9 June, Tuesday.
Sieglinde had survived the journey very well just three weeks after her back operation, but we took an early afternoon train for the two and a half hour journey from Exeter St David to Redruth. This gave us time to sort out our luggage and catch an H bus from the end of the road to St David's station where we had a coffee and snack in the platform buffet.
She enjoyed the wonderful train journey beside the Exe Estuary, along the Channel coast through Dawlish and Teignmouth then following the Teign Estuaries to Newton Abbot, across the rolling South Devon countryside with Totnes Castle perched on its hill, then by the Plym Estuary to Plymouth with spectacular views of the Tamar estuary from Brunel's historic Royal Albert Bridge and finally winding more slowly across Cornwall to Redruth. Brunel's railway bridge over the Tamar
The Tamar Estuary from Brunel's bridge
It was my first time in Redruth, a small post-industrial town, somewhat run down, but proud of its heritage and with several good places to eat. We found somewhere to have a coffee in the market, and we planned how to get out to Tricky's at Tolgus Tin. We realised it was indeed tricky, too far to walk, especially with our rucksacks in the heat, and no buses went anywhere near, so we took a taxi.
Tricky's at Tolgus Tin is actually two miles from Tolgus Mill, Cornwall's last working tin streaming mill, so we never saw it. It is a rambling place out in the countryside, but pleasant and peaceful and we discovered the restaurant there which served large and reasonably-priced meals in a friendly atmosphere.
Rabbits at play, seen from our window
10 June, Wednesday.
After breakfast in our room, we ordered a taxi to take us to Kresen Kernow (Cornwall Archives for non-Cornic speakers), which we were both keen to see. Sieglinde had been disappointed by the lack of a public heritage library in the centre of Exeter, having noticed more children's books in asiatic languages on the open shelves than there were books about Exeter and its region. Could Redruth do better?
We were astounded at the contrast with Exeter, where the Devon Heritage Centre is located three miles from the city centre on an industrial estate. In Redruth the archives ("argh" in Cornic) are to be found together with the local studies library, merged in a modern building near the town centre (admittedly a smaller town than Exeter). There is no charge for using the service except for the provision of scans or copies of documents, and the archives search room and the local studies library are both staffed by qualified archivists and librarians. Volunteers are used, particularly in conservation work, and there are conference rooms, spaces for visiting school and other groups and a changing exhibition on the ground floor – during the conference the theme was “Cornwall in print”, including printing and bookbinding artefacts loaned from local museums. The centre is accommodated in what was a local brewery, long a ruin but retaining as much of the old granite and iron structure as possible. It is fully accessible to all – the welcome guide is also in large print, "easy read" and even widgit – and the Centre was well-used during the conference. There are no slopes, and lifts to all floors. It should certainly be visited by those drawing up Exeter’s cultural strategy as unitary local authorities arrive.
Sieglinde had bravely volunteered to sit through the two days of the Print Networks annual conference: "Print, printing and industrial heritage", held 10 – 11 June 2026 at Kresen Kernow The theme was inspired by the industrial heritage of Cornwall. I will say more about Kresen Kernow, the conference, and my contributions elsewhere and will limit myself to reprinting the progamme so that you can get an idea of what she had to endure.
Wednesday 10 June: Print, Printing and Industrial Heritage in the Southwest
Session 1: seventeenth and eighteenth century
Session 2: nineteenth century
- Ian Alcock. Developments in interactive children’s books in early Victorian England.
- Lisa Peters (University of Chester): Victorian Newspapers and the Mining Industries of Cornwall and Swansea.
- Alastair Tinto. Danescombe Paper Mill, Calstok, Cornwall.
Session 3: nineteenth / twentieth century
- Sallie Morris (Science Museum, London): Colour lithographs of Cornwall: the printing of railway company posters.
- David Osbaldestin (Birmingham City University): Walking through the industrial past of Nineteenth Century Birmingham.
Session 5 : eighteenth/nineteenth century
- Georgina Grant (National Museums of Scotland): The importance of iron to the printing industry and its allied trades
- Sue May. A partial solar eclipse in Turner’s line-engraving of Dudley, Worcestershire (1835).
- Rosie Smith (Birmingham City University): ‘One of the best works of the kind.’ How did the Coalbrookdale Company convey quality through their printed materials?
Session 6 : nineteenth/twentieth century
- Deborah Sutherland (Victoria and Albert Museum). The use of innovative materials and printing techniques in the early twentieth century.
- Juul Uilenreef (University of Glasgow). Letterheads as Industrial Archives: Visual Records of Maastricht’s Urban Landscape.
- Jay Kerslake (University of Leeds): ‘The living voice is mighty, but we were few’: trade union periodicals in early twentieth century Britain.
Work-in-Progress Session
- Ian Maxted spoke on his gathering of imprints of the firm of Wheaton of Exeter who published more than 1,000 schoolbooks from around 1900 to 2020, none of which are to be found in Exeter libraries and his comparative study the the world of the book in three European regions during the 18th century: Thuringia and Weimar, Lower Normandy and Caen, Devon and Exeter.
- Barry Mackay spoke on his work on The shepherd's guides, established around 1817 when a sheep farmer in Martindale, Joseph Walker, had the idea of collecting and publishing wool marks of sheep as a guide to shepherds to distinguish the farm and owner of sheep.
- Bob Oldham, in a video from America, spoke about his massive World Handpress Database, asking for those who knew of unrecorded examples to report them.
There were also tours behind the scenes at Kresen Kernow including the conservation department and the rolling stacks where the archives were stored, and a preview of the "Printing in Cornwall" exhibition.
Sieglinde looks behind the scenes in Kresen Kernow
Participants were also able to use Bristol Common Press Lego Letterpress to set and print their own cards with Lego compatible type under the direction of Jenny Batt - a return visit of a popular event.
