Chairman: Bill Davies Click to E-mail
Secretary: Chris Jones Click to E-mail
In normal circumstances, 13 meetings are held each year at 19:30 - 22:00 in
St John's Church Hall, St John’s Street, Bedford, MK42 0DL (unless otherwise stated)
Admission £2.00 Members, £3.00 Non-members (includes free tea or coffee). Refreshments are served at half-time
You can buy new and second-hand books and other items at all indoor meetings.
Meetings Programme 2023-24
| 2023 | |
| 5th December | From The Tyne to The Tweed Dennis Lovett travels from Newcastle-upon-Tyne to the border town of Berwick-upon-Tweed. On the way he visits each of the stations as well as the branches to Amble, Seahouses and Tweed Dock. We will also take the inland route from Alnmouth to Berwick via Alnwick, Wooler and Coldstream part of which is now a developing heritage line along the Aln Valley. |
| 19th December | Christmas Meeting A Frank Banfield Film Night, with Fish & Chips |
| 2024 | |
| 2nd January | Nothing Stays the Same by Mike Corbett A former Works Manager of Wolverton with a fifty-year career history and many years as a senior engineering manager and director within the rail industry, including Crewe Works, Finsbury Park, Stratford, Norwich, Chart Leacon, Atkins Rail and the ROSCOs |
| 6th February | Blue is the Colour. A Colour slide presentation by Richard Crane A review of the ‘blue years’ of the 1970s-80s along with a few memories of past blue liveries |
| 5th March | An 11th Colour Rail Journey conducted by Paul Chancellor A digital presentation of images from the Colour Rail collection. |
| 2nd April | The Hatfield & St. Albans Branch and some 'Relevant Relics' & 'Re-Creations'. Digital slides & Film, presented by Alastair Cameron |
| April (TBA) | Quiz V RCTS Northampton (Away). Afternoon meeting at 3.00. Details of Venue and Date TBA. |
| 7th May | Shildon–Stockton: The real Stockton & Darlington Railway, by Dennis Lovatt The Stockton & Darlington Railway is probably the best-known railway line in the world. Whilst existing history books outline its historical significance. we delve further to explain where it ran initially. The prime objective was moving coal to the River Tees at Stockton from the pits west of Shildon. The establishing of Shildon as the first railway town cannot be underestimated. |
| 4th June | The Midland Heads for Wales: Part 1 Hereford–Brecon, by Chris Jones The Midland Railway, not wanting to be left out of the "Dash for Swansea", takes the hard way; via running powers, takeovers, even renting shed space and almost entirely single line working. Includes a selection of photographs taken by the late Alan Jarvis. |
| 2nd July | British Rail a New History, by Christian Wolmar (Freelance Writer & Broadcaster) The authoritative and fascinating history of the rise and fall of the state-owned British Rail. You think you know British Rail. But you don’t know the whole story! |
| 13th August | Chairman's day out. Where will we go this year? |
| 3rd September | The Railways of Devon and Cornwall, by Michael Clemens This presentation uses film, B&W and colour images & covers many of the lines across the two counties and the steam locomotives that worked over them during the early 1960’s. |
| 1st October | Thomas Brassey and his work, by David Hunt Arguably the most important contractor of the Victorian age who was responsible for much of the Railway development in the years when most of our railways were built. |
| 15th October | AGM. Followed by A Tribute evening to the late Ken Dickens, Geoff Biggs & Chris Foren |
| 5th November | A Broad-Gauge Journey: Part 1 London to Swindon presented by the Rev Canon Brian Arman (President of the RCTS) Beginning at Paddington we take a historical, photographic, journey along Brunel’s great mainline to the West. |
| 3rd December | Slides from the late Derek Cross collection, presented by David Cross A welcome return visit with a further selection of his father’s classic photographs. |
| 17th December | Christmas Meeting. A further selection of films from Frank Banfield’s extensive film library with food from the local chippy |