Transistor

How do you get this to work the OP didn't even tell what transistor he was having problems with.

Well he said:-

I cannot get how a transistor work.

Not he couldn't get a specific transistor to work. So we too it as a conceptual difficulty he was having.

I got my hands on one and it was a big power transistor

As you now probably know, power transistors especially in the 60s had a very poor gain, in the order of 10 to 20.