A journey along the Welsh Border in 1963

Wynford Vaughan Thomas and friend travel the length of the border between England and Wales in 1963.

But the tone of the commentary could come from a topographical book of 30 years before. Anything that smacks of modernity or progress is suspect and the old ways are to be supported, however silly. There's an obsession with market day, while farmers can do no wrong.

Also in line with such books, there is disapproval for visitors' buses, but the writer's own car gets a free pass.

Still it's lovely country and Montgomery is still a little-known treasure. And Knucklas Viaduct still carries trains despite what the film says about Dr Beeching.

What really interested me in the films are the remains of Victorian agricultural improvement on Long Mountain, because I once discovered them for myself.

I had stayed for the night at Colebatch, the first village south of Bishop's Castle. I set off the next morning to walk to Montgomery. At first I went cross country via Bishop's Moat and Mellington Hall to meet the Offa's Dyke Path.

In those days I sometimes carried a radio when I went walking, and I can remember sitting in the sun listening to The World at One. It was at the time of the collapse of the Soviet Union and there was an item discussing how an independent Ukraine would fare.

I remember laughing because such a notion would have been unthinkable a few days before, and perhaps because I had called at a pub for a lunchtime drink. Looking at the map, I think it must have been the now-closed Blue Bell near Pentreheyling.

Anyway, I passed the turn for Montgomery and kept going because it was only mid afternoon and I felt fine. That's why I found myself on Long Mountain, and wondering what these strange Victorian remains were, before I managed to snag a bed for the night in Welshpool.

Now you could find out online, but this was 1991. Yet, by another of those strange coincidences, there was an item about them in, I think, The Times a couple of days after I got home.

But Wynford Vaughan Thomas is getting impatient, so you'd better watch the video. But after you've done so, you might enjoy my review of All the Wide Border by Mike Parker.

Montgomeryshire Lib Dems call for canal restoration

The past few weeks have seen the appearance of increasingly optimistic schemes for the reopening of long-closed railways.

But Mongomeryshire Liberal Democrats are calling for the reopening of a canal:

We will continue to support the restoration of the Montgomeryshire Canal and push the Welsh Government to provide increased funding towards the project that would significantly boost the economies of Welshpool and Newtown along with other villages enroute. 

The Conservative's have had 10 years in power to push for this and have not succeeded. 

We will seek to use our influence to push the Welsh Government to provide funding for the project, as well encourage the UK government to attribute funding to the project via the new 'UK Development Fund. 

I am pleased to see this. The Montgomeryshire has been undergoing restoration for as long as I can remember, yet progress has been painfully slow.

You can read about the current restoration plans on the Restore the Montgomery Canal! site.

Welshpool Raven Square and beyond in 1963

It's hard to credit if you visit Welshpool today, but the Welshpool and Llanfair Light Railway used to make its way through the town from its modern Raven Square terminus to the main line station.

This beautiful footage from 1963 shows a train on this lost line. It would be something to be cherished just for the colour views of Welshpool back streets.

Click on the still above to view it on the British Film Institute site.

The Montgomery Canal at Welshpool, 1973

Photo: Harry Arnold

'The last of the Inland Waterways Association Bulletins I bought at Foxton last summer is the issue for March 1973.

Taken from it, this photograph shows the Montgomery Canal at Welshpool. Below is a photograph of the same scene I took in 2014.

My plan had been to return my IWA Bulletins to Foxton Locks, where I bought them, and come away with a new batch. That plan will have to be postponed.

Life on the Monty: The Montgomery Canal

The Montgomery Canal ran for 33 miles from Frankton in Shropshire to Newtown in Powys, closing to navigation in 1936.

For as long as I can remember, efforts have been made to restore the Monty. There are now several stretches open for navigation again.

This video shows the progress that has been made and catches the canal's atmosphere.

I once photographed the Monty at Welshpool, and you can read more about it on the Canal & River Trust site.

Gobowen to Welshpool to reopen?

The story does not have that much weight when you read it closely, but the Shropshire Star is getting excited about the possibility that the railway line from Gobowen to Welshpool may be reopened:

The Gobowen to Welshpool rail route was shut in the 1960s, however an idea was mooted by a Powys councillor about reopening the route back in June. 

Now the proposal has been put to transport secretary for Wales Ken Skates, who was asked this week by Mid and West Wales AM Helen Mary Jones whether a study will be commissioned as part of the Mid Wales Growth Deal. 

