CHAPTERS
6 IN THE BEGINNING.
10 GOD'SWONDERFUL RAILWAY IS BUILT.
16 WESTWARDS TO PENZANCE.
26 COPPER DOMES AND STOVE PIPE CHIMNEYS: THE BROAD GAUGE YEARS
34 SWINDON: THE HUB OF THE EMPIRE.
42 THE EMPIRE OF THE WEST.
48 STEAMING INTO THE 20TH CENTURY.
54 CITY OF TRURO: THE 'RELUCTANT' LEGEND.
58 TRAINS AND BOATS AND PLANES AND BUSES TOO!
64 PADDINGTON: THE GREAT TERMINUS.
66 COLLETT, KINGS, CASTLES AND MUCH MORE.
74 A TRICKLE TO A TORRENT.
78 THE HOLIDAY LINE.
84 ANTIQUE MAP OF THE GWR SYSTEM IN THE 1930s.
86 A WORLD WITHOUT STEAM.
92 THE HALCYON TWILIGHT YEARS OF STEAM
98 THE BLUE PULLMAN.
100 PRESERVATION: REVIVAL OF THE COUNTRY BRANCH LINE.
106 SCRAPMAN SAVES THE GWR!
110 EVERY SCHOOLBOY'S DREAM.
112 GWR STEAM BACK ON THE MAINLINE.
118 THE RETURN OF GREAT WESTERN.
124 THE SPIRIT OF BRUNEL LIVES ON!
128 GWR ENGINEERING? IT NEVER STOPPED!
Introduction
Tyseley Locomotive Works-based GWR 4-6-0s No 4965 Rood Ashton Hall and No 5043 Earl of Mount Edgcumbe accelerate Vintage Trains 'The Cornishman' away from Parsons Tunnel towards Teignmouth on a glorious sunny 15 May 2010 morning in Devon. ADRIAN TAYLOR
There are many who state that the Great Western Railway came to an abrupt end on 1 January 1948, when the Labour government nationalised Britain's railways.
Don't believe a word of it.
No, I'm not going to try to sound clever by telling you that the Great Western Railway company was not formally wound up until 23 December 1949, although that fact is in our unique GWR time chart which runs throughout this volume.
Nevermind the paperwork and the legal document, for the Great Western Railway has never come to an end!
This year, many preservation venues are celebrating GWR175 - the 175th anniversary of the company and its engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel being given the powers to build a steam-powered railway from London Paddington to Bristol Temple Meads.
Just as Brunel's magnificent and world-beating 7ft 0¼in broad gauge system and its wonderful express locomotives with the monstrous driving wheels and oversize copper steamdomes had to giveway to 4ft8½inin the cause of standardisation, so the glorious steamage of Stars, Castles and Kings moved aside for dieselisation.
Nationalisation, however, had little initial effect on the 'go it alone' spirit of the Paddington/Swindon empire. Indeed, after the brief experiment by British Railways of painting express passenger locomotives blue, they all carried GWR Brunswick green - even the mighty LNER and LMS Pacifics.
The Western Region reintroduced the much-loved chocolate and cream coaches and just as Brunel defied the rest of the county with broad gauge, so it chose diesel hydraulic traction as opposed to diesel electrics.
Following the vast pruning of the national rail network from the fifties onwards, the affection felt by so many to the great days of steam, when the GWR regularly broke records, both officially and otherwise, gave much impetus to the preservation movement, and the reopening of closed branch lines and cross country routes largely by volunteers for heritage purposes.The busy branch lines so beloved of summer holidaymakers like Minehead and Kingswear are again thriving, while the idyllic GWR country branch line as epitomised by Chinnor, Buckfastleigh, Bodmin, Cranmore or Lydney Town, can be readily experienced. Not to forget the Severn Valley Railway, one of the world's leading centres for railway preservation, or Didcot Railway Centre, which has amassed the biggest collection of GWR locomotives and stock and even runs regular broad gauge trains.
If the powers that be thought in August 1968 that they had seen the last of steam, they had to think again three years later, when GWR icon No 6000 King George V ended the British Rail steam ban and paved the way for today's flourishing main line charter scene, in which Tyseley Locomotive Works as a maintenance and restoration depot that has specialised in GWR classic, both express locomotives and tank engines, has in this respect inherited the Swindon mantle.
The GWR today is by no means just about nostalgia for the past and preservation. Much of Brunel's west of England empire is now served by First Great Western, named in February 2010 as Train Operator of the Year.
The Class 125 Inter-City High Speed Trains trialled on the Western Region where they debuted in the seventies are still very much with us today, having given more than a third of a century of sterling service. Brunel, who tried replacing steam in the 1840s, long before it has realised anything like its true potential, would have been delighted by them.
Tyseley also runs regular timetabled services, in the form of the steam-hauled 'Shakespeare Express' between Birmingham and Stratford-upon-Avon.
Many of Brunel's classic structures have survived the test of time on the national network and remain asamonument to his ingenuity-Maidenhead bridge, Box Tunnel, Paddington the Royal Albert Bridge.
It is planned to electrify the routes from Paddington to Bristol and South Wales, ensuring that the Great Western still plays an integral role in Britain's transport network for the foreseeable future.
So do not lament the passing of the GWR
when there is somuch of it to see and enjoy
today. InGWR175, we are not celebrating
just the rich legacy of the past, but exactly
what the logo says - 175 glorious years, with
many, many more to come!
Robin Jones
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