Let's return to the October 1972 edition of London Transport Magazine and see what some of the employees were getting up to. Nothing interesting. [scan]
• Sylvan Agard has been top bakery student at a leading London college for the past three years - thanks to the English climate.
• London Transport railway instructors came through a gruelling six-hour test with flying colours.
• The first full-time secretary of the National Federation of Sea Anglers is former Bromley bus driver Bob Page.
• When Holloway bus driver George Paul and his family moved into an Islington block of flats in 1968 he lost no time in organising a soccer team from the local youngsters.
• Hackney council alderman Sam Springer has been appointed a member of the conciliation committee of the North Metropolitan branch of the Race Relations Board.
• The stupendous feats of strength displayed by weightlifters in action at the Munich Olympic Games stirred the memories of at least one member of our staff.
• The towns of Ayr, Bath and Truro were just three of fifteen visited in a hectic eight-day spell by Mr Bertrand Moran, former London Transport gardening superintendent.
• Tram enthusiast Geoffrey Baddeley of the muniments office devotes his off-duty time to more than the restoration of London trams.
• The modern red London bus has been a feature of several Department of Trade Industry sponsored overseas exhibitions to boost sales of British goods.
• A leading member of the East Anglian Transport Museum at Lowestoft is James Malster, a central London bus inspector for 43 years.
If any of those 'first lines' pique your interest you can click on the scan and read the article in full (but I suspect they won't, and recommend you don't). Note that all of them are about men - the only woman on the double page is Anita Harris promoting an all-over ad on a Red Arrow bus.
• The numbers attending London Transport rugby club's training sessions and trials has been very encouraging.
• Writer and television personality Kenneth Hudson gave an illustrated introductory talk at the first meeting of the London Transport industrial archaeology group.
• District line cricket club defeated a combined Acton works XI by seven wickets.
• There is a programme change for Central line camera club's practical night on October 10 - the subject will now be mounting and spotting.
• Stamps of Denmark were featured at a recent meeting of the London Transport philatelic society.
• District line football section are looking for experienced players who can turn out regularly.
• Meetings of the chief signal engineer's department technical society during the coming months include talks on such diverse subjects as hovercraft, glass manufacture and North Sea oil.
• Whitechapel ticket machine fitter Albert McLean took first place in the 100 metres at an international veterans' athletic meeting at Crystal Palace.
• Here are the main winners of the railway employees' horticultural society annual show held at Hammersmith.
• The next meeting of the LER dog club will be held at the Camden Town committee rooms at 7.30pm on October 12.
• Members are reminded that the annual presentation dance will be held in Acton pavilion on November 3.
It's still a very male preserve, although we do learn the name of the District women's tennis tournament champion and it is possible some of the horticultural show winners were female.
The letters page kicks off with an angry conductor moaning about the generosity of concessionary bus passes. [scan]
The scheme is badly costed and the qualifications absurd. To put the whole system straight should be a priority. We must call a halt to wealthy and independent people joy-riding all over London every day at the expense of the ratepayers because they have reached a certain age. The concession should be FREE and only available to the aged and needy. The sole qualification should be that the applicant be 65 and he or she should be in receipt of some sort of social security payment.
These joyless miseryguts still exist - it's just much easier for them to be heard these days. And this one hasn't finished lambasting old folk yet. Bloody freeloading pensioners.
The timing, anyway, should be adjusted. Folk are getting on a bus just before 4pm for a long run and during the 5pm peak they are occupying full fare space that the all-day workers should have. All journeys by the concession holders should be terminated by 4pm.
Which brings us to the Woman's Page. Everything else in the magazine is about transport and what transport employees have been doing, but the Woman's Page is very different. The main article is about buying blankets. [scan]
Black blankets for those winter nights
The approach of winter calls for bright gay colours in the bedroom. And this includes blankets. This year they come in more than fifty colours ranging from bitter chocolate and aubergine to mango, purple and even black. More people are using blankets instead of a bed cover to highlight a colour scheme in patterned wallpaper or carpet.
Those colours sound very 1972. And what else are women supposedly interested in?
• A new hand-held hairdryer in a streamlined design and attractive colour combination of lilac and white, peach and white or lilac and mauve sells for £3.95 at Boots. If you prefer roller sets to the blow-dry hairstyles, there's a colour-matched hood available with hose and stand at an extra £1.
• A new potato chipper from Woolworth has a high quality, long life plating, stainless steel cutters and a plastic pusher designed to ensure the chips pop out when pressure is applied to the handle.
I think we had one of those chippers at home, livening up our teatimes, but even so I doubt my Mum would have been interested in reading this patronising slop. Neither did she need tips on keeping her skin healthy (don't eat a lot of fatty foods, do eat lots of citrus fruit, don't leave make up on overnight, do get lots of fresh air). And as for the model in the swirly dress...
Silhouette have introduced this attractive long Polyester bra dress in their autumn leisurewear range. In sizes 12-18, it comes in tan/green and blue, selling at approximately £8.65. The name? Natasha.
London Transport Magazine morphed into LT News in 1973, which is probably just as well, and I never saw a copy on sale at Croxley station again. Whatever TfL serves up for its employees these days is a lot more private, undoubtedly a lot less sexist, much more agenda-driven and quite possibly a lot less interesting. Times change.
