My father died when I was 18 and I decided to quit college (where I had just begun to train as a teacher) and return home. I needed a job, cold-called Oxford railway station and joined the staff of British Rail as a clerical officer in 1973.

I made 1,080 pounds ($1,790) a year answering travel queries. There were about eight of us covering multiple shifts and we couldn^t cope with the number of calls. People were left waiting on hold and sometimes tried repeatedly for days.

We took it in turns to be the train announcer, advising passengers on arrivals and departures we could not see from where we sat. I used to guess, based on the timetable and the sounds I heard, and sometimes guessed wrong.

Once, I advised passengers to board a freight train carrying coal that had stopped on a middle track, away from the platform. Another time, I misidentified a holiday special to Wales as a scheduled service to central England. Staff had to run up and down the train telling commuters to get off.