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In Darlington, in 2008,
a team of enthusiasts is building

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the first brand-new
British steam locomotive
from scratch in nearly 50 years.

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It's a multi-million pound endeavour
that started nearly 20 years ago.

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Though the project is unique,
the enthusiasm is not.

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Steam engines still have
a huge and passionate
following all over Britain.

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When you're near a steam locomotive,

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there's an almost
elemental force at work.

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You can feel every single aspect
of that machine is working.

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It's passionate, it's theatrical,
it's dirty, noisy, powerful.

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It's heavy metal in motion.

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It's a combination of noise,
and atmosphere,

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vast, cranking engines
and colour and coal and fire.

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I just think it's the most
wonderful thing on earth.

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Most of us think of steam trains
as museum pieces.

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They were a Victorian technology,
dirty, incredibly inefficient
and dangerous.

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But as late as 1968,

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scheduled steam services
still ran on British railways.

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After World War II,
most European countries switched to
diesel and electric powered trains.

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Britain chose to
stick with steam power.

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Thousands of new steam locomotives
were built.

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A quixotic enterprise
doomed to failure.

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The steam engine had been around for
150 years, it had done its job,
the world had moved on.

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The day of the diesel and electric
train had come, and steam had to die.

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Other countries left steam behind
long ago.

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Why did Britain persist?

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And why do we still find it
so hard to let go of steam?

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The origins of Britain's post-war
obsession with steam

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lie in the decision to build
over 2,500 brand-new locomotives
between 1948 and 1960.

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This was in stark contrast
to many European countries,

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which chose to leave Victorian
designed steam power behind.

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If you look at the railways of
Italy, France and Germany,

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which were not entirely destroyed,

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but certainly in Germany,
70% of the bridges were blown up.

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Quite a lot of the railways
were completely destroyed.

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And, particularly in France,
they said, "Right, we are going to,

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"as fast as we possibly can,
build a new railway."

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And when they built their
new railway they said, "Right,

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"we don't want steam any more,
we are going to electrify."

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The destruction of allied Europe's
railways meant they had to be
rebuilt from scratch.

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Our railways hadn't
been destroyed outright.

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It was possible to patch them up,
and keep them running with steam.

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The finances for a complete
overhaul were not yet available.

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There were investment shortages
across the whole of the UK economy.

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And railways were not
top of the agenda, quite rightly.

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There was a National Health Service
to fund, there were houses to build,

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there was a huge housing shortage.
There was a steel industry to revive.

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There were tremendous
investment challenges.

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The railways may not have been
Britain's top priority,

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but their central role in the war
effort had been crucial to victory.

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The use of railways during
the war was a critical element,

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because the railways were not only
operating at volumes that were
much higher than in peace time,

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but there was no time
to maintain the railways.

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Indeed, it was quite dangerous times
to try and maintain the railways.

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The non-stop journey
from Holland to home

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was made possible by the military
authorities and British Railways.

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Red tape was cut
and the green light shown...

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The Second World War left
the four big private companies
completely bankrupt,

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as far as
their infrastructure was concerned,

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pretty much smashed up as well.

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Really, that's why British Railways
came into being

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because the war had rendered
the railways almost inoperable

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as a private source of income,
to a certain extent.

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Most of Europe had operated
nationalised railways
before World War II.

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Britain had run four big,
private railway companies.

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The London
and North Eastern Railway,

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the London, Midland
and Scottish Railway,

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the Southern Railway
and the Great Western Railway.

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We had the combined railways system

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with four major companies,
heavily regulated,

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providing railway services.

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They were utilities,
they weren't particularly profitable,

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and they were largely
taken for granted.

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The four big railway companies
had struggled even before the war.

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When the Labour government
swept into power in 1945,

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they promised to
invest in the railways.

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Nationalisation was on the agenda.

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And the railways,
what have we got there?

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Operated for more than
100 years without a break.

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Feeding a war machine
for six weary years

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without adequate renewals
and repairs that left them
as tired as the rest of us.

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A wonderful,
but complicated heritage,

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that could do with
a bit of sorting out.

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The railways were run down after
the Second World War,

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and the private sector,
quite frankly I think,

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was going to
find it hard to carry on.

