The obvious big clue to where it is - the sign - I googled and it seems to be for the pub of that name at Lenham which makes sense for me. I won't over complicate it but in 1949 HP would be heading from London to see her mother either [1] in hospital near Canterbury [in which case they may have been going a slightly long way round] or [2] to Charing Crematorium, after her mothers death in March - the weather looks quite good and I have another of them picnicking and one in the boozer [? Dog & Bear in Lenham - maybe]. HP came here in January and went back to India in May '49.
I also checked both modern maps and google maps street views. The road layout seems to fit to Lenham as there is a fork right in the distance and you go in to Lenham village. The street view shows an exit spot which may co-incide with the gate by the pig!? I hope to go there and check it out in a few weeks.
The car as an English number plate and another pic shows it to be right hand drive.
She came over in 1936/37 but I think had an Opel car from Germany - which may have been left hand drive? I don't know for sure that they brought the Opel to England?
I think you can probably set aside the austerity thoughts. Before the war they had a bit of dosh and HP was used to the high life. It was tight in '48 & '49 and she had to borrow the money to come over, although paid back when she got here. She had 'ways ' to get what she wanted and was able throughout most of her remaining years to ' maintain much of what she had been used to.
I see the consensus is that it might well be 36/7 based on her hat and the bus ID. From family whereabouts this does not seem to fit as I am not aware that there was anyone in Kent at that point that they would be going to see. I might be wrong or maybe it was just a jaunt. Somewhat ironic they apparently ended up so close to where her mother was later cremated. That's what makes me plump for '49.
Thanks once again for all your help

Laurence van Kleek

14/03/11

I have looked again in the light of you all thinking it seems more likely to be 1936 and I think you are right. I struggled with the Opel car but have now looked at another photo of it in Delhi with Indian number plates! and right hand drive - c1937/39 I think. I think my grandfather was in Germany in '36 and HP came over to England in June and must have then gone to Germany and collected the car [ and him ] and brought it back to England - not sure if that number plate QA 6446 is English or German? In India it was D 3729. Goodness knows what happened to it - I expect they gave it up by the end of the war.
Anyway that both helps and hinders! - I mean all I wanted to do was know the truth as to which year it was but it confuses over what they were doing - I mean I had an explanation if it was 1949 but have none for 1936. It does help explain though why another lady in a photo of the time looks a good bit younger than she would have done if it had been 13 years later! - a difference between 50's and 60's.
Thank you for your help and I am going with 1936 now. Not sure I can supply any more but would love to help ID the bus and exact location. I don't know but I think the signage is
top line - next destination and number by the side
middle line - ? the via bits
bottom line - final destination
I agree the bottom line seems to be 2 words of 4 letters each but I can't read them. I looked at the map and can't find anywhere heading towards or past Maidstone that looks like 4 and 4. If it is Lenham then the bus is heading away from the village towards Maidstone.
Thanks again

Laurence van Kleek

14/03/11 - 09:10

Thank you Laurence for those two further fascinating pieces - the whole topic has turned into a wonderful journey back into a lovely era which we older ones are able to remember fondly. I would love to have met the characterful lady - I had older relations who similarly could "get their own way." Incidentally I was born in 1936 !! I have just dipped into a lovely old AA book which has a section on registration marks and I can solve the mystery of the car for you - "QA" and several other "Q" multiples were issued in London to vehicles "temporarily imported into Great Britain" so there you have it !!
Roy, just another thought on the bus - did M & D possibly take over any small independent operators in those years ?? - if so rather than alter the destination screens they may have had "bespoke" rolls printed. This would mean, of course, that such an acquired vehicle would be nearly new (TD3or TD4) in 1936, but such deals were not unknown.

Chris Youhill

14/03/11 - 19:36

My thoughts have gone along similar lines to everyone else's. Firstly it's definitely a Maidstone and District bus then no, the blinds aren't right but then what? I've searched high and low for pictures of contemporary M & D 'deckers and found very little and what there was had single aperture blinds.
However, the display layout does look quite similar to what M & D used on single-deckers. If you Google image DKT 16 you'll see what I mean on the preserved TS Tiger. So to me it's not inconceivable that it is M & D but we need an expert on the fleet to advise.

