Locks - the old way

I took these shots of our lock keeper opening the gates for us on our way in to Ter Apel to show how it used to be done.  Even when we where in France a couple of years ago and they had manual locks they didn't do it like this.  At least there they had a wheel on the side that moved the gears and that moved the gates.  At this lock, everything manual, lucky there's not too many of these.