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The District Line
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When the congregation rises there is a rustling of silks like that of the Devils' wings
in Paradise Lost. Every woman then, even if she had forgotten it before, has a single
thought to the fold of her clothes. They pray in the litany as if under enchantment.
Their real life is spinning on beneath this apparent one of calm, like the District
Railway-trains underground just by - throbbing, rushing, hot, concerned with next
week, last week.
THOMAS HARDY from his diary for 8 July 1888, from The Early Life of
Thomas Hardy by Florence E Hardy.
The troglodyte in a crowded tunnel under central London, watching District Line
trains crackle past in procession to Ealing and Wimbledon and waiting for the Circle
Line train that never comes, can look at the map on the wall and daydream of far
away places called Ickenham and Boston Manor.
PHILIP HOWARD, The Times
TURNHAM GREEN
All the angels at Turnham Green
Survey a gentle, idyllic scene -
Wide-winged, blue-eyed, English ones,
With their hair tied up in buns
How lucidly they look - behold
Privet hedges green and gold
Round tiny gardens prettified
With stocks and pinks and London Pride,
Of houses built on a modest plan,
Semi-detached victorian,
with freshly painted door that shine
All along the District line.
JOHN HEATH STUBBS, Satires and Epigrams, 1968
EARLS COURT
On 4 October 1911 Earl's Court received the first public escalators, or "moving
stairs" on the Underground. They linked the District platforms to the Piccadilly, but
the public were wary of them and a man with a wooden leg, who was known as
"Bumper" Harris, was employed to ride up and down all day demonstrating how safe
it was. Some old ladies were not encouraged in the slightest, because they had a
suspicion about how Mr Harris had lost his other leg.
LAURENCE MENEAR, London’s Underground Stations,
1983
SLOANE SQUARE
And you’re giving a treat (penny ice and cold meat) to a party of friends and relations
-
They’re a ravenous horde – and they all came on board at Sloane Square and South
Kensington stations.
And bound on that journey you find your attorney
(Who started that morning from Devon).
W S GILBERT, Iolanthe, 1882
VICTORIA
…..and it seemed to Jim you weren’t necessarily any happier whichever side of
Victoria station you were born on. What a lot of miserable objects her carried
luggage for – sleek, soft-voiced young men trailing behind old aunts bored to death
because they were travelling abroad. Why, the very labels excited him: Paris, Milan,
Rome, Geneva, Vienna, Bucharest, Athens, Cairo, Baghdad. If his bag ever had one
of those labels on it he’d run all the way down the platform instead of drawling – ‘Aw
portah!’ or ‘How frightfully crowded!’ or ‘Really, my dear it’s preposterous!’
CECIL ROBERTS Victoria Four Thirty 1937
UPTON PARK
Upton, Wimbledon, Elm and St.James
All share ‘Park’ in their station names.
Parsons and Stepney and Turnham ‘Green’
Add fields and lawns to the rural scene.
Ans you feel the magic of Richmond and Kew?
Then the Green District Line is the line for you.
ANON
UPNEY
Just ‘Upney’, reads the station sign
Out eastward on the District Line,
Which, one stop short of Becontree,
Is thirty two from Gunnersbury.
Now who was Upney, one might ask;
Was once a death-defying task
Performed, by which this humble name
In ticket booths achieved such fame?
Avoid the next stop, Becontree
For beckoning trees mean devilry,
Such trees can only signal death,
As those which stalked the cruel Macbeth.
Best stick to Upney, keep it short,
Do not befriend the Barking sort,
For dogs or persons barking made
Could well attack the shin or head.
Dear modest Upney, so petite,
As comfy as a railway seat
An Upney simple, Upney slow,
Non-uppity as your Auntie Flo.
So why continue to Elm Park,
Why head for Dagenham’s booking clerk
Where Upney begs a passing stop,
As might, of poets, Adlestrop.
Just ‘Auntie’ reads the station sign –
For Upney on the District Line,
An Upney which, so upney small,
Seems upney to exist at all.
MONICA HOYER Upney, the Name,
More lines coming soon.......
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