Last train marked end of an era
Just under 50 years ago, and without fanfare, a chapter in Newport's history closed.
By the time the last train left the town, there was no longer a railway station in Newport - it had been demolished a few months earlier, and grass was already growing out between the once-busy tracks.
There were just two British Rail employees and a small boy to wave it goodbye. That last train was a British Rail diesel engine, number D1841, which left Newport station's goods yard with its 15 loaded wagons on Monday, September 23, 1968 - meaning some accounts on the internet which give an earlier date for the final closure are wrong.
And we know it was shut then because the occasion was covered in the local press. Alas, our journalist colleagues of that time did not mention where that last train was bound for, nor what the load was, let alone the name of the driver.
The writing had been on the wall since 1963 when British Rail announced its plans to withdraw passenger services on the Stafford to Shrewsbury line, resulting in the closure for passenger facilities of eight intermediate stations, including Newport. Despite a local campaign, the last passenger train left the station in 1964.
But still the campaigners did not give up hope. Over the next four years there were many efforts to reopen the line to Stafford, with petitions being signed and public meetings held. It was all to no avail, for the railway tracks between Stafford and Newport were taken up, and the stations in between were closed.
Things got yet more serious for Newport when a demolition crew moved in and began to pull down the station buildings in the first part of 1968.
Over the years, several royals had used Newport station. In 1907, King Edward VII entrained there, and King George VI, as Duke of York, had alighted there before motoring through the town on his way to formally open the National Institute of Poultry Husbandry at Harper Adams Agricultural College, Edgmond.
The last member of the royal family to detrain at Newport was the Queen Mother, on May 1, 1963, before she opened new buildings at Harper Adams.
But could Newport see trains again in future? A petition was launched earlier this year calling for a reopening of the line linking Shrewsbury to Stafford. It would reinstate a line through Newport, although building which has taken place since the line closed all those years ago presents formidable difficulties.
