Cumberland Comms Ltd have written to me with the most concise message yet received (that does not have swearing in it).

There wasn't a full stop at the end either. So maybe they intended to tell me much more about themselves and were cut short.  Perhaps by the telephone ringing with an order for a telegraph pole or maybe someone disturbed their train of thought with a mug of tea. Or could it be that they just don't see the point or significance of full-stops.

If the latter, then they need to consider the distress they put pedants like me through. For starters, I never paused for breath until I got to the end of their email, including all the footers and everything.  And then I had to go on and on to my poor wife about the standards of punctuation and what do they teach them in schools these days.

Anyway, upon research, it transpires that Cumberland Comms Ltd do indeed put poles in the ground. And they'll do so for you too - at the right price of course - just like they have been doing since they started in 2001.

With the word "Cumberland" in their name though, I expect they prefer to erect them up there - in a county which hasn't existed as an administrative entity since 1974.  Ooh, it's a complicated world!

 

What's not to love about eBay and the things people flog on there?  This item I discovered during a covert surfing session whilst I was supposed to be working.  I'm still supposed to be at it and if anybody comes I may have to flick back to a spreadsheet or something official looking.  Please bear with me here dear reader...

As listed by ladymuck1(18)

This Item is the TOP 3 metres of an original old telegraph pole which I rescued from a Lincolnshire farmers field a few years back. The field is now part of his farm, but it used to be a local railway siding that served the community, and the nearby bomber air field in the 2nd world war.
The exact age of the item is unknown to me as I am not an expert in such things, but I am sure you all are , so please e-mail me with your questions about all the various markings including where and what to look for,
I have mounted the pole inside a steel tube, welded to a car wheel (see listing) and due to it's current size ( the bottom part of the pole was rotten) it can be displayed inside or outside.

Being the important person that I am (in the world of telegraph poles), I occasionally get visits from passing royalty. Such was the case last Tuesday when the contractors (and their lorry) from Carillion dropped in for a cup of finest Welsh tea and a slice of my wife's exquisite coffee and walnut cake.  Agent X* and Agent Y* were on a skiving mission before meandering their way back to their depot somewhere over the border in the badlands of England.  

Anyway, as well as the scrumptious bag of ceramic booty (see right) that they handed over as payment for said tea and cake, they also told me of the fabled lost pole of Bala Leisure Centre.  A pole so laden with cross-spars and so bristling with an enormous double-sided bounty of ceramic insulators it must surely rank as the Jason's Golden Fleece of the telegraph pole enthusiasts world.

It is said that those (enthusiasts) who gaze upon its glory are smitten for all time and spend the remainder of their days wearing fur-edged outdoor coats whilst wandering the lanes trying to re-capture the moment of that first glance. I pressed my telegraphic friends for more information but they were more insterested in Everton football club and an ashtray for their fags. These men had seen this pole and yet were somehow emotionally unperturbed.

As soon as I had waved them off and watched their telegraph pole truck disappear over the horizon I dashed into the house for my ordnance survey map of Bala and also for my trusted copy of the Gazetteers field guide to the telegraph poles of Great Britain and Ireland. Oh where is Anneka Rice when you need her? Watch this space....

*Not their real names

Martin Tapsell sent us this photograph of a favoured telephone pole in a quiet corner of Water Street in Deal, Kent.  Whilst not bristling with ceramics, like many favourite poles, these Maypole-esque highly strung affairs are always a handsome find in suburbia.  And they are usually popular among the dove and pigeon fraternity too (for some reason).

Deal, of course, is famous for its Timeball tower and is hence synonymous with telegraph poles and the transmission of the Greenwich Time Signal - mostly to passing ships (and Radio 4).  The naval yard at Deal was once at the end of a long chain of telegraph stations stretching all the way from the Admiralty in London.  To celebrate this history, Deal has a street called Telegraph Road.  Perhaps we should think about moving there.