Simon Rushton is a pole aficionado after my own heart. He clearly gets the poetry of their silent sentinel lives watching over us as we scud about our business beneath. Here are a selection of Simon’s photos from overlooked poles in Northumberland. Simon’s own beautiful words are best to describe them:
“Ancient beauty shivering on the edge of woodland in the winter snow at Howick, Northumberland. She’s a toothless wonder, poor thing, with just a couple of insulators left in place, but no doubt amazed to have a new lease of life carrying fibre. There she stands, blinking in the fading light, relieved not to be recycled as gate posts in the local fields quite yet.”
And there’s more: “Mystery survivors on the road from Hexham to Alston, Northumberland. The wires are ominously down in places but the remainder are soldiering on regardless. Here and there are fresh faces, newly creosoted – the matchstick brigade, lacking those gorgeous double and triple cross-members with insulators…”
It’s been quite a while since we last heard from Lord of the Northern Poles, aka Kev Currie (#0530). Turns out he’s been busy misanthroping in Ardnamurchan – 50 square miles of remote and empty (of humans) peninsula in the western Highlands of Scotland. It’s a grand place for it, for sure, but we’ve missed Kev’s excellent and bewitching pole photos. Amends have been made with these two however. Kev says that his passion for poles has not waned and if anything has deepened as his wife (Lady of the Northern Poles) has been trying, unsuccessfully, to get him to counselling. Don’t bother Lady OTNP.
“The Ardnamurchen peninsula was absolutely amazing” Kev said “not just for the abundance of old telegraph poles but the amount of otters eagles and seals we saw and for being almost devoid of other humans.” It’s long been on my must-visit list and I have sailed past it on the ferry to Tiree and Barra.
Pic #1 is of some fine reindeer food on an unmarked pole. Shows how clean the air is up there, that it’s growing on a creosoted pole notwithstanding. And the second pic is a 2½ armed pole also with no date.
It’s remiss of me, I know. It’s nearly July already and this is my first post in ages. As I am free between the hours of 2am and 5am each day, my wife thought I ought to take on some more part-time work to make ends meet (they don’t still). I resort now to sleeping on the job during lengthy toilet breaks. An “Out of Order” sign on the door helps here, I find. Consequently, things have slipped a little on this particular desk.
Anyway, I was going to do a Pole of the Month post but I’ve not seen any white smoke arising from the POTM selection college’s chimney so assume the committee have yet to come to a decision. So, in the interests of meanwhiledom, herewith a selection of recent photos, some contenders and some not.
First off, there’s these from Ian Stokes (#1134) who tells us that he can’t help feeling there’s no place for AI in Wales (see previous post) but there is one for AA and it’s on the A40 just west of Crug Hywel (Crickhowell). “A beautiful vision of two old friends”, he says, “untroubled by the passage of time and touchingly colour co-ordinated”. Ian used the salution “Hello Butty” in his covering letter. A quaintly south Wales term for friend or pal. Being a “gog” though, (a north Walian), I know Butty better as being a soggy sandwich, likely with shrimp paste, otherwise a pint of “Butty Bach” a fine ale from over the border into Hereford. But enough of that.
Next in my deep in-tray was this lovely specimen from the Isle of Mull taken by Roger Boulton. Roger was unaware of TPAS until today (a week or two ago). He took these whilst on holiday and said it was the combination of pole and scenery that made him stop. We’re glad you did Roger. The skidmarks are still there by the way.
This next pole is a contender for Pole of the Month (Whenever we get around to doing that again). Not because of any particularly fine aesthetics but mainly because the sender, Trebor Snobbig, asked us so nicely. This pole, is situated close to a not so tall sticky-up Trig Pillar (Grid Reference SJ4859 9086) in Rainhill, Merseyside. Trebor, whose name is probably an anagram, says he consulted all his friends about this pole’s selectability, but he has no friends so sent it anyway. Good luck Mr Snobbig, let’s see what the white smoke bringeth.
Well that’s all for now folks. But rest assured, I’m going to start smoking soon so that I can take some cigarette breaks and use them to come and post some more photos.
