One man has a special reason for wanting to visit the North East’s newest tourist attraction, celebrating Darlington’s railway heritage. PETER BARRON explains
AS he wanders round Hopetown, the memories come flooding back for Melvyn Wake.
“I loved working on the railways, it's what Darlington was all about,” he says. “It’s about time they celebrated the town’s heritage properly. I'd like to see more trains but, overall, they've done a good job.”
Hopetown, a £35m redevelopment of the former Head of Steam railway museum, opened last month and will be at the heart of the 200th anniversary celebrations of the Stockton & Darlington Railway next year.
Visitors have been flocking to the new attraction during the summer holidays, and Melvyn had special reason for wanting to see what had been created in a modern-day salute to Darlington’s unique place in railway history.
That’s because Melvyn was the last apprentice to serve his time at the nearby North Road Locomotive Workshops, once the town’s biggest employer as the place where they built and maintained the nation’s steam locomotives.
The Darlington Works, housing the ‘North Road Shops’, were established in 1863 and closed on April 2, 1966. At the height of its powers, around 4,000 men earned a living there.
Since 1979, it's been the site of a Morrisons supermarket, with the industrial hub remembered by the old clock, whose white face once looked down from the arched entrance to the works, keeping track of shift patterns. Now, the clock hangs off the side of the supermarket, a stone’s throw from Hopetown.
Melvyn, born at Greenbank Maternity Hospital in April 1945, started at North Road Shops as an apprentice fitter as soon as he left Eastbourne School at 15, having passed a test in spelling and maths.
“I’d always had a fascination for the railways – as a kid I used to go train spotting with my mates from the metal bridge on the approach to Darlington station,” he recalls. “I had a book of train numbers.”
His dad, Tommy, worked at the Darlington Wire Mills, while mum, Rita, helped train the lasses at Paton and Baldwins knitting factory. However, it was the North Road Shops, where the steam locomotives came to life, that young Melvyn wanted to be.
Now living in Hurworth-on-Tees, near Darlington, he still has a fading copy of his apprenticeship agreement from the British Transport Commission – a contract agreed on August 19, 1960, between his father and the Locomotive Works Manager, John Steven Scott.
While that agreement was full of hope for the future, Melvyn has also kept a more sombre document – the ‘Notice of Discharge Owing to Redundancy – signed by Works Manager, J. Brown, on December 30, 1965.
It reads: Due to the closure of this Works you are now declared redundant and as it has not been possible to allocate you to suitable alternative employment within British Railways, I regret that your services with the British Railway Workshops will be terminated.
It gave Melvyn 14 weeks’ notice, coming into effect on April 4, 1966, when the closure of the works came as a crushing blow to Darlington’s economy.
“By the time I finished, on my last day, there were no apprentices left – I was the last one out of the door,” he says.
“It was so sad, seeing the huge lathes being taken out, and big boxes of tools being weighed for scrap. I didn’t want it to shut – none of us did – but I suppose what will be will be.”
Melvyn had spent his time working on steam locomotives, then diesels started to come in. Sometimes, he’d get the chance to go out for exhilarating runs on the engines he’d worked on.
He also loved the social side of working there, going for nights out with workmates to the Baths Hall, in Gladstone Street, to see the likes of Ken McIntosh and His Band, and the John Barry Seven.
It’s where he met his late wife, Joan, who worked at the Stooperdale Railway offices. She passed away 22 years ago.
Working for the railways came with its perks, including an annual allocation of “privs and passes”. Passes permitted free rail travel, while privs (privileges) were discounted tickets.
“I used them to go and see Darlington play away matches,” he remembers.
Those football trips included going to London in 1975 to see The Quakers lose 3-0 to West Ham in the League Cup.
Melvyn was a keen footballer himself, appearing regularly for the Darlington FC youth team, then Darlington Railway Athletic.
When the railway workshops closed, Melvyn got a job at HG Wilds, making underground roof supports, before spending 24 years working at the Rothmans tobacco plant.
But it’s his days working on the railways that the grandad-of-three looks back on most fondly.
“They were great days – the happiest days of my life,” he declares. “When you built an engine, put it together, and saw it working, there was a real sense of pride in thinking ‘I helped make that’. We made engines and we made friends.
“It was important for Darlington to remember its railway history ahead of the bicentennial next year because trains are what the town’s known for.”
Melvyn was given a tour of Hopetown as a lifelong member of Darlington Building Society, which is one of the council's key partners as sponsor of the new Exhibition Hall in the old carriageworks.
And he will definitely be returning to Hopetown for the 200th anniversary celebrations, in the hope that he might even bump into some old friends and colleagues.
“I’d love to meet up with some of the lads who worked at the North Road Shops, and talk about the old days, but I've no idea how many might be left,” he says.
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As he speaks, Melvyn takes another nostalgic look at his redundancy notice from nearly 60 years ago, and reads the final paragraph from Mr J. Brown, the Works Manager:
“On behalf of the British Railways Workshops, I would like to express my appreciation of your past services together with my best wishes for your future.”
The last words, for the last apprentice.
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