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So when the government, as part
of its nationalisation programme,

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offered the railways
the possibility of compensation,

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the owners snatched their hands off,
actually.

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1st January 1948
ushered in a period of new hope.

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The four great railways companies
were brought together
into one single new organisation -

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British Railways.

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It's just a few minutes before
midnight, and very soon,

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the signalman here will signal in

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the last Great Western Railway
train to pass through Reading.

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On day one of British Railways
everyone was thinking,
"We've got a bright future,

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"we're going to modernise,
we're going to be a shining example

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"of a modern
passenger transport system."

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With the passing of the old year,

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the principal railways of
Great Britain, London Transport,

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came under public ownership.
So the first big stride

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was taken towards establishing
in this country

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a publicly owned transport system
under unified management.

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The vesting of the four mainline
companies, and more than 50 others

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in the British Transport Commission,
is indeed an historic occasion.

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You can imagine the scene
at midnight on 31st December.

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In many people's eyes,
become owned by the people,

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whistles were let off, no doubt
caps were thrown into the air.

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A very theatrical moment, a moment
I think of real enthusiasm amongst

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great swathes of the population
that the railways had become

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British Railways,
the people's railway.

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But officially,
the Great Western Railway is dead.

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And to many,
undoubtedly, the late lamented.

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The assets they inherited were
massive. They inherited everything

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that was within the control
of the former railway companies.

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Not only the infrastructure which
they owned, the track, signalling,

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all the locomotives, a very large
number, and we're talking about

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tens of thousands of wagons,
were just not fit for purpose.

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What also came into the railway
operations was shipping, hotels,

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and well over a million people.

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British Railways were
starting a new chapter,
and so were the British people.

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Travel restrictions were lifted,
and people took the opportunity

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to journey around their country
again, looking for light relief.

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After the war, people responded to
the new freedom to travel.

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Firstly, through more and more people
going away on holiday to a resort,

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the archetypal fortnight in Hastings
or Brighton or wherever it was.

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But also through the excursion.

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Both of those were responses
to people's desire to get around,

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and there's no doubt about it, people
started to travel again, big time.

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The mounting pressure on
the world's oldest rail system

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got engineers and managers
thinking about the future.

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The question of steam's
continuing place on our railways
had to be addressed.

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The steam locomotive had been
a very successful technology
for Britain's railways.

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But even in the 1930s,
there had been discussions about

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how great a future, how long
a future steam traction had.

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After the Second World War,
the debate started again.

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What sort of traction
should be used?

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Leading British Railways' search
for a new type of locomotive

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was their chief engineer,
Robin Riddles,

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who had three options to look at.

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Traditional coal-powered steam,
electric or diesel.

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Electric trains had been
successfully run in parts

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of southern England
since the turn of the century.

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They seemed a logical replacement
for steam.

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Electric was superior,
it is superior, it was superior.

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But it cost more. Robin Riddles was
in fact in favour of electrification,

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which was ruled out because of
investment shortages after the war.

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We were in the middle
of the austerity period.

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Electrification required miles
and miles of costly overhead lines.

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Diesel power
was more straightforward.

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Yet the first diesel trains
to run on main lines in 1948
proved very unreliable.

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However, the real argument against
using diesel power at the time

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came down to energy supplies.

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Diesel traction, certainly,
relied on oil.

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There were some people who argued
that we didn't have any oil -

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of course, nobody knew about
North Sea oil in those days -

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and that it would be very foolish
to turn the railways over

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to an oil-based
form of traction, diesel.

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It was felt that coal was an
indigenous fuel from this country,
oil wasn't, and therefore we should

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use coal, we should use it to
continue with steam locomotives
as long as possible, and eventually

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convert the mainline railways
to electricity,

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again using electricity
produced from burning coal.

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Steam was the proven technology.

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Everybody knew how
a steam locomotive worked,

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how it could be used most
effectively, and above all,
steam traction was cheap.

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It was cheap to build, anyway,

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it didn't cost very much
to construct a locomotive.

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Britain was not yet ready
for the expensive switch
to electric or diesel.

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Steam power was cheap
and coal was plentiful.

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But the decision to stick with steam
at this time

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may have been built on
more than just practicalities.

