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Leighton Buzzard in mourning for Brian

With a couple of colleagues, Brian took part in the legendary meeting in 1967 with the management of Joseph Arnold & Sons Ltd, a local sand quarry company which by that time was the sole owner of the Leighton Buzzard Light Railway.

They had come to discuss the possible purchase of track for a new narrow-gauge line that was planned in the Watford area. Instead, over the next few months they negotiated the deal which allowed the operation of a passenger service at weekends, when the sand trains were not running. Brian was a driving force in founding the fore-runner of the current Society, and in getting regular passenger services started in 1968.

He ran a design and print company in Watford, and for many years supplied posters and other publicity materials to the Railway.

More recently, he designed and produced the Greensand Railway Museum Trust appeal leaflet, which led to the restoration of Baldwin 4-6-0T No 778 (BLW 44656/1917). He was still doing Santa turns until the last couple of years.

There was a strong LBNGRS presence at his funeral in Hemel Hempstead, and plans are already being made, with his family, for a permanent memorial at Page’s Park station.