Mr Skates said the line would be looked at as part of a strategy to reopen lines across the country.

According to the Star, the line was closed to passengers in 1966 and to freight in 1971.

My photograph is taken from the footbridge at Welshpool, where the tracks have been slewed away from the station building to make room for a new main road.

"I think we will stay": Vince Cable on Brexit

“It’s only a matter of time before we come back in Montgomeryshire. It was a Lib Dem stronghold – we will be back.”

That's what Vince Cable told a meeting at Welshpool Town Hall on Saturday.

The Shropshire Star has a video of him speaking at the event and quotes his views on Brexit:

“The split between leave and remain hasn’t changed very much. It’s moved a little bit towards people who think leaving is a bad idea, but it’s not shifted a great deal. 

"If they were to set for another vote, this time on the facts, it will be for about Christmas time. 

"I think once people are clearer about what Brexit means, a lot of the negatives that were not really brought out in the last campaign, I think we will stay."

I knew having a photo of Welshpool Town Hall would come in useful one day.

Disused stations on the Oswestry to Welshpool line

Exciting news! We have not finished with Oswestry to Welshpool.

Here Holden Webster, who runs the Shropshire Railways site, returns to this line to look for more remains of disused stations.

Oswestry to Welshpool part 2

Last time we were at Oswestry station. Tonight we are at Llanclys, where a mile of track is open for heritage trains.

Oswestry to Welshpool part 1

The first of a series of videos made by Holden Webster, who runs the Shropshire Railways site.

It concentrates on the disused Oswestry station, which is now in part a railway museum.

The Welshpool and Llanfair Light Railway in 1960

In 2014 I travelled on the Welshpool and Llanfair Light Railway. After doing so I posted an old video of the lost line from through the streets of Welshpool that once connected the line's Raven Square station with the town's mainline station.

Click on the photo above to go to the BFI site and view film shot in 1960. It shows the whole line, including that abandoned section.

There you will also learn about the man who shot it:

Footage shot by Ion Trant, originally from Dovea Farm, Tipperary, Ireland. He farmed Maesmawr farm, Welshpool (plus the adjoining farm, Cefn Du and a Radnorshire hill farm, Esgairdraenllwyn) with his wife, Janet (nee Lewis). Conscious of a growing gulf between town and country, he welcomed school visits to his farm and created the BBC children’s series "Country Close-Up" (1956-62), featuring his land and children.

The Montgomery Canal at Welshpool

The Montgomery seems to have been undergoing restoration for ever. This stretch at Welshpool is navigable, but it is not connected to the rest of the canal system.

The Welshpool & Llanfair Light Railway in the 1950s

I travelled on and blogged about the Welshpool and Llanfair Light Railway a couple of weeks ago. Then, I wrote:

Originally the line ran all the way to Welshpool's mainline station, crossing the town by threading its way between buildings and crossing roads on the level. That route is now lost.

This video from the 1950s, when the line was still operated by British Rail for freight, shows an enthusiasts' special using that lost route through the town and much of the rest of the line too.

The Welshpool and Llanfair in British Railways days

#90774622 / gettyimages.com

On Wednesday I travelled on the Welshpool and Llanfair Light Railway. The line is now operated by enthusiasts, but after nationalisation it was run by British Railways until its original closure in 1956.

This photograph shows a freight train in British Railways days (1950). By then there were no passenger services - they ended as early as 1931.

The Welshpool and Llanfair Light Railway

Opened in 1903 in an attempt to aid the local economy, this line runs for eight miles from Welshpool to Llanfair Caereinion.

It never made money and was closed to passengers in 1931. Freight services lasted long enough for the line to become part of British Railways, but they ceased in 1956.

The first few miles out of Llanfair were reopened by enthusiasts in 1963 and the line reached Welshpool once more in 1981. The building at its new Raven Square terminus there originally served Eardisley station in Herefordshire.

Originally the line ran all the way to Welshpool's mainline station, crossing the town by threading its way between buildings and crossing roads on the level. That route is now lost.

In fact, someone decided it was a good idea to build a busy main road between the station building and the railway there. Lorries race past the disused platform face at the back of the building.

Welshpool features in Trivial Fact of the Day

Welshpool was known as Pool until 1835. Its name was changed to avoid confusion with Poole in Dorset.