I’ve been playing with ChatGPT lately – the world-changing artificial intelligence that we, as a society, haven’t fully worked out what to do with yet. I won’t tell you how, but it is a real boon in one of my day jobs. I won’t be telling the people I work for either. Anyway, very recently, I was introduced to ChatGPT’s elder, more artistic sister. Her name is DALL-E. We’ve become very close. Close enough that Mrs TPAS is asking me what’s going on. I think up something and DALL-E draws it for me. Just like that. Here’s a couple of pictures she did for me of Godzilla in a wedding gown (Bridezilla). Mrs TPAS already knows about this side of me by the way.
So, obviously, being the supreme commander of The Telegraph Pole Appreciation Society I wanted to know how DALL-E might draw a telegraph pole. So I asked her for “a photo realistic telegraph pole with 6 arms on a lonely road in Wales”. Below is what she came up with. It really flips my mind. I can almost feel the fuggy intelligence behind it all trying to please me. The landscapes and the poles are real enough, yet completely alien at the same time. Eerie even. I love them. What’s also clear is that DALL-E, like most people, doesn’t discern between a telephone pole and a power pole. Mwynhewch! as we say on lonely roads in Wales. (click an image to enlarge)
Not having advertised our trimestral trip to the land of Emeralds (and Six Nations grand slammers) meant that we returned home to an unburgled house this week. Which was nice. The key was under the mat where we left it and granny was still in her annex watching re-runs of The Exorcist and chewing upon the remains of the toffees we left for her in the automatic cat feeder; timed to release two Werthers Originals per hour. Lovely. Now to wade our way through the pile of TV licence reminders received in our absence.
Our homeward journey started in the top left hand corner, specifically, Inishowen, Co. Donegal and we travelled almost exclusively by ‘B’ roads*1 all the way to the bottom right hand corner and our rendezvous with the good ship Stena Europe at Rosslare. That ageing tub couldn’t handle the swell and high winds in the Irish sea on the Monday, so we had an extra day to meander even more. Our route took us down the west coast past Sligeach, almost to Galway then meandered hither and thither seeking out interesting potholes and pubs with the most sidelines*2.
“Get to the telegraph poles man!”
Day #2 found us, in the drizzle still, on the R680 between Clonmel and the rather Frenchie sounding Carrick on Suir. This is the mother of all “B” roads. Potholes aplenty, and then these half-armed beauties hidden among the roadside foliage. The first one was the best, but I couldn’t stop as it was a narrow road and I had a car up my arse*3. These are genuine half-arms, not rotted off or stolen, the real thing. Rather than sort through them*4, here, enjoy the lot.
*1 They’re called “R” roads over there. *2 Saw one premises that advertised: Pub (naturally), Petrol, Coal, Newspapers, hairdresser, hardware) *3 Can I say this on this website? Turns out I can. (arse /ɑːs/ noun: (i) buttocks (ii) stupid person (iii) verb, tailgating, driving too close behind, being an /ɑːs/) *4 It’s late, Match of the Day will be on the telly in a minute.
I was getting worried. It’s been so long since I posted on here that I wondered if something might have happened; maybe I’d “moved upstairs” or something. But given the lack of sympathy cards on our mantlepiece and that Mrs. TPAS seems to be cheerfully going about her business I’m probably not meeting my maker and so nothing for it but to get on here and catch up with some emailic inboxing.
Regular visitors to these sage pages will know that we are frequent visitors to the far north (and west). You only have to look at our outstanding 2023 calendar to know that (a handful left for £9.99). Now, I’ve been past it on my way to Orkney several times, but never quite got around to visiting Dunnet Head in Caithness. Turns out I didn’t need to as Jim Irving, who, I think, might be from Glasgow, has been there for us. His penchant, however, is for lighthouses – which whilst being tall and sticky-uppy are only 50% of the way to being tall, wooden, sticky-uppy with wires coming out the top. Anyway Jim got to service both fetishes*1 with this visit.
He travelled north with his colleague and current wife who pretended to be asleep the whole journey to avoid the nerdic conversation emanating from the vehicle’s male occupants. Apparently, their excessive enthusiasm for the poles began to scare all concerned by the time they had finished taking the photos you see below.
Anyway, for clarity’s sake, the pole with “yours truly”*2 in it and with the lighthouse and buildings directly behind is THE most northerly pole.
For more clarity, yes, we know these are power distribution poles rather than telegraph poles per se and we refer to paragraph #2 above which contains a mashed-up version of our society mantra.
Jim says he might be back for a TPAS Mug for his mate at some point. Well if even further clarity is required, he hasn’t yet done so – our order clerks are on standby. And we have a few calendars left too. Have I said that already?
