The Slides of Alan Lovecy

Presenter: Andy Barclay

Well, it was good to be back! The face-to-face meetings programme of the Sheffield Branch resumed on Wednesday 29th September after a break of around 18 months during which time we have joined together in a varied and imaginative programme on the Zoom platform – but virtual meetings, however interesting, still aren’t the same! Since we last met at the Scout HQ we have acquired a new Chairman, Derek Stuckey, and it was Derek who opened the meeting and introduced our speaker (who, in truth, needed no introduction) our old friend Andy Barclay. Ably assisted on the projector by Robert Pritchard, Andy showed us a first chronological selection from the slides of our late Chairman/Secretary Alan Lovecy. What an interesting selection they were. Alan was a career railwayman and the slides were predominantly taken from the time when he was based at Tinsley Motive Power Depot. Andy was therefore able to show us a cross section of the locomotives that passed through the depot in varying states of disrepair, including a number that has suffered in collisions. Alan had also taken his camera with him when he went out to trackside locations to view re-railings and accidents. There was a further thematic strand running through the show: shots taken on a number of enthusiasts’ ‘specials’ to a variety of locations: remote corners of Wales featured strongly. Fortunately Alan had left identification for the majority of the images – a good lesson for all of us – but there were a few which were vague and prompted some head-scratching and mild controversy amongst the audience. Altogether a refreshing start to what we trust will be a bright new season of monthly meetings.