THE cartoon, by Bud Neill, makes you smile.
It shows a tram driver - bristly of moustache, contemplative pipe in mouth – just about to set off from the terminus. Glancing at the conductress behind his right shoulder, he tells her: “9.55. Well, aff we go again, Nellie – hurtlin’ through the night wi’ wur precious cargo o’ human lives”.
Neill wrote more than a few cartoons about the ‘caurs’ in the pages of the Evening Times. Another has a conductress telling a would-be passenger, who has a small dog under his arm: “Can ye no’ unnerstaun’ English? There’s nae dugs gets on the caurs unless they’re no Alsatians, an’ there’s nane at a’ gets on if there’s wan up the sterr a’ready”.
The trams etched themselves into Glaswegians’ affections over many decades. When they disappeared for good in September 1962, people took the opportunity for one last journey. The Auchenshuggle-Dalmuir service was particularly popular.
Buses were to take over from the trams, but one tram conductress confided to the Glasgow Herald: “Ah’m dreadin’ thae buses. If something goes wrong wi’ a tram the conductor can aye stop it wi’ the brake at the back; but whit can ye dae wi’ a bus?”
“Nae jumpin’ off at the lights wi’ yon things”, said one woman as she prepared to get off as the tram neared some traffic signals. A man in a bowler hat said his wife used to window-shop from slow-moving trams, and jump out when she spotted something she wanted to buy.
A group of schoolboys from Leeds, armed with cine cameras, was recording the final hurl. One man said he would miss the pleasant sound of the trams late at night. One young woman, though, had no sentimental attachment. “It’s time”, she declared, “all thae old things wis aff the road ... Ye huv tae be modern nooadays”.
Read more: Herald Diary
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