In my occasional series of memory posts I link to my second (now discontinued) blog “Age of Innocence” . In this two part post I look at growing up and playing dangerously…
Play places didn’t get more dangerous than the London to Birmingham railway line It was relatively easy to get up on the tracks and put half pennies on the line for the trains to squash and expand to the size of a penny in the optimistic hope that this would double the value of the coin and shopkeepers wouldn’t notice. (This never worked by the way).
This was rather like in 1969 trying to tile the edges off of a half crown coin to double its value to make one of the new 50 pence pieces. (This didn’t work either).
Have Bag, Will Travel 
The link to the story doesn’t seem to work, Andrew
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I am having the same problem, Andrew
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Fixed now
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trains are dangerous too indeed, just a metro platform in Mexico sink in over 23 dead and 67 injured! ::)
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Sad news.
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yes
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Your childhood sounds so like that of my husband, brought up at the edges of Liverpool. You both clearly had a huge degree of freedom to explore and get up to all kinds of adventures. Was my London childhood more curated by my mother because I was a girl, or because she was risk averse? I’ll never know.
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I think that my sister had exactly the same freedoms.
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That’s good to know. Must have been my family then.
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I bet your Ian Allen trainspotting book had lots of underlines from the London-Birmingahm railway.
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We used to go the Rugby station on the central line for trainspotting until it was closed down.
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Used to do that as well as a kid living near Paddington, was fun outrunning the railway workers as well
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Thanks for adding your memory.
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An enquiring mind!
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That is a way of putting it.
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We certainly had a lot more freedom. I remember making a den in an old hut near a railway line, though I suspect it might have been a disused line. We lived near the sea and wandered the beaches with our friends too. But we were probably too girly to do the really dangerous stuff!
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Thanks for adding your memory Anabel.
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Looks like you had had the most adventurous childhood! Such an interesting story indeed to revive olden times! I think those were the golden times or the golden age without the influence of technology, which we are witnessing these days in every spree. I always wondered how we never had cell phones but still met our friends as planned. Thinking of it now feels like a miracle or a great feat!
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Tin cans and a piece of string always worked for me.
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