This photograph includes a view of the old Burns Dairy next to the Phoenix sidings at Stockton Station. Courtesy of Gordon Armes. 
Picture Stockton Archive
A Pictorial History of Stockton-on-Tees
This photograph includes a view of the old Burns Dairy next to the Phoenix sidings at Stockton Station. Courtesy of Gordon Armes.
The green doors on the building in the background belong to H.J.Heinz 57 it was a distribution warehouse for the north east and yorkshire areas
I remember the electric delivery carts in the picture, I spent six months or so working for the delivery girl Maureen who had the round in Roseworth around the late sixties or early seventies. Was hard work in the cold weather… hanging off the back of the cart as it rattled around the streets… darting off with cold bottles in your hands to the various doorsteps along with another lad called Brian Storr… no health and safety regulations in those days.
I was in Roseworth secondary modern school with Graham John Burns around about 1972
I was at same school as you Barry also lived over back from you in Roseworth I always thought his name was Roger Burns least we called him Roger when we cheered at the fight between him and Gary Booth round the back of Blaky
Roger Burns was the tall lad who lived over the field from you in the houses by Durham Road, Rothwell Crescent, Graham Burns was from Burns dairy and lived on Junction Road
This isn’t a local industrial branch line. Those are the exchange sidings for Thomson’s scrapyard near Stockton station, and are still in use today. It is likely that the locomotive is running round a train of condemned rolling stock brought up from the south.
The loco in the photograph is carrying the electrification warning badges which probably dates the shot as early 1960s onwards.
The locomotive is a B1 4-6-0 No 61176. This engine was shedded at Darlington until the early sixties. It was then transferred to York where it was withdrawn in 1965. Why this engine should be using this local industrial branch line is uncertain. The lines look fairly well used, which probably predates the 1960’s, when little traffic used the line. The engine may have been having minor repairs at Stockton shed, and this was a running in turn, Stockton shed in effect ‘borrowing’ the loco. The car in the background looks late 50’s. Stockton motive power depot shut in June 1959, the remaining loco’s going to the new depot at Thornaby. Any usage by Stockton must predate this time