Three generations of the Grundon family turned out to celebrate the recent unveiling of a newly-refurbished aggregates wagon for Oxfordshire’s Cholsey & Wallingford Heritage Railway.
President Norman Grundon, Chairman Neil Grundon, and Neil’s daughter Grace, who works in Grundon’s fabrication workshop, were on hand as the ‘Dogfish’ ballast wagon took to the tracks in its smart new Grundon livery.
The 1950s wagon was originally donated to the heritage railway in the early 1990s and has now been ‘gifted’ to Grundon in return for its ongoing support and sponsorship.
Sister company Grundon Sand & Gravel operates New Barn Farm quarry, which is situated next to the railway line, and eventually the wagon will carry stone from the quarry up and down the line as part of an ongoing track repair programme.
Grundon’s Peter Kent, who is closely involved with the railway, said: “As we are in the aggregates business, it seemed appropriate that we lend our skills to working on this wonderful heritage wagon and help it carry out a very important job on the railway.
“It was a major refurbishment project and took about a month to complete as we had to strip it back to the bare metal and undertake fabrication work, as well as get all the parts working. Now we’ve been able to repaint it in the Grundon livery appropriate to its time, and we think it looks amazing.”
Michael Palfrey, chairman of Cholsey & Wallingford Heritage Railway, said: “The work the Grundon team has done on the wagon has significantly improved both its structure and condition and has made it much more usable for many years to come.
“Grundon’s support for this and our wider projects has genuinely been transformational, in terms of improvements to the look and feel of the station and facilities overall, work we would never have been able to do ourselves. To be able to celebrate with three generations of the Grundon family present, made this even more of a special occasion.”