Hall Leys Park has been home to our resident locomotive ‘Little David’ since 1974. We absolutely love our little train, as do many of our visitors.
When we first took over the business in 2015, we felt that he was ready for a complete overhaul. I wasn’t personally fond of his colour and we felt he looked rather tired.
As soon as our first season was over, we sent him off to 17d miniatures, a miniature train specialist based locally to us at Via Gelia, near Bonsall. They had him over the winter months and did an amazing job of transforming him!
His coaches were painted in LMS Maroon and black and he himself in British Railways early diesel colours of Deep Brusnwick Green with a grey bonnet and roof. His livery is close to early diesel locomotives circa 1948 onward (on the mainline).
His coaches were stripped and the coach bogies were rebuilt with new axles, wheels and bearings. The end panels were replaced and painted.
On Little David himself, he had new wheels, axles, sprockets. New bearings were fitted along with new drive chains. His body panels were removed, stripped and sand-blasted before being re-painted.
When he was delivered back to us ready for the following season it was very exciting! He was restored back to a beautiful locomotive.
A pleasant surprise came about in 2019 when I was actively doing some history research. Totally unbeknown to us, we had actually converted him back to the very same body colouring he had been when he first arrived at the park!
During my history research, one of the things I always wanted to know was the story behind the naming of the train. I knew it had to have a back story and felt I needed to find out. It proved to be a very frustrating quest and after many months of getting nowhere I finally came across an old facebook post with a comment from a relative!
I contacted them and they very kindly met me and shared the story.
The real Little David was a young boy who would visit the park every Sunday with his sister for a treat. He shared Cyril Swain’s love for the trains and being a regular visitor Cyril became very fond of him and decided to name the train after him.
Sadly David passed away at a very young age. Having his name on the train and knowing the story behind it makes our train even more special. He will always remain a very important part of our train’s history and rightly so.
I also managed to track down Cyril’s son Hubert. He has shared lots of stories about his father and his time in the park. He was a very popular character, always wanting to make sure the children enjoyed their visit. People traveled from all over for a day in the park and a ride on his train. He would show them how the engine worked and go out of his way to make it a pleasurable visit.
Cyril finally decided to retire in 1980. He received letters from visitors thanking him for the memories which really speaks volumes about the kind of person Cyril was. Sadly he passed away just 4 years later and didn’t get the long retirement he deserved.
With everything I have learnt about the business history, hearing all the stories, seeing all the photographs of people enjoying themselves here, it really isn’t ‘just a business’ for us. It is so much more than that. It is such an important part of the town’s history.
If you haven’t been to visit yet, please come and see us and enjoy something different, something unique, something that was a ‘real treat’ for families in years gone by and make some memories of your own.