Railway buff

He still clearly remembers standing in the playground at the infants' school in Cefn Fforest, the village where he and his wife Tricia were born, and thinking what it would be like to be an engine driver.

"However, since driving and firing an express passenger locomotive for my 60th birthday on the Watercress Line in Hampshire, my view of that boyhood dream has changed," says Ken in a letter to me from his home in Swindon.

The engine, for those who know about such details, was 34016 named Bodmin.

Ken became a member of the Abergavenny society in 1994 and attended most of the meetings until he became editor of The Coal Tank magazine, which contains news of steam in general with around five percent of the coverage devoted to the society.

Until the end of last year his father regularly attended meetings at the Hen and Chickens public house, but in recent times found the stairs to the upper-floor meeting room too much of a challenge.

Ken's other calling is that of a lay preacher who, along with Tricia, takes services at Zoar Baptist Church in Pandy.

Says Ken:"To Tricia and me, it is an interesting link because I don't believe in having my Christian faith and my hobby in separate compartments."