Photograph details

© Transport for London
Collection of London Transport Museum
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Ticket Office, Chiswick Works. A 'Punch girl' reseals a ticket machine (Bell Punch) after examination.

Photographed by Topical Press, Aug 1927

Location: Chiswick, Hounslow, W4

Image no: U4558

Inventory no: 1999/7726

20th Century London caption: This picture shows a young woman at work in 1927. Her name is not recorded but she worked as a 'punch girl' for the London General Omnibus Company (L.G.O.C.). Conductors on the buses would use a Bell Punch to validate passengers' tickets. The woman is holding one ticket and many more are on the table in front of her. When the conductor held a ticket in the machine and squeezed the trigger, it would punch out a small circle from the ticket and the bell would ring. Back in the ticket offices, women counted these circles. They were just a few millimetres across and called 'confetti'. This was to make sure that the money collected matched the number of tickets sold.

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