With their ability to keep us in the moment, dot-to-dot puzzles are potent stress-busters.
This delightful collection
...The first railway in Dorset was not a steam operated line, but one worked by horses & gravity, to transport Portland stone from the quarries to the sea. However, the first true main line in the county was the Southampton & Dorchester which opened on 1 June 1847 followed by the Wilts, Somerset & Weymouth Railway (WSWR) which reached Weymouth on 20 January 1857. The Southampton & Dorchester Railway had running power over the line between Dorchester and Weymouth & opened to Weymouth in 1857. The Salisbury & Yeovil Railway opened to Gillingham in 1859, & to Yeovil & onwards to Exeter in 1860. The Dorset Central Railway was inaugurated between Wimborne & Blandford in November 1860 & northwards to Cole in 1862 where it linked with the Somerset Central Railway, the two companies uniting as the Somerset & Dorset Railway. The extension to Bath opened on 20 July 1874 creating a new main line. Thus was established the pattern of four main lines in Dorset: two running Approx. east to west & two north to south. From these main lines, branches were created to serve places off a main line such as to Lyme Regis, Bridport, Abbotsbury, Portland & Swanage. For decades these branch lines flourished, but eventually the more convenient internal-combustion engined vehicles rendered these branches uneconomic & they were closed around the time of the 1963 Beeching Report. Colin Maggs, the renowned expert on railway history, tells the fascinating tale of the railways & the impact they had on the lives of everyone in the county. The nostalgic branch lines with their small local trains & the main lines with their thundering expresses, are all part of a rich heritage which is explored in an expert text & in more than two hundred evocative images to present an absorbing view of Dorset's recent past.