As a boy in the 1950s, David Buck liked nothing more than being taken to work by his father and being allowed to visit Ipswich station – opposite his father’s office.
From there he could indulge in a bit of trainspotting and watch the steam trains coming and going.
It sparked a lifelong interest – and now he’s preparing for another steam train to pull into the station. This time he hopes to be on the footplate of his own huge locomotive!
Mr Buck was brought up in Henley Road in Ipswich and was one of a number of young trainspotters who were fascinated by the happenings at the station.
After leaving school he became a highly successful businessman, and made his money in film production – but his love of steam trains never left him.
He has built his own line in the garden of his home near Windsor in Berkshire, and for a long time had an ambition to buy his own steam locomotive.
That opportunity came in the middle of last year when “Mayflower”, an LNER-designed B1 locomotive came on the market.
Mr Buck bought it and moved it to its new home on the North Norfolk Railway.
But the five-mile track along the Norfolk coast was never the summit of his ambitions for the locomotive, and now it is being prepared for its first trip on the main line for almost 40 years.
It is due to pull a steam special from Norwich to Windsor, through Ipswich, and pull the train back to London from where it will move to a new base for the next few months. The train will return to the region behind a diesel locomotive.
Over the following few weeks Mayflower is due to pull a number of excursions from London before returning to the North Norfolk Railway for the summer season.
But steam got into Mr Buck’s veins at a young age: “I loved going along to the station and watching the trains. In those days the Britannias were just coming in – but there were still a lot of B1s like Mayflower on the express trains from London to East Anglia.
“I am really looking forward to bringing it back to this line – it will be the first time an engine like this has been on the line for many decades.”
Mayflower is unusual in that it was bought directly from British Railways in the 1960s. It was never left to languish in a scrapyard before being rescued for preservation.
The B1s were one of the largest classes of LNER locomotives, used on everything from express passenger trains to heavy goods services.
However, only two survived in preservation. Mayflower itself was only named after being sold by BR, although the name was carried by an earlier member of its class.
It has seen action on many preserved railways, including the North Norfolk, the Mid Norfolk and Nene Valley lines – but it’s been a long-cherished dream to get it back on the main line.
Mr Buck said: “The last time it ran on the main line was to the Stockton to Darlington cavalcade in 1975 so we’re really excited about this trip.”
Mayflower arrived at the North Norfolk Railway in August and was a star performer during the autumn season – but has been in the shed at Weybourne for a few weeks being prepared for its main line trips.
“It will be away from home for a few months so we wanted to make sure everything was in first class condition before it goes away.”
And he is looking forward to being on the footplate for at least part of the journey. “We have to keep up with the normal timetable between Norwich and Ipswich so that should be a very fast run. I am really looking forward to that,” he said.
Mayflower is not Mr Buck’s only locomotive – but it is certainly his largest British engine!
He also owns industrial steam locomotive Hornpipe that paid a nostalgic visit to Ipswich docks en route to a steam gala at the Mid Suffolk Light Railway at Wetheringsett three years ago.
Mr Buck said: “I remembered the steam shunting engines at the dock during my childhood and I wanted to take one back there for one last time, even though it wasn’t able to run anywhere!”
One of David Buck’s favourite photographs is of him in 1953 on the footplate of “Britannia” class pacific locomotive Rudyard Kipling at Ipswich station.
The locomotive was one of a fleet that revolutionised express services from Liverpool Street to East Anglia in the early 1950s – but unlike its sister-engine Oliver Cromwell didn’t make it into preservation.
However Mr Buck was able to buy one of Rudyard Kipling’s name plates when it came up for auction several years after the locomotive itself met its end in a scrapyard.
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