I've just completed another, fairly substantial, update to my MODEL LIFE project.

One of my former delivery-driver colleagues, whilst clearing out the home of a deceased relative, came across a display cabinet which he thought might be useful for my collection. The main cabinet is now less congested than it used to be as I've been able to re-locate quite a few of the more 'special' models - the military ones, for example, on the top shelf.

The cottage in north Wales into which my mother and I moved from Liverpool was part of an estate administered by my godfather - who was the youngest brother of the man who owned the company for whom he and my father worked.

He (my godfather) had two cars. One was the MG my father used to get to and from Liverpool and the other was a huge American coupe which (if the truth was told) was entirely unsuitable for the narrow lanes in and around where we lived.

Bearing in mind I was only three at the time, it might seem rather fanciful to claim that the MG was the very first vehicle I ever drove. Apparently, however, I climbed into it one day and managed to release the handbrake - causing it to roll forward for several yards before it's momentum was, fortunately, arrested by a stone wall which prevented it from hurtling down a very steep drop.

I was born in Liverpool about a year before the start of WW2.

Started in 1865, the city's tramway system was an extremely efficient means of public transport and, during the war, a significant number of trams were painted in a military colours.......

When the war broke out, the company  my father worked for was requisitioned by the War Department and, for a year or so, he was  exempted from military service. During that time, the area where we lived was subjected to frequent and quite irritating air-raids courtesy of Herr Goering's somewhat destructive airline; so, my mother and I evacuated to north Wales (the place of her birth). My father visited us at weekends in an MG sports car which belonged to my godfather.

One of the earliest vehicles in the collection is a London Transport trolley-bus. For those unfamiliar with the concept, these vehicles (like tram cars) are powered by electricity derived from overhead cables  (see video). However, instead of having iron wheels running on iron tracks, trolley-bues have pneumatic tyres and - so long as contact is maintained with the overhead cable - they can weave in and out of traffic in much the same way as conventional vehicles.

Although I can recall riding in them whilst visiting London as a child, I never actually drove one because they were being withdrawn from service at around the time I passed my PSV test in 1961.

"Why have one in the collection, then?" one might ask.

Well, apart from when he re-enlisted in The Royal Navy during WW1, my paternal grandfather, was an electrician with London Transport for the best part of forty years. One of my most treasured possessions is a certificate which was presented to my grandmother after his passing.

Here is the certificate and the model.........

Almost as interesting as the certificate, is the letter which accompanied it - which read.....

Dear Madam,


           It is my pleasant duty to enclose herewith an illuminated testimonial, as a token of the Board's appreciation of the many years' service rendered by your late husband.


            The Board regret that owing to war conditions it is not now possible to frame the certificate, but after cessation of hostilities, it may be returned for this purpose.

                                       Yours faithfully,

                                                T. Cook.

                      A/CHIEF ENGINEER(TRAMS & TROLLEYBISES)

Interestingly, I delivered a new bus to the same depot, recently, and I presented the letter and certificate to the current Chief Engineer. Sadly, notwithstanding the fact that I was only a little more than sixty years late, he seemed unwilling to enter into the spirit of the occasion and suggested I take them to The London Transport Museum in Covent Garden. Regular readers may not be surprised to know that I intend to do just that!

It was probably sometime in the eighties that my wife bought a model bus (see below) for me. She had noticed it in a jumble sale and suspected that it was in the livery of the company with whom I had taken my PSV driving test in 1961.

As it happened, not only was she right - but, the registration plate revealed that I had actually driven that very bus. Furthermore, it was completely identical to - and within four numbers of the one in which I passed the aforementioned test.

Subsequently, over the next fiteen years, or so, if I saw a model of a vehicle which I had either owned, driven, or with which I had some sort of connection, I would buy it and, by the time I retired, I had collected a couple of dozen or so.

Not long after I started the part-time bus and coach delivery job, a chap who had visted our house to do some plumbing noticed the collection and mentioned to my wife that he collected models too - and, if I were to be interested, he would take me to a 'Collector's Fair' where there would be thousands of models on sale.

And so began a sequence of events which - influenced to a large extent by the fact that my new job involved collecting and delivering dozens of different types of  buses and coaches (along with being introduced to eBay)- by the time I finally packed-up my job, my collection had risen to something in the region of 150 models; all of which, I repeat, have a definite connection with myself - ranging from the first car my father owned right through to the last coach I delivered.

One of the projects I had put aside to give me something to do in retirement was to catalogue the collection and it was pointed out to me that - in many ways - the collection serves as a record of my life and, bearing that in mind, I thought it may be interesting to create the catalogue in the form of the journals I've produced in the past.

So, I'm going to try to kill two birds with one stone by using this blog as a 'rough copy' of the proposed journal and, to that end, this first effort might act as a blueprint for The Preface at a later date.