57, Stanley Street, Rothwell, Kettering, Northamptonshire,
England
Over 20 people attended the maugural meeting of Corby and
District Steam Preservation Society, held on Friday Evening October
10th at Corby Technical College. As many again expressed an
interest in the club by writing letters of support.
The aim of the society is to collect and preserve disused steam
machinery. Mr. Adam Belford of 41, Glynbourne Gardens, Corby, said:
‘If we do not make an effort to preserve this machinery, then
future generations will classify us with all the other
unenlightened peoples of the past who omitted to preserve at least
one of their artifacts for the interest of their
descendants’.
A steering committee of ten was appointed to look into matters
pertaining to finance, membership and constitution, to be reported
at the proposed meeting in November.
Mr. Belford asked Stewart and Lloyds (one of Europes largest
Steel making companies with huge works at Corby) if they would be
willing to help them in lending equipment and providing the site
for a museum, which the society hopes to set up.
Mr. A. J. Minney told the audience that already a steam shovel
was being ‘put-by’ for them and they hoped to borrow more
machinery later. ‘We are not asking to be given this
machinery’, said Mr. Minney, ‘But that it is loaned to us,
until such a time as we can afford to pay for it’.
A spokesman for Stewart & Lloyds who attended the meeting
was unable to make any official comment, but said that the matter
would be put before the board of the firm.
Stewart and Lloyds did operate a big shed of Steam locomotives
which ran for miles across the Northamptonshire countryside on the
lines leading to the iron ore mines, but the majority have been
scrapped over the past 12 months. A lot of track has been taken up,
but where still required is now carrying diesel locomotives.
I think if people marry it ought to be for life; the laws are
altogether too lenient with them. Finley Peter Dunne.