Headline of the Day

A win for Powys in the shape of the County Times:

Rogue cow causes chaos in Welshpool as police cordon off street

Lembit Opik carried from the ring on a stretcher

Back in April this blog reported that Lembit Opik would make his wrestling debut at Welshpool Town Hall on 2 June. You are no doubt wondering how he got on.

The Daily Express enlightens us:

Former MP Lembit Opik’s latest bid for stardom got off to a bruising start – after he was stretchered out of a wrestling ring by paramedics. 

The attention-seeking Liberal Democrat hoped to launch a new career as a professional wrestler following previous forays as a stand-up comedian, reality TV star, music video dancer and consort to a Cheeky Girl. 

But yet again his dreams of being in the spotlight came crashing down, as he was tossed around by 18-stone opponent Kade Callous before being floored by several blows to the face. 

Opik, 47, wearing an ill-fitting T-shirt, tracksuit trousers and kneepads, looked in agony as he was taken away by medics ... clutching his stomach and wearing a neckbrace.

Grappling with Lembit Opik - the video

On Saturday I carried the news that Lembit Opik is make his debut as a wrestler at Welshpool Town Hall on 2 June. Now you can watch a video of the embarrassingly contrived confrontation that led to this turn of events.

Liberal Democrat Voice, which has also posted this video, adds the news that Lembit has another ambition. He wants to be elected as Northumbria's first police and crime commissioner.

Perhaps it would be better if he became a masked superhero and left it to the commissioner to call upon him in time of need?

Grappling with Lembit Opik

Yesterday's Daily Mail told us that Lembit Opik would be making his debut as a wrestler at Welshpool Town Hall last night. I had a search on the net, but as the only mentions I could find suggested he would merely be attending the event I did not blog about it.

But look what happened last night. Lembit did attend the wresting, and the County Times, the Mid Wales newspaper, reports that he was "unable to keep his mouth shut and managed to talk himself into a grudge match with Welsh bad boy Kade Callous at the same venue on June 2".

The story goes on:

Annoyed that Kade Callous used foul play to defeat his opponent Iestyn Rees, Lembit joined the rest of the packed out audience in calling the Welsh Wresting star a cheat! 

Later in the evening, Lembit again rubbed Kade Callous up the wrong way by costing him the chance of victory in the Rumble by grabbing his arm and distracting him. 

Angered by Lembit's actions, Kade Callous grabbed the County Times columnist by the throat, launched him into the ring and challenged him to a fight at Welshpool Town Hall on the evening of the Queen's Jubilee. 

"You're in my world now Lembit," shouted Kade Callous. 

"The last time you were in this town hall you lost, on that very stage they stood up and announced to the world that you are no longer the MP of your constituency. 

"Now you are going to lose again. Do you really think you can beat me? Do you think you can knock me out? Who do you think you are, John Prescott? 

"I will beat you from rope to rope, from corner to corner all over this ring. 

"The last person to stick their nose in my business had it bitten off!" 

At first a petrified Lembit Opik seemed reluctant to get involved, that was until Kade Callous added: "You're not a man, you're a coward!" 

The word 'coward' - combined with the encouragement of the sell-out arena - triggered something off in Lembit's mind that saw him agree to a fight, before being saved from further humiliation when 'goody' Iestyn Rees came to his rescue.

All very silly and all very contrived - like everything else in wrestling, this was obviously arranged in advance.

My words from 2008:

Lembit has tested to destruction the proposition that there is no such thing as bad publicity. He now needs to take himself more seriously in order to persuade others to take him more seriously. He has a Westminster seat to retain and will no doubt return to the Lib Dem front bench soon. Otherwise... 

As I write this, Neil and Christine Hamilton, as if in dreadful warning to him, are appearing on Hole in the Wall.

now seem less prophetic that hopelessly inadequate.

The serious point is that Lembit's antics will do nothing to help whoever stands in Mid Wales for the Liberal Democrats at the next Westminster and Welsh Assembly elections. He might even have got away with his determination to be a media personality if he had sat for a different constituency, but the people of Montgomeryshire - polite, staid, a little old fashioned - were never going to be attracted by it.

Meanwhile, the Daily Mail's parallel with the Rector of Stiffkey seems ever more apt. Far away on the breezy Lincolnshire coast, a lion licks its lips.