excursion

Hi, I'm an admin for a group called Pith Helmets, and we'd love to have this added to the group!

Mme Crouzat is here too:

i love this photo.( My favourite character is the lady on our far right)

They had cars like that in 1885?!

I did notice that car as well. Perhaps around 1903 to 1915? There seems to be some electrical wires and street lights hanging too which might have started as far back as 1895. I find this picture fascinating because if you look at it closely you'll see all the people in it staring at what was probably the latest photographic technology. And much to their knowledge of you or me at the time, that technology had forever captured them looking back at us from a very different point in history. Almost as if all of us were being allowed only a glimpse into the future as well as the past through some sort of strange time machine.

The Motor Car Act 1903, which came into force on 1 January 1904, required all motor vehicles to be entered on an official vehicle register, and to carry alphanumeric plates. Photo Post Jan 1904. BJ is an Ipswich plate.

Thanks O Mac. Based on input from yourself (and [https://www.flickr.com/photos/118169193@N05] and locustangerine above) I've updated the range to c.1900+. What do you think about location? Based on this similar image, I recon we're around here....

National Library of Ireland on The Commons That postcard was helpful in finding exact location. The art deco bank building is still there so the hotel was exactly where Dunnes Stores is now. www.google.ie/maps/@54.8515083,-5.8183155,3a,75y,241.01h,... That Dunnes building is a awful looking building....along with too many others.

I think the photographer is on the footbridge shown on the OS 25" map here. If you flip to the modern streetmap, there is no sign of the railway now. Google map location: at this green arrow.

The loco in the shot appears to be 171 (Slieve Gullion), which is currently stored by the RPSI at Whitehead awaiting overhaul. www.steamtrainsireland.com/171/

The station would close 6 days later on 21st March 1959 - you can see more about it here www.flickr.com/photos/2cme/5416013948/ as well as a contemporary view of the remaining buildings. The Irish Railway Records Society had a much more cosmopolitan following and was not tarnished (in those days anyway) with the current perception of "train spotters" and I would suggest the ladies were part of the IRRS group (or partners/relatives of those there)

Now that is an interesting shot, there are just the two passenger cars and the remainder of the train is made up of goods wagons, that must be unusual for an outing. I was going on the dart to Lansdown Road a couple of weeks ago and as I was passing through Pearse Station there were larger crowds than usual. Further down the line a steam engine with carriages was getting ready for the IRRS group to go on an outing but as it was between stations I did not manage to see it in time to get any shots.

Are you sure the location isn't Buggleskelly?