Paul Williams reports from a gathering of green and red buses in Lancashire
Some long-vanished bus companies are forgotten almost as soon as they cease to run, others have a fanatical following that outlasts them by decades and have men (and women) of a certain age go teary at the very mention. Southdown, Devon General, Midland Red and Crosville all spring to mind. Was it their sheer size? An attractive colour scheme? Their territory covering fondly-recalled holidays? CBW mulled over the questions as it anticipated a trip to see the buses of… John Fishwick & Sons, of Leyland in Lancashire.
Fishwick’s, which disappeared as a bus operator in 2015, has a following that’s wide and deep – this little company, which never ran a fleet of more than 40 buses, still inspires fierce loyalty amongst the townspeople of this little market town and much further afield. A running day in Leyland at the end of August featured Fishwick green buses and the cherry red vehicles of its massive former neighbour, Ribble Motor Services.
For one day on a Bank Holiday Sunday – punctuated by drizzle and cloud – the streets of Leyland reverberated to the sound of buses made in that very place, in red or green with a few buses from other fleets mixed in. Leyland badges with ‘Olympian,’ ‘Titan,’ ‘Leopard’ and ‘Royal Tiger’ emblems prowled the streets, mixed with more prosaic names such as ‘National 2’ or, err, ‘Bristol RESL6L.’
Aficionados of the Fishwick fleet and the Ribble Vehicle Preservation Trust collaborate to hold this now-annual joint running day. Mark Hayes, who has been fascinated by Fishwick buses since childhood and is one of the event organisers, is in no doubt why Fishwick and its neighbour Ribble have a hold on the public as well as enthusiasts: “Partly it’s the lovely colour scheme – two-tone green for Fishwick, deep cherry red for Ribble,” he said. “And that livery was basically the same for decades, so if you’re from this part of the world there were green Fishwick buses when you were little, then green Fishwick buses that you went to school on, then the same when you were working and maybe with kids of your own. It’s the same for Ribble, it was always just there.”
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