 on the U.S. Billboard chart with another train-themed number - Tuxedo Junction.  The song had actually been written in 1939 by American bandleader Erskine Hawkins and while his original version made it to number 7 in the charts it remains less well-known today than the classic Miller arrangement.



Another railway tune that has become inextricably linked to its [co-]composer - so much so that it is invariably called his "signature song" and found in every compilation of his music - is Duke Ellington's Take The 'A' Train.  It is a reputation that it thoroughly deserves, being one of the defining examples of 1940s big band music never mind rail-based songs.



One of my very favourite "songs of the track", though, is this one - Honky-Tonk Train Blues.  Although written and first recorded as long ago as 1927 by the noted early boogie-woogie pianist Meade Lux Lewis, this 1938 arrangement by Bob Crosby (Bing's brother) with Bob Zurke on the piano really rolls along splendidly.

For me all of these help rekindle some of the fun and romance that seems to have been lost from modern train travel, as I commute to and from work in a characterless and brightly-coloured plastic tube.  Sometimes I can even imagine seeing something steaming past the station platform, or pulling the far more luxurious carriage I picture myself travelling in... porter! My case please!

New Year, Old Buses

This year's resolution, as far as I go in for that sort of thing, is to get to more museums, events and places of interest and hopefully to meet more like-minded folk in person.  I may even have a blogger meet-up planned!

For now, though, I've started the year as I mean to go on with a visit to the Castle Point Transport Museum that has featured on these pages before.

In a similar vein to the Keighley Bus Museum whose Christmas Day service I posted about recently, Castle Point Transport Museum in association with a couple of local bus companies have for the last 5 years been putting on special services in the local area on New Year's Day when no normal buses are running.  Made up entirely of exhibits and some of the bus operators heritage fleet, it allows people to move around the local area as well as visit the museum.  It's also an excellent excuse to ride on some old buses!

So bright and early on Sunday morning I was standing at the local bus stop waiting to hail what promised to be quite a different bus compared to the norm.  Rather a nostalgia trip to see this pulling in a few minutes later:

My transport for the day, a 1973 Bristol RE

And so on to the museum, with a some stops along the way as a few bemused members of the public hopped on and off en route.  Oh, the looks you get from people as you sail past in a vintage omnibus!

1949 AEC Regent RT III

The museum itself was fairly busy by its usual standards, even taking into account the whole New Year's Sunday date.  There was even a female 1940s re-enactor (complete with victory rolls!) visiting with her family.  It all added to the fun!

1959 AEC Routemaster in local operator's colours

Several buses were lined up on either side of the museum, which was the local depot between 1934 and 1978 and still has much of the workshop ambience about it.  Elsewhere there are display rooms and a model railway, with more being added continually.

1960 Leyland PD3

Some of the buses are still undergoing restoration, like these two PD3s, and there remain many signs that this was and still is a place for repairing public service vehicles.

1958 Leyland PD3

Many of the museum's top exhibits were present, such as this Bristol open-topper and a 1949 Leyland OPD.

1953 Bristol KSW

The traditional London Routemaster was also represented, with this example serving Hounslow.  All aboard, tickets please!  Note the period adverts extolling commuters to "Please avoid the rush hours".  Seems some things never change!

1962 AEC Routemaster

1959 Bristol LDL

I couldn't help but smile at the above LDL - service no. 13 served Runwell Hospital, the local mental health hospital.  No superstitious bus drivers worked that route, I'll warrant!

The relative quiet of the museum compared with the climactic annual open day in October meant I had more of a chance to take a few snaps of the contents of the display cabinets.  Most of them contained articles relating to vintage bus travel, but there were also several items pertaining to local and national history.

Enamel signs for the county's bus routes and local businesses

All kinds of bits and bobs could be seen, from razors to pumps to books.

Even some jewellery for the gals!

London Transport books and leaflets

Bus and railway paraphernalia

Children's toys

Cooking

Washing

Do I remember?  I wish I did!

Clippy's Cafe

Not sure what the link is here...!

More wartime kitchenware and whatnots

Clock in (or out!)

Don't forget your badge!

Through the office

 

An Imperial 65 (wide carriage), the direct precursor of my own 66

All in all, another splendid day out with hopefully a lot more to come in 2012 from this museum at least.  The weather managed to hold off until just before I got home and it was a lovely way to spend the first day of the year.  So far my New Year's resolution is holding up well, and unlike some I can't wait to put in into practice again!