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It may have been influenced
by personal agendas.

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I'm not sure that
it was the right decision.

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Robin Riddles was a frustrated
steam locomotive designer,

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who couldn't wait to actually get in
there and design his own locomotives.

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For many of the people
working in BR,

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it was hard to imagine
a railway without steam.

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Beginning more than a century ago,

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it had helped to make
Britain strong.

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For many who had grown up with it,
steam WAS the railways.

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The train was the first sign
of modernisation,
pre-dating the car, of course.

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A steam train
went to every corner of the country.

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They were the first thing
that knitted Britain together.

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Everything about the railway
was modern. It was new.

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We really can't understand what
it was like to live

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in a predominantly rural society,
when these great iron horses

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were crashing through,
saying to people,

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"This is the future,
you've got to get used to it."

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The engines themselves became
cultural phenomena -

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heroic machines designed
with fearful symmetry.

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Some famous engines became
household names. The Flying Scotsman

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and Mallard, the fastest
steam locomotive of all time.

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British Railways' decision to stick
with steam after World War II
meant that new locomotives

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had to be built,
in places like Darlington Sheds,

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one of the oldest railway workshops
in the world.

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You're OK, we can come down.

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60 years after nationalisation,

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a new locomotive, called Tornado,
is nearing completion.

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It's known as an A1 Class
and it's cost £3 million to build.

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This is a 160 tonne,

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90mph steam locomotive,

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capable of developing something in
the region of 2,600 horse power.

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There'd been 49 of them built,
during a period of 1948 to '49.

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It was the sort of engine that hauled
the fastest trains from King's Cross

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to Newcastle and Edinburgh.

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The major things that they achieved,
compared with the pre-war engines,

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were improvement in
maintenance requirement.

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Easier to turn around and service,
would run on less good quality coal,

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and would run longer
between major overhauls.

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It would've been expected that
these would've been in frontline
service for 35-40 years,

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as their predecessors had been.

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That's it.

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The A1 class is a Pacific.

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And Pacific means that it's got
four small wheels at the front,

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which are just carrying weight,

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six large driving wheels, and
finally two small wheels at the back.

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One of the key features
which goes right the way back to
the Flying Scotsman in 1922

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is the wide firebox which goes right
to the edge of the running plate.

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And on this, there's 50 square feet
of grate fire.

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That's somewhat bigger
than the pre-war engines,
which were 41.5 square feet.

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The locomotive is equipped with
Walschaerts valve gear,

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which is driven through
a series of rods and levers,

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through this device here,
called the radius link.

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Now, this is the essentially
clever part of the steam locomotive,

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which avoids the use of gears.

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And as you start moving quicker,
you gradually wind this in,

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so that by the time
the engine is cruising at 70mph,

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you're probably only actually
admitting steam into the cylinders

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for about 15% of the total stroke
of each piston.

229
00:16:18,080 --> 00:16:20,800
It also explains why
when engines start off,

230
00:16:20,800 --> 00:16:22,920
they make a
very loud chuffing noise...

231
00:16:24,920 --> 00:16:29,080
Cos you're admitting steam for nearly
the whole stroke of the piston,

232
00:16:29,080 --> 00:16:32,880
and then letting out the exhaust, at
not much less than boiler pressure.

233
00:16:35,160 --> 00:16:41,560
But as you wind the gear back,
you're only letting steam in
for a short distance,

234
00:16:41,560 --> 00:16:44,840
so when they're cruising
they're making more of a soft beat,

235
00:16:44,840 --> 00:16:47,240
rather than
the fierce beat at the start.

236
00:16:56,240 --> 00:17:00,440
Tornado is a new engine, but the
design predates British Railways.

237
00:17:01,960 --> 00:17:05,640
Looking forwards as a
single, unified organisation,

238
00:17:05,640 --> 00:17:10,080
BR chose to develop a new class
of steam locomotive for the future.

239
00:17:11,600 --> 00:17:16,920
Locomotive trials were set up
to cherry-pick the best ideas
from the big four companies.

240
00:17:20,440 --> 00:17:23,040
We're knocking four railways
into one.

241
00:17:23,040 --> 00:17:26,240
That's bound to cause
a bit of a clatter!

