profile - dennis benson
My first memory of my interest in locomotives is when I was 3 years old. My Gran lived by the railway line at Bordesley Junction. I looked forward to crossing the bridge over the line - I always waited on the bridge for a steam engine to pass beneath, bellowing smoke up the sides of the bridge.
When I was about 5 years old, my Dad used to take me to Snow Hill and New Street and thats when I became a train spotter!
My family lived in Small Heath, very close to Tyseley Locomotive Depot and so I was lucky enough to be able to walk there. By 1969, the age of steam was over. I was 11 and had just got my first camera, a Kodak Instamatic 133X given to me by my parents for passing my 11 Plus. I spent a lot of my time photographing locomotives using slide film.
Open Days were being held at Tyseley and there were examples of the various types of locomotive. This was the first time I ever saw a Western; it was D1020 Western Hero and it looked and sounded so different. I wanted to see more and so I started to travel behind Westerns at every opportunity - not going to any set destination, just going wherever I could get behind another Western.
By now I was able to buy a better camera and I got a cheap 35mm camera to take advantage of interchangeable lenses; it was a Russian Zenith B. I later realised the imporrtance of through the lens metering and so bought a Praktica MTL3. I later progressed to a Canon AE1. I also decided to buy a very cheap Super 8 basic cine camera and filmed Westerns whenever I could afford to buy a roll of film. more >
