A LOOK back into the heyday of steam power in Nelson and Brierfield was featured in Pendle Forest Model Railway Society's annual exhibition at Nelson's Civic Centre 40 years ago.

This photo, taken in April 1978, shows Mr David Carter, secretary of the society, taking a look at the scale model of Brierfield station.

Society members spent many months on research, scouring old documents, photographs and official British Railway records to capture detailed models of the stations of both towns around the 1939 period.

This included work to reproduce Brierfield station, complete even with the neighbouring gas work.

Society secretary Mr Carter said that no effort had been spared into carefully translating the results of the research into finely detailed models.

He said: "Members have spent much of their free time, often in the evenings, compiling information and searching out old records and photographs.

"The result is two excellent layouts which faithfully recapture all the atmosphere of the original."

The models would be unveiled when the 8th annual exhibition opened to the public on November 28 of that year.

At the time bosses said the exhibition promised to be a poignant reflection of the bygone days of the steam era.