Fun with the Lego printing kit.
Sieglinde's father was a hand compositor.
11 June, Thursday.
We had spent little time looking at Redruth after the first day, but returned to Tricky's for another of their ample evening meals, washed down with a aperolspritz. We had also squirrelled some food for a breakfast in our room this morning before taking a taxi to the second day of the conference. The conference ended with a buffet lunch and we had the afternoon free to explore Redruth, which keenly celebrated its mining and industrial heritage. The arrival of Kresen Kernow in the little town had certainly injected new life into the community.
Fore Street, Redruth, decked out for Murdoch Day
William Murdoch is the town's chief celebrity. He invented and tested one of the world's first locomotives in the town in 1784. The house where he lived was also the first in the world to be lit by gas. There is a museum in Murdoch House and a St Rumon's Gardens on the site of a monastery nearby but both were closed when we visited.
Murdoch House, Redruth
Among the sculpures were the "Tinners Hounds, made by Cornish artist David Kemp from the discarded wellington boots of the workers from Geevor Mine in West Penwith, one of the last Cornish tin mines to close in 1991. The Tinners Hounds, Redruth
The Ark of Extinction, a massive mural in Redruth with Ian for scale.
Looking for refreshment before returning to Tricky's we discovered Home Ground coffee shop in Fore Street which offered good Italian coffee, and excellent cakes. We saw that it regularly hosted community events such as poetry and literature evenings.
12 June, Friday.
We had decided to stay on for an extra day in Redruth as I wanted to meet up with old friends Marilyn and Graham. We first got to know them in 1977 when Jill and Marilyn both worked in the University of Exeter. Graham taught at Exeter College of Art, later part of the Polyechnic South West which became the University of Plymouth which promptly closed the Exeter Campus, although there was already a College of Art in Plymouth. Retiring about the same time as us, they decided to move from Pennsylvania (the Exeter one) to Cornwall, attracted by the arts scene around St Ives, Newlyn and Penzance but there were problems with the estate developer and they rather regretted their move.
We met for coffee and lunch at Penlee House, a museum and art gallery above the town and caught up on each other's news. They were aware that Sieglinde wanted to see more of the far west tip of Cornwall, so pointed us in the direction of the Morrab Gardens and went off to do shopping and return home to their little village just noth of Penzance.
Penlee House is located in Morrab Road, a handsome street lined with impressive late Victorian Houses which sweeps down to the sea. Obligingly, one of Sieglinde's beloved seagulls perched on a car tor a photo opportunity.
Morrab Road, Penzance
There are gates through to the Morrab Gardens, a semi-tropical paradise with paths winding under palm trees past small ponds to a fountain, bandstand and various memorials. Some parts were fenced off for garden work when we visited.
Morrab Gardens, Penzance
The most important destination in the Gardens is the Morrab Library, an independent library established in 1818, with over 70,000 books on floor-to-ceiling shelves as well as archives and a rich photographic collection, all held in the rambling rooms of a Victorian building. Much of the wide range of fiction and non-fiction books is available for loan. Like the Devon and Exeter Institution in Exeter, the Morrab Library is a registered charity and a member of the Independent Libraries Association. There was a talk on the history of the Library which had just started. As it was clearly and slowly delivered, we stayed for a while and we both learned much about the early history of this library, which has almost 1,000 subscribing members. 
Morrab Library, Penzance
Although it was less than four weeks after the operation on her back, Sieglinde was still full of energy and wanted to see Land's End, so we made our way down Market Jew Street, Penzance's main street, cutting through to Wharf Road which led to the bus station, where we picked up the bus to Land's End.
Market Jew Street, Penzance
Cut through to Wharf Road, St Michael's Mount in background
View over Mount's Bay, Penzance
View towards St Mary's Church, Penzance
Land's End was closing down for the day by the time we arrived, but we managed to find a coffee in the Land's End Hotel, looking out over the rocks to the Longships Lighthouse and the Atlantic Ocean. We had the place to ourselves. The signpost was no longer staffed so we were able to quietly pose for the obligatory photograph.
The cliffs at Land's End, the Brison rocks on the right
We always thought they looked like General De Gaulle in his bath
A long way from anywhere except Land's End
On the bus to Sennen Cove
We left Land’s End just after 18:09, calling at the picturesque village of Sennen Cove and went in to the Raj Restaurant only to find that it had no licence. The bottles of wine that were in evidence had been brought by other diners. We had a pleasant meal washed down with fruit juice. The table next to us had a group of about eight people and they apologised in advance in case they were noisy. Their conversation was lively with much laughter but was certainly not disturbing, so we were surprised and delighted when they gave us a bottle of wine as we left. We caught the train to Redruth, then a taxi to Tricky’s where we started on the bottle of wine.
13 June, Saturday.
We returned to Exeter today, but why did we have to choose Murdoch Day to do so? Streets were blocked off for the Grand Procession and the taxi driver suggested we walk the last few hundred yards to the train station, fortunately downhill. Waiting on the platform we heard a brass band and the procession passed by. The little straggle didn't take long and we wondered whether William Murdoch would have approved of the rainbow tinted celebrations in his name.
We finished off the wine, drinking it from the bottle and young fellow travellers passing by gave us the thumbs up of approval.
Growing old disgracefully, on the train from Redruth to Exeter
We arrived in Exeter about 18:00 and, as it was the first anniversary of our meeting on the platform at Weimar station, we took the H bus outside the station, not to home but to the Ivy to celebrate, finishing off with crêpes suzette served at the table.
Crêpes suzette at the Ivy, Exeter
13 June 2025, Weimar station
13 June 2026, the Ivy, Exeter
What a year it has been for us both since that first meeting.
