Since we’re on about old poles, John Paine (#0512) has just returned from holiday in northern Cyprus. Therein he was amazed to find an abundance of very old ones – left overs from colonial days, he reckons. Anyway, herewith a delightful specimen he sent us with almost full complement of insulators. And they even appear to be tied off properly, though the wires do appear to just hang looose. Anyway, John also managed to bring back an insulator – pictured next to smaller GPO type. It carries the marking L62L if that means anything to anybody. Anyway, I’m sure there’s a law against this sort of thing. I think it’s called smuggling.
A marvellous time was had by all in the Mediterranean sun, but all of his telegraph pole hunting whilst he should have been on the beach or in a taverna has managed to convince John’s wife of his madness. But we don’t let that sort of thing worry us.
I refer you now to my previous post on old poles – you see, I to forgot include Disco Dave’s 1937 pole in its full glory and within its insalubrious surroundings.
Penultimately, I am in receipt of a clarification letter from Lord of the Northern Poles, Kev Currie (#0530). He insists that none of his photos were taking in the North Sea. In fact, his Northern Lordship’s domain is a dog-walking range 10 mile radius of Denholm in the Scottish borders – nowhere in Scotland could be further from the sea. The reason the pictures showed up on Flickr as being of oceanic origin is something to do with a missing GPS tag on his phone. So there you have it.
Absolutely finally, I just remembered an email I received quite some time ago from a chap called Paul Weliketomoveit. Paul was busy harrassing a BT engineer up a pole outside his house, as you do – and said engineer told him of a pole just off the A55 near St. Asaph which is stamped 1908 and is still good to take a ladder. Alas no photographic evidence so far. Paul said the engineer also showed him the new-fangled way they test telegraph poles. What’s wrong with a good old-fashioned hammer I ask? Anyway, Paul’s own pole, which carries his oft-disconnected broadband, has a 1941 stamp.