J-Class
20th Aug 2001, 15:19
Perhaps some of you old-timers can help me out here. Writing in today's Evening Standard (p.37 of the early edition), Rod Eddington, British Airways' Chief Executive, says:
"A lot has changed since I first visited England as a student from Perth in the early 1970s... Steam trains were still puffing away on mainline tracks. Commuters today would no doubt say the service is not noticeably faster."
Now I must admit I was in short trousers for most of the 1970s, but - steam trains? Surely the age of the Railway Children had passed by the era of the Stylophone, the New Seekers and the Austin Allegro?
Perhaps Mr. Eddington was himself puffing away on something more exotic when he was here as a student in the early seventies. Has he confused the resulting fug with the byproducts of rail travel of yesteryear?
In any case, my own memory of the era is none to clear. I could swear it was a DC-3 that took me to JFK when I got my first Junior Jet Club entry back in 1976!
"A lot has changed since I first visited England as a student from Perth in the early 1970s... Steam trains were still puffing away on mainline tracks. Commuters today would no doubt say the service is not noticeably faster."
Now I must admit I was in short trousers for most of the 1970s, but - steam trains? Surely the age of the Railway Children had passed by the era of the Stylophone, the New Seekers and the Austin Allegro?
Perhaps Mr. Eddington was himself puffing away on something more exotic when he was here as a student in the early seventies. Has he confused the resulting fug with the byproducts of rail travel of yesteryear?
In any case, my own memory of the era is none to clear. I could swear it was a DC-3 that took me to JFK when I got my first Junior Jet Club entry back in 1976!