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Brits: need, an answer
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In 1965, the majority of crossings on BR would have been manually operated by the crossing keeper, either by turning a huge wheel like a ship's wheel in an adjacent signalbox (control tower), or by pushing the gate, until they locked into a 'shoe' . I remember seeing a crossing gate being demolished by a steam hauled freight train in around 1958 when the gate had failed to engage in the shoe. The signalman had thrown the signal back to danger when he realised that the gate wasn't in place, but it was too late. Even though the gate timbers were about 9" square, the train smashed it to match wood without derailing. After that the signalman (or 'Bobby' , as we called them - they were originally policemen, also known as Bobbies, after the man who originated the British police force, Sir Robert Peel) would shake his fist at me and shout 'Go away ! ' or words to that effect. I think he was worried that he may lose his job if I made a witness statement !. A crossing at the little Wel***own of Caersws still has gates that are pushed open and shut by a crossing keeper, who then returns to his box to manually operate the levers to semaphore signals protecting the crossing.
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