"New Routemaster" Bus for London driven

Image courtesy of Autocar

"New Routemaster" Bus for London driven

One of the ten most popular posts ever on Eclectic Ephemera was when I blogged back in November 2010 about the new "Routemaster" double-decker bus.  Obviously it must have been a popular search item, and rightly so!

Now I'm pleased to say that my favourite motoring periodical, Autocar, has tested one for its special bumber Christmas issue, giving you some idea of what the thing is like to drive.  With the New Bus for London, or NBfL (come on chaps & ladies, we can think of a better name than that, surely?!) due to start passenger service on the 20th February 2012 this is the first full test of the vehicle by an independent party (albeit with tongue slightly in cheek) and it seems Autocar like it.  That makes two of us!

Image courtesy of Autocar

And it just gets better on the inside.  As the 21st Century successor to the iconic Routemaster the poor old NBfL has a lot to live up to and while the outside is quite reminiscent of the old AECs, especially from the rear, the interior was always going be a challenge.  But the designers have come up trumps in my opinion with the wonderfully russet London Transport red setting off the cork resin on the stairs splendidly.  Plus, as the article says, real thought and aestheticism has been put in to the cabin lights, the windows and the roof-lining.  After all, this isn't any old double-decker, y'know - this is a London bus!  (For now, although makers Wrightbus may be able to sell the design elsewhere both at home and abroad - wouldn't that be something?).  OK, perhaps the seat fabric is a little bit kaleidoscopic but overall it's delightful to see such care and appreciation going into a public service vehicle for a change.  Perhaps it bodes well for the future of public transport design.

Image courtesy of Autocar

So come the New Year those bendy whatsits will be on the way out, to be replaced by this topping new omnibus for a new generation (albeit with some lovely old-fashioned touches).  Yet another example of modern technologies working in harmony with traditional design.  All aboard, tickets please!

Boardwalk Empire Is Bringing Back Old School Subways

Image courtesy of Gothamist

Boardwalk Empire Is Bringing Back Old School Subways

A wizard wheeze from HBO, makers of the hit U.S. television series Boardwalk Empire, who have brought an actual 1920s subway train out of retirement and with the assistance of the New York Transit Authority are running it on a limited basis on one of the Manhattan lines for every weekend throughout September!

Image courtesy of Gothamist

The London Transport Museum and London Underground have done similar one-offs in the past with 1930s-era stock, but nothing as old as the '20s I think.  It must be quite an experience; it's just a pity there's a great big ocean between me and it, else I'd probably be on it every weekend!  Well, it's reminded me to keep an eye out for any vintage LU runs in the future, anyway*.  Some videos have already surfaced on YouTube which give a good sense of travelling on a 1920s subway train.  It looks like fun!




Incidentally has anyone actually seen Boardwalk Empire yet?  Is it as good as I hear?  I'm amazed the first series hasn't already been snapped up by Channel 4 or someone.  For the likes of me who refuse to further line the pockets of the Murdoch empire it is most frustrating!  I want my Twenties fix! ;-)

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*While searching the Interweb to confirm my memory of the LU/London Transport Museum heritage runs, I've discovered there's another one this Sunday, the 11th September, up at the end of the Metropolitan line between Harrow-on-the-Hill, Rickmansworth and Amersham.  The museum's 1938 train and locomotive are being given an airing and there's even a competition for the best period-dressed passenger!  It may be a little late in the day (certainly is for me, not to mention a little bit of a trek for me at the moment) but I thought I'd bring it to your attention anyway.  Details here.

Historic footage shows Bermuda at dawn of tourism age

Historic footage shows Bermuda at dawn of tourism age

It is amazing how the Internet can shrink the world to such an extent that a humble little vintage blogger in Great Britain can stumble across a news item from Bermuda, of all places.  That is what has happened, though, with this article from the Bernews website which has somehow managed to come within my purview.

And it's just the kind of thing I like for this blog, containing as it does film shot in the 1920s of Bermuda when the island was beginning to undergo a sea change from a simple British Company colony settlement into a tourism hot spot.  As such it contains not only a myriad of period detail, with well-heeled Americans, Canadians and Britishers holidaying on the island but also the occasional glimpse of an already fast-disappearing colonial way of life.  It's a fascinating snapshot of Twenties travel to a tourist location we now think of as quite "usual" and is thoroughly deserving of a wider audience.

Indeed, the entire Novia Scotia Archives look like a treasure-trove of 1920s and '30s delightfulness, which I shall look forward to viewing in more detail.  And all thanks to a Bermudan website I happened to chance across.  Splendid tool, the Internet, eh?