trams in Willis Street, Wellington, 1900s

Looking north. See earlier posts and our two books on Wellington, particularly Wellington Transport Memories.

'we need a transpress nz book - where can we find one?'

Devon Belle train poster, England, 1947

The train was begun the year before nationalisation and only lasted until 1954.  The two observation cars are preserved and can be riden in.  More

Mt Cook Airlines skiplane on the Tasman Glacier

For details, see the book The Aircraft of Air New Zealand and affiliates since 1940.

electric recoaling plant on the L.N.E.R.

Saving time on the prestigious Flying Scotsman schedule; presumably it wasn't only used for that service.

electric multiple unit of the Tatrabahn, Slovakia

From communist days, as is obvious from the red star.  See earlier posts.

retro motoring household ornaments

Seen at a hardware store recently were these gasoline pump and drink vending machine recreation ornaments. The pumps had lights in the tops; the Shell one had shelves inside, the 'Route 66' one was designed for wine bottles.  The Coca Cola and Jack Daniels ones were for putting the obvious inside.

Restored versions of the full-size real things have featured on programs like American Restoration, worth watching.

Swedish Lloyd poster, circa 1951

Obviously a poster for France.  The Britannia and Suecia, both 4,661 grt and 376 ft (114.6 metres) long, were launched in 1929 and were in service with Swedish Lloyd from 1929 to 1966. The significantly bigger Patricia dates from 1951, a detailed illustrated history is on this webpage

interior of a Pullman Palace Car, 1885

from 1960 flat-bed Lambro 3-wheel bike to Tuk Tuk Campervan

and probably the world's smallest such van, a project that featured on the Channel 4 (UK) program "Amazing Spaces". Project website

Kona the bookstore cat

of Bound to be Read Books in Atlanta, Georgia, one of 44 US independent bookshops featured on this webpage.

Western Australian X class

Road numbers 1001 and 1002. See earlier post.

MV 'Fraser Venture'

Fraser Island is off the coast of Queensland, north of the Sunshine Coast area.  This roll-on, roll-off ferry plies the water between River Heads/Hervey Bay on the mainland to Wanggoolba Creek on Fraser Island.

BNSF Railway 2015 calendar

We got a complimentary copy in the mail as we are a supporter. Copies are available for sale at a modest price from BNSF.

The unusual cover scene is a cut through basalt pillars on the Fallbridge Subdivision near Lyle, Washington. Photo credited to Mike Repp.

furniture removal van seen in Papua New Guinea

 

From a viral e-mail. As the accompanying caption said, "Try setting up this business in Australia, NZ, the UK, USA, etc. The Fun Police would be all over you."

'isn't it great having a transpress nz book each?'

Canadian Pacific 'Trans-Canada Limited'

This ran from Montréal to Vancouver. According to this webpage, the first train with this name appeared in 1907, then disappeared and reappeared in 1919. The Trans-Canada Limited was doomed by the Great Depression which struck after the Wall Street Crash of October 1929.  It operated one more season in 1930 and was discontinued, its equipment redistributed or stored.

1956 Fiat 1900 B(?)

With tigers and cone-shaped structures in the background.

wavy track at the Kisogawa Haguri Aichi railway bridge, Japan, 1893

The result of an earthquake.

AEC Regal 'half-cab' bus in Christchurch, 1950s

It could almost be England.  The bus was built post-WW2 with local bodywork. The prams (baby carriages) hanging on the front was a quaint practice which was also done in Dunedin.  In Wellington buses had spaces for them in the back or sides.

1912 Lozier Touring Car

The Lozier company, founded by Henry Abrahm Lozier, produced expensive luxury cars in Detroit, Michigan, from 1900 to 1915 when it went bankrupt.

Egypt warns that Islamists are poised to seize Libya's oilfields

Egypt is warning that terrorist groups are poised to seize control of Libya’s oilfields, as the country’s foreign minister appealed for an expansion of the Western-led campaign against jihadists fighting for the Islamic State of Iraq & Al-Sham (ISIS) to tackle extremism threatening North Africa.

Sameh Shukri, the Egyptian foreign minister, used a visit to London on Monday to push for a new approach from Britain and the West to Islamist violence in Egypt and its neighbours, modelled on the campaign targeting the Islamic extremists.

“The natural resources in Libya represents a very large pool of wealth and funding that will fund terrorist activity not only there but in other parts of the world,” he said. “You see [ISIS] in Iraq utilizing gasoline and the black market, and in Libya this is a danger that will have a big impact for us.”

Read more

personnel on the Q, 1900s

The staff of the Oamaru locomotive branch - 20 of them visible - pose on an example of the first locomotive class in the World to have a 4-6-2 wheel arrangement, the Baldwin-built Q; hence the term "Pacific".  For more, see our books.

1908 REO Roadster

A permanent topless car from the look of it.

short distance Alster steamboats from Hamburg, Germany

Every 5 minutes between Hamburg, Winterhude and Eppendorf, 20 Pfennigs per person. Late 19th century.

blue agapanthus praecox and a Ganz Mavag electric train

Seen at Muri in 1986.  For lots more, see the book Wellington Transport Memories.

Holdens and the good old days

As much motoring icons in NZ as in their native Australia...

Indian motorcycles poster

The age of this is uncertain.  The original Indian Motorcycle Manufacturing Company was founded in 1901 and went bankrupt in 1953. A number of successor organizations perpetuated the name in subsequent years, with limited success. In 2011 Polaris Industries bought Indian Motorcycles and relocated operations from North Carolina, merging them into existing facilities in Minnesota and Iowa. Since August 2013, three motorcycle models that capitalize on Indian's traditional styling have been built under the Indian name.

