‘That Was the Year That Was – 1972’, by Geoff Plumb, 1st July 2025
1st July 2025 Meeting.
Our end of season July meeting was a presentation by our Branch Chairman Geoff Plumb.
Starting in March 1972 we had a trip on the ‘Brighton Belle’ Pullman EMU in its final days of operation, this was followed by a trip to Germany in April to see 01 Class Pacifics in the Hof area, both day and night, and battling the famous ‘Schiefe Ebene’, with 1 in 40 gradients.
This was followed by a quick visit to the Welshpool & Llanfair and a railtour from Wembley to the Dart Valley Railway, as it was then. 7029 ‘Clun Castle’ was out on the main line from Didcot to Tyseley, where 5593 ‘Kolhapur’ and 5428 ‘Eric Treacy’ topped and tailed passenger shuttles through the yards.
July saw London Transport run a brake van special to celebrate fifty years of the Met Electrics, with No. 5 ‘John Hampden’ topping and tailing with No. 12 ‘Sarah Siddons’, part of its route including Watford Met station.
The Bristol area, Avon Gorge and Severn Beach were next up during a visit in August, before a few shots at Geoff’s then local station at Sudbury and Harrow Road.
The main event was the ‘World Steam’ organised tour of South Africa, Swaziland (now Eswatini) and Mozambique. This was an intense, three-week tour utilising hire cars to maximise linesiding photographic opportunities. A guideline itinerary was suggested, but it was left to individual carloads to do as they wished. Two groups of cars were used, one circuiting the countries in a clockwise direction from Johannesburg to Port Elizabeth and the other group travelling anticlockwise. Geoff was in the clockwise group, so after a couple of days in the Johannesburg and Pretoria areas, it was off to Swaziland and Mozambique for another few days, mainly around Lourenço Marques and the docks. Then southwards into Natal and the Transkei and to Port Elizabeth. The ‘Mossell Bay Express’ was chased over the Lootsberg Pass from Graaff-Reinet to Middelburg, along with various freights, all worked by Class 19B 4-8-2s at this stage. De Aar was the next centre, on the mainline through the Great Karoo desert from Beaufort West to Kimberley, where many trains were operated by Class 25 condenser 4-8-4s, able to make some spectacular smoke effects.
Two SAR Class 25 “Condenser” 4-8-4s sit side by side at the wayside station of Britsville, both of them with northbound freights in the loops, as a northbound passenger train hauled by another "Condenser" overtakes them, before resuming their journeys to De Aar. Monday 4th September 1972. Image Credit: Geoff Plumb
The Bloemfontein area was the next port of call, a busy centre with lines joining from four different routes, worked 100% by steam at this time. Heading north via Kroonstad it was back to the Jo’burg area and a look at some of the industrial lines serving the collieries and gold mines. Apart from some electrified lines, much of the countrywide system was still steam-operated, though diesels were beginning to appear in some locations. As well as many 4-8-2s of diverse classes, many lines, both 3’6” gauge and 2’0” gauge, were worked by Beyer-Garratts, often in pairs, making for some wonderful scenes.
Soon after, Geoff was back in Germany to see heavy ore trains and express passenger trains, mainly steam-hauled by huge 2-10-0s and three-cylinder Pacifics, working the line north from Rheine to Emden, where some time was spent at the engine shed.
Then back to Blighty, with a final look at Geoff’s HO scale model layout ‘Dampfstadt Hbf’.
A splendid evening with a good attendance of 23 (who all stayed until the end) which was a high for July.
Rob Davidson, Branch Secretary