David Beilby

15/03/11 - 06:19

Didn't East Kent run into Maidstone and have some TD4s dating from 1935/6 (which were rebodied after the war)? Compared to M&D, East Kent tended to put more intermediate locations into their destinations blinds but, try as I might, I cannot find any photos of this batch with their original bodies, so this is possibly a wild guess.

Paul Haywood

15/03/11 - 15:43

Thanks very much for your continuing help! Chris, David and Paul. I will try not to drift off busses too much! Attached are a couple of pics found by google of what I think is the car in question – an Opel Super 6 – seems to be a fit. Thanks to Chris for help with the number plates – that cracked that, exact fit to what is known of the car.
HP – she was well worth a visit although most of ‘us’ often caught the wrong end, she could be ‘difficult‘. Certainly a character, the older I get the more I miss her. The pose in the photo is typical, arms akimbo, don’t mess with me!
So, 1936, I have no idea what they were up to – perhaps it was indeed simply a beano – which brings to mind the thought that perhaps the bus is doing the same? Could be one on a day trip back or forth? It does seem to be summer. Maybe the 2 x 4 words are ‘back here’!? Reminds me of the bloke who went to his local station and asked for a return and the ticket guy said ‘where to ?’ so he said ‘here, you b… fool !’.
As I write I have just realized what we may be looking at! This could be the import of the car! Driven from Germany, via Dover or Folkestone and home to London with a pitstop at Lenham! Seems worthy of a large bet. Not sure if the number plate would have been issued immediately upon importation?
So, we know the pub [I think]; my Grandma, the car and the pig! Maybe I should chase up the man locally but the big mystery is the bus! Pity it’s not colour. Not sure I can help more on that but interested to know if you figure it out.

Laurence van Kleek

16/03/11 - 10:59

Well, I think Laurence's extra information has pretty much tied things up. Confirming the location as Lenham means it must be an M&D vehicle or just conceivably, as Paul says, East Kent. I'm going to have to do a bit of looking round in the hope of explaining the vehicle's appearance. As it happens, the same thought that Chris had - that it might be an acquired vehicle - had occurred to me, but that is now somewhat academic. A final observation about the car. It was quite common for expatriates to buy a new car when they came home 'on leave' and then take it back with them overseas. This enabled purchase tax, (and probably import duty on a foreign vehicle), to be avoided, provided it didn't stay in Britain for more than six months. The car would be given a temporary 'Q' number on registration.

Roy Burke

16/03/11 - 14:32

Thanks Roy and all. The car plate is interesting and I'm sure they would have been keen to avoid any duty. They were not really ex pats – HP lived in India for 60 years returning here for good in 1980. Her husband was self employed and never drove whereas she drove an ambulance in France during and after WW1. I have tried to make clearer the bus but I will have another go at photoshop and send along if I can then read anything but it seems impossible.

Laurence van Kleek

17/03/11 - 06:23

That last piece of information about "HP", Laurence, is just the icing on the cake - you had already painted a wonderful picture for us of what a fascinating and feisty lady she was, and it comes as no surprise to hear of her heroic devotion to "King and Country" in World War One - I would dearly have loved to have met her.

Chris Youhill

17/03/11 - 06:35

I have just been pointed in the direction of your site, and believe I can identify the M&D bus photographed in the Lenham area - thanks for such a fascinating picture.
I am fairly certain that it is one of the batch of eight TD3 Titans with Harrington double-deck bodywork (itself a rarity) delivered in 1934. They were numbered 338-345 (BKK 302-309) and had coach seating (24 on each deck), making them unusually luxurious for double-deck buses of the time, and when new were used mainly on longer-distance services, of which the 10 between Maidstone and Folkestone was one of the main examples. Until 1942 this route ran to Folkestone Harbour, and a photograph exists of one of the batch (BKK 303) actually at the harbour terminus.
They were certainly distinctive and different from anything else operated by M&D, but were rebodied in 1942, presumably to provide much needed additional capacity to which the coach seating was not suited (though one wonders why they were not just reseated, which would have been more economical). The lower destination glass originally carried a duplicate registration painted on the glass, so what looks like two (three or four-letter) words is actually BKK 30x, the last digit being between 2 and 9. The last two of the batch (BKK 308/9) were of the TD3c type, with torque convertors and oil engines (the first M&D vehicles to be delivered new with diesel engines).
After rebodying (by Weymann) they looked rather different, so this clinches the point that the photo cannot have dated from 1949, so must be from 1936.
The Dog & Bear is/was in the centre of Lenham (in the Square), and this photo appears to be in a much wider road, probably on the main road which by-passed Lenham and other villages in the area from the late 1920s. I would guess the sign is an advert a short distance from the centre of Lenham trying to persuade passing motorists to divert into the village and visit the hotel - the loss of passing trade caused by the by-pass would probably have been as much of an issue then as in later years.

