Veteran winner
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THE WORTHING Historic Commercial Vehicle Group has in its keeping a 1934 SD Freighter with Chelsea refuse collection body, a unit truly representative of collectors in popular use for the 20 years up to the end of World War II. The vehicle mentioned was obtained from Epsom and Ewell a couple of years ago, after being unused since 1959. With assistance from the Epsom and Ewell local authority the original livery was restored and in 1966 it won a first prize in the London-Brighton run of the Historic Commercial Vehicle Club. This unit is tiller-steered. The design was in one respect the forerunner of certain modern thought for the engine is positioned transversely beneath the driver's seat. Spares for this model have, of course, long been out of production and the WHCVG chairman, Mr. B. Johnson (24 Sheridan Road, Worthing, Sussex), hopes that someone may have parts available. Those most urgently needed are for steering and transmission.
Mr. Johnson tells me that the group's members accommodate various historic models on their own properties. There is also a club shed. So they might possibly be able to co-operate in saving any historic cleansing appliances in danger of destruction.
From the angle of preserving the records generally it seems a pity that public cleansing has never been taken up enthusiastically by the amateur photographer. Over the past 35 to 40 years thousands have made a hobby of railway photography with the result that every aspect of the rapid-changing railway activity has been amply covered. Certainly many cleansing vehicle manufacturers have good photographic records of their own products. These, however, are necessarily of limited interest, especially so since they very rarely consist of action pictures.