…a book of Great Western Railway Engine names and numbers dated 1921

Trainspotting is considered mainly a post-war hobby, with the 1950’s and 1960’s as its heyday, although the earliest reference to trainspotting, found recently by the National Railway Museum in York, is of a 14 year old girl named Fanny Johnson in 1861, whose notebook of Great Western Railway (GWR) trains at Westbourne Park station, London, is mentioned in a GWR magazine of 1935.

The young lad who once owned this book marked the engines he had seen, though it is not clear what the difference was between the ticks and crosses. Few of the engines listed in 1921 survive. A famous one that does is City of Truro, here numbered 3717, but today carrying its original number when built in 1903 of 3440. 

As a private company, the GWR was free to name its engines as it chose. A certain eccentricity therefore crept in. The name Lalla Rookh is the title of an early 19^th century novel. Katerfelto, is another now obscure novel. And quite why you would call an engine One-and-All is a mystery. Several, it is evident, were named after Directors of the Company; men whose names have long since faded from public recognition, such as Francis Mildmay, Charles Grey Mott and Sir Massey Lopes.

…a copy of the Sunday Mirror

This 1969 edition of the Sunday Mirror was published prior to Apollo 11’s successful landing on the moon, just hours before astronaut Buzz Aldrin stepped out onto the surface and uttered those less than immortal words: “Beautiful View”.

Other news of note was Labour Chancellor of the Exchequer Roy Jenkins’s optimistic view of “Flourishing Britain”. Those who remember the dismal 1970’s, which led to us being labelled “the sick man of Europe” and which culminated in the Winter of Discontent, could be forgiven a burst of scornful laughter.

On the rear page was brief news of a fatal accident in which Senator Edward Kennedy was involved. It seems he had driven off a bridge in the dark, and a young woman had drowned, trapped in the car. But as was later revealed, he had left the scene and not reported the accident until the following morning. The word “Chappaquidick” would dog his footsteps for the rest of his life, and probably cost him a chance of the presidency.
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…Sooty and Sweep 1950’s “Snap” cards.

The game of Snap is one of the simplest of all card games, and can be played with an ordinary set of playing cards, or with specially designed cards, like these well-thumbed examples from the 1950's aimed at children

But in this computer age, do children still play Snap? 

Who could not be charmed by the wonderful images on these cards? Sooty doing magic tricks. Sooty and Sweep baking a cake. Sooty and Sweep driving a train. Sooty bashing Sweep over the head with a hammer. Pardon??