*1 Need to find a better word than this *2 I always thought “yours truly” was me. Turns out it’s Jim Irving.
An idiom if ever there was. This complex beauty is anything but common. Garden it is though. That of Jon McCollum in Nottinghamshire, actually. Jon had a hunch we’d appreciate this weathered old thing but I don’t think he knew quite how much. No engraving with a date he says, but reckons it was probably erected around 1896. This, to pole watchers, is perhaps what an Iberian Chiff Chaff might be to birders (A venn diagram I also find myself within). I can only wonder at how much a pole like this must add to the value of your home. I’d move to a house with this in the garden. Never mind where it was or how many sheds it had.
Karen Hughes, member #1107, sent us these pics to share with our fellow appreciators of all things tall, wooden, sticky-uppy and with wires coming out of the top. These are from where Karen lives in the Forest of Dean in Gloucestershire. They are indeed very appreciable.
There’s clearly a bit of everything going on with these poles: leccy, phone and street lamps. No missing cat posters though. That is the only thing that could top it. Lovely rural lane that just invites perambulation. The name Forest of Dean, though… is that possessive? As in Dean’s Forest, the Pullover of Martin kind of thing? We should be told, made to do some research. Or something.
I have a lifelong fascination with radio. You know: vintage stuff, crystal sets, valves, aerials strung like washing lines and all that. And romantic sounding radio stations. Earlier this month Mrs TPAS and I took a different route home from visiting dislocated family in the top left hand corner of Ireland and drove all the way down the west coast, cutting across the middle to catch our ferry from Rosslare back to Fishguard. I ensured that our journey took in the town of Athlone smack bang in the middle of Ireland and at the extreme right hand edge of the MW dial on my old Roberts R500. Athlone the town has much going for it but alas Athlone 612Khz no longer transmits. Those of a nerdic disposition may like to check out the Radio Telefis Eireann 100kw broadcasting equipment page I found in the silt at the bottom of the internet.
Meanwhile sit back and enjoy the rest of our telegraphic journey south and eastwards, Rosslare bound.
Next year we plan to visit Hilversum I and also try to take in Hilversum II (which must surely be nearby).
Newport is in Wales. Just. It’s in Wales about as much as Berwick upon Tweed is in England. So close to “them” that “they” may as well have it. I am of the previously unshared opinion that the rest of wales is quietly ambivalent about ownership of this particular corner.
What do I know about Newport?
Well, I became intimate with the roundabout beneath junction 24 of the M4 during a stalled hitch-hike home back in my army days – specifically where the A449 branches north; the fans of Newport County football club could be friendlier (one savage purple-jumper wearing Newport fan has stayed long in the memory of my home town’s fans); AND nobody ever chose Newport as a holiday destination – except when confusing it with Newport, Pembs.
So, given the feeling in the rest of Cymru it was with some trepidation that long-term correspondent to these pages MartYn Fielder (a son of Abergavenny) had to visit the town with his mother for a medical appointment. He need not have worried. It was while waiting for the NHS to do its thing that MartYn followed his Indiana Jones urges and explored an old railway track bed in Malpas just to the north of the town. I’ll let his words describe his adventure:
“I came across the noble form of an old pole, forlorn in the splendour of its decaying grandeur. The pole is incredibly pock-marked, as though it’s been attacked by giant woodworm, and there are no identifying markers. It is also entirely alone – having walked all the way to the point where the old railway has been obliterated by the link road between the A4042 and the A4051 in one direction, and then followed it in the other direction where it has been transformed into a tarmac footpath wending its way through endless housing estates, I can confidently state that this is the only remaining telegraph pole on this stretch of the old Eastern Valley Line of the Monmouthshire Rail and Canal Company (1852) which closed in 1963. This splendid solitary specimen stands as a witness to a century of spectacular growth and slow decline in the industrial heartland of South Wales. A humbling thought.”
So there we have it. Newport, Gwent, still in Wales, has Big Mac’s Wholly Soul Band and a single old and isolated, redundant and woodpeckered multi-arm telegraph pole. The word “Yay!” comes to mind. Put Newport on my holiday list. Summer 2074 should do it.
Anyway, I looked it up recently, MartYn and I have been exchanging telegraph pole related missives for more than ten years now. He is this close ” to getting on my Christmas card list.