Derek Jones

17/03/11 - 09:57

Relief! Thank you, Derek, for your detailed and conclusive explanation of the bus in Laurence's photo. I was beginning to think my reservations about the destination screen layout were a mental aberration on my part, so the information you have given - I was convinced someone would know - has been most useful and helpful, to me as I'm sure it has to Laurence, too. I got a wry smile at learning that Harringtons were the bodybuilder, and the appearance of one of these unusual vehicles gives the super picture an added piquancy. It occurs to me that, if you have a picture of BKK 303 at Folkestone Harbour, and it is of reasonable quality, (Peter is great at improving the quality of pictures submitted to him, by the way), it would make a most interesting posting on 'Old-Bus-Photos'. Thanks again for your definitive comment.

Roy Burke

17/03/11 - 13:22

I'm sure that Derek will be able to hear the sighs of relief from all over the Land as this question was proving to be very difficult indeed. Quite apart from identifying the vehicle the discussion has taught me much that I didn't know. I was initially amazed at the suggestion that the bodybuilder might be Harrington as I didn't know that they'd ever built double deckers but here we have the proof. It is indeed strange that rebodying was considered for such relatively new vehicles if seating capacity was the only requirement but there we are !!

Chris Youhill

24/03/11 - 18:25

Hi Chaps
Thanks very much for such detailed information. I got more than a wry smile when I saw it was Harrington! Hooting out loud here because that was HP’s mothers name! The co – incidences abound for me. Sorry, off bus topic. Yes Derek, I did check google maps as well as ordinary ones and I think the road seems to fit the A20 approach to Lenham [with Harrietsham behind the camera] . As I said before I will motor down there and take a look before too long now the better weather is here and let you know if I can add anything.

Laurence van Kleek

02/07/11

True to his word, Derek Jones of the Maidstone & District and East Kent Bus Club has sourced this fine photo of a Maidstone & District Harrington-bodied TD3 which has intrigued us all for so long. The photo was part of the late J T Wilson collection and is kindly offered to Old Bus Photos on the proviso of there being a strict copyright restriction. The following text, supplied by Derek Jones, adds to the interest and I am grateful to him and the Club for their help in solving this intriguing thread.

The photo above (© The M&D and East Kent Bus Club) is taken at Lower Sandgate Road, Folkestone Harbour, which until 1942 was the terminus of the Maidstone-Folkestone service (numbered 10 by M&D, though East Kent did not use the number until 1937). The premises alongside were those of Folkestone Harbour Garages Ltd, which ran its own fleet of coaches trading as Auto Pilots, became Auto Pilots Ltd around 1930, and sold the coach business to East Kent in 1935. The M&D vehicle was new in 1934 and looks fairly new in this picture. Note that the small destination glass below the route number shows a version of the M&D fleetname, which was a feature of these vehicles briefly from when they were new. The Lenham picture of one of the same batch shows that the fleetname in the destination glass had been replaced by the registration number (one of BKK 302-309) and advertisements have been added to the sides and front tween-decks panels. This suggests that the Folkestone photo probably pre-dates the Lenham one by a year or so. A range of historical negatives of vehicles of local fleets (East Kent, Maidstone & District, Maidstone Corporation and local independent operators) is held in The M&D and East Kent Bus Club's collection and copies of prints from it are available on approval; they can also be found on sale at selected events in Kent, the next main one being the Herne Bay bus rally on Sunday 14th August 2011. An updated list of views originating from the official collections of M&D and East Kent is in preparation and will be added in the near future to our website which is in the course of being revamped - however the old website can still be used in the meantime if readers would like more information about the Club it can be found at this link.

Paul Haywood

02/07/11

So, with the aid of Derek Jones and the club information that the route did not get numbered 10 until 1937, we can firmly date the photo as being taken in 1937. Job done!

Chris Hebbron