1970 Ford Fairlane ZC

An Australian model which had a 221 cubic inch (3.6-litre) six-cylinder engine as standard.

the Lemon Express, Spain

The Limón Expres (Lemon Express) tourist train, apparently the first in Spain, ran from 1 June 1971 between Benidorm and Denia, later reduced to Gata de Gorgos on the FGV - the Costa Blanca tram & railway company - metre-gauge line between Alicante and Denia.  The rolling stock consisted of 10 passenger cars with wooden seats and 2 saloon bar cars built in the 1920s and 1930s. Power consisted of 3 diesel-hydraulic "Batignolles". In July 1988, the "Batignolles" were replaced by 2 Alstom, BB diesel-electric type. In 1994 a third such locomotive followed.

It ceased running in 2005 because the bogies (trucks) and wheels of the cars needed maintenance and alteration to fit the new track which is being improved and electrified by the FGV.  The old train has remained in a siding at Benidorm Station covered in graffiti. The expected cost of the upgrade is about 1.2 million Euros and the idea has been shelved, perhaps permanently.

Baldwin Locomotive Works stock certificate, 1950

Later that year on 4 December 1950, Baldwin merged with Lima Hamilton to become Baldwin-Lima-Hamilton in a move to diversify its operations. But Baldwin's success in selling diesels was poor; the company ceased making locomotives in 1956 and closed most of its Eddystone plant. From then to its cessation in 1972, Baldwin made heavy construction equipment.

steam train on the viaduct at Ober-Schmiedeberg in Schlesien, Germany

Since 1945, this place has been Kowary Górne in Poland. This was on a 40 km semi-mountainous line completed in stages between 1882 and 1905 from Hirschberg (Jelenia Góra) via Schmiedeberg (Kowary) to Landeshut (Kamienna Góra) in Lower Silesia in an area known as the Giant Mountains (Riesengebirge). The line, operated by the PKP since 1945, lasted until 2007.

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Air New Zealand 50th anniversary stamp, 1990

The genesis of Air NZ was in 1940 when 10 passengers travelled from Auckland to Australia in the flying boat Aotearoa of Tasman Empire Airways Ltd (TEAL). That journey took nine hours - Air New Zealand trans-Tasman jets today take less than three.

For lots of info and heaps of photos, see the book The Aircraft of Air New Zealand and affiliates since 1940 by Paul Sheehan.

new book on the Hudswell Clarke sugar cane industrial steam locos

The 2ft (610 mm) gauge Hudswell Clarke steam locomotives that hauled sugar cane in Queensland and Fiji for The Colonial Sugar Refining Company were once an iconic part of the scene in both states.  This 144 page book (not viewed) seems to be an improved makeover of the book Last of the Hudswells from a few decades ago, and can be ordered from the Australian Narrow Gauge Railway Museum Society for $A 35 plus postage (525 grams).  For enquiries or to place an order contact sales@angrms.org.au

the inter-island ferry ship "Maori"

For heaps of photos and info on this and every other ferry between the North and South Islands to the end of the 2000s, see the book Strait Crossing: the ferries of Cook Strait through time by Vic Young.

Santa Fe FT's in Colorado, 1959

The EMD FT was a 4-axle 1,350-horsepower (1,010 kW) diesel-electric locomotive produced between November 1939 and November 1945. The "F" stood for 1,400 horsepower (rounded from 1350) and the "T" for twin, as it came standard in a two-unit set. It was the locomotive that convinced many U.S. railroads that the diesel-electric freight locomotive was the future. Many rail historians consider the FT one of the most important locomotive models of all time. More

Chaika on rails

The Mark 1 Chaika, the GAZ M13, made its debut in 1958, a Soviet luxury car for party bosses and top functionaries. This example converted for rail track use is in the Vasúttörténeti Park (Hungarian Railway Museum) in Budapest. (wikimedia)

Soviet diesel-hauled train in the Ural mountains art, 1958

Maybe depicting a Te3 - info on it and other Soviet diesels is on this webpage

ding at Nykøbing Falster, Denmark, 15 July 1969

A seemingly undamaged Lyntog on the left, a crumpled boxcar and a GM Nohab partly in the ditch.

travel to Boston by the New Haven Railroad poster, 1930

1913 Oakland

Oakland was founded in 1907 by Edward M. Murphy, a manufacturer of horse-drawn carriages. In January 1909 he sold half the company to General Motors; when Murphy died in the summer of 1909, GM acquired the remaining rights to Oakland. The brand was discontinued in 1931.

'Night Scotsman' poster late 1920s

Essentially the overnight version of the Flying Scotsman train from London to Edinburgh. This sleeping car service was introduced by the London & North Eastern Railway in 1927 and ran from Kings Cross to Edinburgh Waverley. The service ceased to run as a titled train in May 1968.

The Golden Chersonese train poster, Malaysia, 1930

The 'Golden Chersonese', a name for the Malay Peninsula, separates the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean, extending roughly north-south for just over 1,000 km (600 miles) from the narrowest part of S.E. Asia. The whole railway system is metre-gauge, apart from a standard gauge line to the airport in Kuala Lumpur.

Shanghai Harbour, China, early 20th century

lovely peeps at Timaru postcard, 1950s(?)

A postcard with a flap in the centre which when lifted gave you a less restricted view.

canoeing in the Adirondack Mountains, NY state, poster

Get there by the Delaware and Hudson Railroad.  Date uncertain, pre-WW1?

bicycle philosophy