Bygone tram memories

FAMILIAR STREETS: these postcards, lent by collector Peter Veness, show, left tram lines being laid in Mount Pleasant Road, and, right, in Queens Road, in the early 1900s

OUR recent articles about trams have triggered more reminiscences about this long-lost form of transport in Hastings.
Some of those who contacted us had relations who used to work on the tramways.
Janet Weston, who was sent a copy of the Observer by her cousin, was delighted to read about the trams because her father William Campbell spent more than four decades years working on them.
She said: “My father, who was known as Bill, worked for Hastings Tramways Company and later Maidstone and District when it took over, for 44 years.
“He joined in 1923 and retired in 1967. He started on a tram and then went to trolley buses and then, of course, finishing on the Atlanteans.
“He had the privilege of driving the last trolley bus in Hastings and on that day he drove Happy Harold which, as you know, was originally a tram then converted to a trolley bus and then to a diesel.”
Another reader whose relative was a former tram worker is Ken Sandell. His wife’s grand uncle worked on the tramways up until 1928.
He was born in the 1890s and died in the Swan public on May 23, 1943.
When the Observer asked readers whether or not Hastings Borough Council should reintroduce trams or trolley buses to the town, the public response was a resounding yes.
Ken Betts, of West St Leonards, emailed us to reminisce about his childhood when he would travel to and from school on a trolley bus.
He said: “I travelled daily by trolley bus and have often wondered why they were discontinued here.
“They are a quiet (less noise pollution), electric (less CO2 pollution), and manoeuvrable (as against the track based tram) means of carrying many people.
“I realise the bus companies like Stagecoach want to have easily re-routable vehicles and they have their place in a reliable and effective local public transport system but that re-routability is, in my opinion, the failure of the current system which is totally unreliable.
“The investment involved in setting up a system of trams is vast and causes massive inconvenience to other traffic in narrow roads as we have in this town.
“However, the costs in setting up a trolley bus network is much less and there is minimal disturbance to other traffic. It is also more easily extendable than a tram system.
“I travel in Europe frequently and in almost every town and city one finds a good public transport system. Many places have a co-ordinated system of trams, trolley buses and buses all having their special facilities meeting the conditions of the routes they travel.”
Ron Cubison was also fully behind the re-introduction of trams to Hastings.
He wrote: “It would be a great attraction for visitors and create virtually no pollution.
“The new Croydon tram has proved a tremendous success. We have many of our old tram lines still in our roads just under the Tarmac surfacing.
“Once the Station Plaza is in operation the trams will be vital as in no way can the present rail and very limited bus services cover the passenger requirements for all the education blocks let alone the business and residential units.
“Just look at the planned number of car visits and the limited number of car park spaces that will be available.”
Email richard.morris@trbeckett.co.uk.

HISTORIC DAY: it seems hard to imagine to us today, but postcards were made and sent to record the opening of the first tram service in Hastings in 1906 - in an age long before every family had a camera and people owned mobiles with cameras

OLD FRIEND: Happy Harold, photographed above in 1953 outside the fishmarket and resplendently decked in lights. Right, a more recent photo of Happy Harold, now no longer a trolleybus but a diesel powered bus much loved by many people in Hastings