Hand balled sugar beet nuts out of railway vans at preston station in the early 60s
I remember handballing hundredweight plastic bags of nitrate fertiliser out of rail wagons onto pallets. The bags were hard to grip but the fertiliser was rock hard and the bags were all kids of shapes.
Hi haddy and others,
A couple thanks to the Nation Railway Museum, Scotch seed tatties arriving at Norwich and Ipswich.
Oily
Back in the “good old days” I did three 7-ton loads of fertilizer out of railway wagons or direct out of boats at Fishguard Harbour to farms throughout Pembrokeshire. Without fail the farmer’s wife would tell you, “He’s gone to market/the other farm/a funeral but I can show you where he wants it stacked”.
Good old days, my ar*e!
And the sugar beet pulp? Oh dear, I had forgotten just how much the stuff itched! About fourteen feet high, double-sheeted and having to tighten the ropes every ten miles or so. Then next day chuntering around farms with the stuff, invariably with the same greeting, “He’s not here at the moment…”
Where did the railways find all those chaps, Oily?
Retired Old ■■■■:
Back in the “good old days” I did three 7-ton loads of fertilizer out of railway wagons or direct out of boats at Fishguard Harbour to farms throughout Pembrokeshire. Without fail the farmer’s wife would tell you, “He’s gone to market/the other farm/a funeral but I can show you where he wants it stacked”.
Good old days, my ar*e!
And the sugar beet pulp? Oh dear, I had forgotten just how much the stuff itched! About fourteen feet high, double-sheeted and having to tighten the ropes every ten miles or so. Then next day chuntering around farms with the stuff, invariably with the same greeting, “He’s not here at the moment…”
Where did the railways find all those chaps, Oily?
Hi ROF, during the nationalisation period(when over manning was the order of the day) and unusually they all appear to be grafting 
Oily
Edit… On consideration I would say those chaps probably had a pre nationalisation work ethic, so fair play to them.
Oily
Not railtrucks but what about Stratford lift , down you went they dropped it on the wagon you handballed it on then up and away.The only good thing was nobody did a count so you could slip a few cases of whatever you were loading in your hiding places on the wagon.
jeffrey ellener:
Not railtrucks but what about Stratford lift , down you went they dropped it on the wagon you handballed it on then up and away.The only good thing was nobody did a count so you could slip a few cases of whatever you were loading in your hiding places on the wagon.
Cartons of pineapple chunks out of Liverpool Docks. They stacked in blocks of fourteen on a layer but if you turned them on their edge, you could get fifteen. Often wondered how the tallyman got out of that one when the ship was done & he was a couple of hundred short! 
Had the pleasure of handballing beet pulp from railway wagons at Bathgate [ West Lothian Scotland ] for deliveries to local farms in central Scotland , worst of all was wet bags of carrots [ in the middle of winter ] from Leith near Edinburgh for again delivery to a wholesale vegetable merchant in central Scotland , the only up side to this is that you were kept fit !!! .
Well when I was a boy in the 40s, My late great uncle Tommy Boiston from Seaton Burn used to load coal out of railway trucks at Seaton Burn Pit it was called the Landsale in those old days, I used to goe there during the school holidays, It was all shovelled into bags or in bulk into 3 ton Bedford Tippers which was the delivered to the The Sylvan Jam Factory at Benton, Or to the Queen Elizebeth Hospital at Gateshead, Plus the Creamoner Toffee works at Chester-Le Street, Co Durham, Regards Larry.
Might have been seen before but, here is a short film about rail to lorry - hard graft, handball & good work mates
Correction, It was Creamoner Toffee at Benton, & Dainty Dinha at Chester Le Street, Bloody hell I must be getting old or just ■■■■■■■ Perhaps, Or both, Regards Larry.
ADR 1:
Might have been seen before but, here is a short film about rail to lorry - hard graft, handball & good work mates
if you look on youtube there is a set of 4 films of these brs drivers and that job, fredm
fredm:
if you look on youtube there is a set of 4 films of these brs drivers and that job, fredm
…Yeah, I should of linked them all - pt 1 not really relevant, but 2/3 & 4 are. 
In the late 1960’s we had a job where, every summer, two of us used to travel round station sidings all over Devon and Somerset shoveling (by hand!) road salt out of open trucks and taking it to council dumps all over the area. A couple of occasions, when it got VERY busy, they used to hire in a Poclain excavator with a clamshell bucket - pure luxury!!
Steve
kevmac47:
In the 70’s and 80’s I would often load at Hither Green with fresh produce for Gateshead market bloody hard graft then sheet and rope it . The not so good bit of the “good old days”.
I worked for J H Martin back in the early 70,s with a AEC 6 wheeler,I used to load fruit out of Hither green and nine elms,always" had it off" an came out of there with a binder on the top for myself!
You want hand balling? near enough but try this:- download/file.php?id=97910&t=1
A load of anthracite out of one of those rail wagons onto a 4 wheel Commer tipper…with just me and a big shovel 
It took me all day and even though I was only a young fella, it nearly killed me. A South Wales colliery, 1961, the loading grab had broken down. I earned my money that day.
Here is a picture of my dad loading brewers grains out of a railway truck with a fork at Trueman’s Burton on Trent into a Thames Trader, he would then have to unload them at a farm the same way, he would sometimes do 3 load a day like this, no wonder he looked so thin then. The picture was taken around 1967/8, he also did plenty of beet pulp from Hatton Station, first in hessian bags then came the 80lb paper ones, all these were rock hard and all shapes.
grumpy old man:
You want hand balling? near enough but try this:- download/file.php?id=97910&t=1
A load of anthracite out of one of those rail wagons onto a 4 wheel Commer tipper…with just me and a big shovel
Fair do,s mate that looked hard graft.
1970commer:
Here is a picture of my dad loading brewers grains out of a railway truck with a fork at Trueman’s Burton on Trent into a Thames Trader, he would then have to unload them at a farm the same way, he would sometimes do 3 load a day like this, no wonder he looked so thin then. The picture was taken around 1967/8, he also did plenty of beet pulp from Hatton Station, first in hessian bags then came the 80lb paper ones, all these were rock hard and all shapes.
Your dad’s name wasn’t Jim, by any chance?
Sorry, but the pic looks like a younger version of someone I knew.
Steve