This year’s Christmas Quiz was held earlier than usual due to our decision to forsake the Red Lion for our Christmas meal in the hope of obtaining better fare elsewhere thus making it impractical to hold both the quiz and the meal on the same day. Having unfortunately failed to avoid finishing on the winning side last year David L and Bill were awarded the dubious honour of being quizmasters for this year. After teas and coffees had been served (so necessary for the application of brain power) and everybody chased out of the kitchen and other hidey holes we divided into four teams and settled down for the quiz. David explained that he and Bill had divided the questions into categories and that the usual rules applied in that the Quizmaster’s decision on the validity of answers would be final. That is to say that when the Quizmaster is wrong, he is of course right and that therefore there can be no arguments.
David then read out the questions for the first category which featured pre-grouping railways. At this point several people were surprised to find that railways had existed before British Railways, but we pressed on anyway. Further categories were then presented in turn by David and Bill and included post-grouping, signalling, infrastructure, general ignorance and the last category; first, last, fastest and slowest. As the answers were read out at the end of the quiz and the scores added up it became apparent that two teams had done rather well and that two hadn’t. Ross’ team had played a blinder and in a finely judged performance had managed to avoid winning by one point. The unfortunate winners were Geoff’s team of Dave B, Roger and Barry who will now go on to provide next year’s quiz so I’m guessing that we should all swot up now on industrial locos and diesels. After the quiz Rob referred back to his talk earlier in the year on “Railways in Folkestone” and the fatal accident of a labourer walking through the tunnel at the Warren. Rob had recently been informed that walking through the tunnel was quite common and that school children used to do it on their way to school and were advised that if a train came along to lie down between the tracks as flat as possible but with your head towards the oncoming train. This way apparently there was less chance of anything catching in your clothes and dragging you along to nasty end and surely a useful piece of advice for us all. On a brighter note, we also had a Bring and Buy which as usual did brisk business and after a final cup of tea or coffee, courtesy as always of David Ho, we cleared everything away and headed for home. Chris
