TALES TOLD BY TICKETS

Dominion, Volume 27, Issue 297, 12 September 1934, Page 2

TALES TOLD BY TICKETS

.. In the Great Western Railway Museum at Paddington, London, is a collection of hundreds of railway tickets, many of which recall historic happenings or events of unusual interest in the past 100 years of railways. A handsome Oxford blue ticket, the colour chosen for second-class travel, recalls the abolition of second-class tickets, first from the Cornish Riviera Express, on July 1, 1905, and later on October 10, 1910. from all the company’s trains. Another ticket reminds one that prior to 1891 fares were not shown on tickets, after which date an Act of Parliament made it compulsory for fares to be shown except on tickets issued at a reduced rate. Ticket No. 8799, from Marazion Io Penzance, dated May 20, 1892, was the last to bo issued for a broad-gauge train. There are rail-cuni-fercy tickets, issued prior to the opening of the Severn Tunnel in 1556, for passengers who wished to avoid the long rail detour via Gloucester, and an unusual rail-cuni-tea ticket issued for a Sunday school outing to Looe. The most extraordinary ticket is that issued bv the Caradon Railway, which, unauthorised to carry passengers, overcrime .flic difficulty by issuing to nil and sundry a free pass—-but made a charge of 2<l. or 3d. for the privilege of carrying each eoaf. hat, umbrella, or other article ot luggage.