There are several BCN Society members who also belong to the Tojo's Bridge Appreciation Society. To the uninitiated, Tojo's Bridge is a simple, unassuming structure which crosses the New Main Line between Pudding Green Junction and Albion Junction. Properly named as Union Furnace Bridge, it appears under that name on the OS Second Edition (1904) 1:2500 scale map. The bridge formerly carried Union Road between Oldbury Road and Roway Road but now serves merely as a footbridge. It stands close to the Stour Valley railway line and provided a route to the adjacant Albion Station via a level crossing. The station itself closed on February 1st 1960 and the level crossing was removed thus ending Union Furnace Bridge's usefulness. However the bridge still remains. It has often been the subject of correspondence within these pages as to the meaning and provenance of its singular piece of graffito for in large white capital letters, covering three of the bridge's eight sections is written boldly TOJO THE DWARF. As readers of recent BP's will recall, various scholarly theories have been put forward and the age of the message has been computed at anything up to sixty years. Chemical analysis of the paint used has been called for to prove the issue beyond doubt one way or other and, as a seeker after the truth I have always gone out of my way to encourage correspondence and debate on this important matter.
Imagine, then my shock and horrer when re-reading Ned Williams excellant "Railways of the Black Country" Volume Two : The Main Lines, page 22, I noticed a photo of Union Furnace Bridgetaken from the site of Albion Station. As Ned points " On 11th June 1984, no sign of the station, and very little sign of the level crossing, remain." Very true. However, what will come as a veritable bombshell to Tojo' Bridge aficinados though is the fact that the photo shows no sign of the graffito either!
If, as the photo suggests, the bridge was graffito-less a mere twenty years ago, this news will send shockwaves through the Tojo Community and years of speculation will be as naught.
Say it aint so !