242
00:17:26,240 --> 00:17:30,200
We're taking the thing a stage
further than it had already gone.

243
00:17:30,200 --> 00:17:34,120
To save waste and overlapping,
we've got to standardise.

244
00:17:34,120 --> 00:17:36,600
And standardisation

245
00:17:36,600 --> 00:17:40,160
on such a big scale as this
can only be done as it comes.

246
00:17:40,160 --> 00:17:45,200
Each railway in the big four group
had their own way of doing things.

247
00:17:45,200 --> 00:17:50,840
Now what we have to do is to examine
them all and take the best from each.

248
00:17:50,840 --> 00:17:53,560
Everything from carriage bogeys
to signalling.

249
00:17:55,240 --> 00:17:58,600
Within two years, designs
had been produced for standard

250
00:17:58,600 --> 00:18:02,760
locomotives for the whole of
the British railway system.

251
00:18:02,760 --> 00:18:09,160
And they were designed specifically
to be as easy to maintain
as was possible.

252
00:18:09,160 --> 00:18:14,880
A simple example of that is that
a lot of the mainline express
locomotives designed

253
00:18:14,880 --> 00:18:17,960
by the big four companies
had four cylinders -

254
00:18:17,960 --> 00:18:22,720
you had the two on the outside,
and then you had two hidden inside.

255
00:18:22,720 --> 00:18:27,840
And maintaining the inside cylinders
was actually very time-consuming
and quite difficult.

256
00:18:27,840 --> 00:18:32,960
The decision was taken very early
on that all of the steam locomotives

257
00:18:32,960 --> 00:18:37,680
produced for the unified
British Railways would all be
two-cylinder locomotives.

258
00:18:37,680 --> 00:18:39,880
It would be possible to get to
the wheels,

259
00:18:39,880 --> 00:18:43,160
it would be possible to get to
the coupling rods and the motion.

260
00:18:43,160 --> 00:18:47,600
You would see, if you had pictures
of the standard locomotives,

261
00:18:47,600 --> 00:18:52,480
they weren't necessarily pretty,
but they were very accessible.

262
00:18:52,480 --> 00:18:58,080
Over the next decade, 999
Standard Class engines were built,

263
00:18:58,080 --> 00:19:01,840
as well as more than
1,500 non-standard engines.

264
00:19:01,840 --> 00:19:05,520
This great variety of locomotives
running on the lines gave rise to

265
00:19:05,520 --> 00:19:09,360
a cultural phenomenon
that celebrated this diversity.

266
00:19:11,400 --> 00:19:15,040
Young boys all over the country
appeared at railway stations

267
00:19:15,040 --> 00:19:17,680
in droves to catch a glimpse of

268
00:19:17,680 --> 00:19:21,520
the weird and wonderful engines
running on Britain's railways.

269
00:19:21,520 --> 00:19:23,880
The spark that ignited

270
00:19:23,880 --> 00:19:27,480
the train-spotting revolution
was Ian Allan's

271
00:19:27,480 --> 00:19:29,960
ABC Guide to Southern Locomotives,

272
00:19:29,960 --> 00:19:34,360
which was published in 1942,
when he was 15.

273
00:19:34,360 --> 00:19:38,280
What it is, it's a list of numbers,
which doesn't sound very exciting,

274
00:19:38,280 --> 00:19:43,920
it's not a great read,
but the point is that you take it
out onto the end of the platform,

275
00:19:43,920 --> 00:19:48,600
and you wait to tick off
the engines as they come past.

276
00:19:48,600 --> 00:19:51,840
And it became very popular
amongst teenage boys.

277
00:19:51,840 --> 00:19:55,080
It was kind of
the iPod of its generation.

278
00:19:56,960 --> 00:20:00,120
Train spotting in 1942 was hip.

279
00:20:00,120 --> 00:20:02,320
It's unthinkable now, but it was.

280
00:20:03,840 --> 00:20:08,960
During the war, Ian Allan
was working for the PR department
at Waterloo Station,

281
00:20:08,960 --> 00:20:12,080
answering letters from the public
asking for information

282
00:20:12,080 --> 00:20:14,800
about Southern Railways
engines and carriages.

283
00:20:14,800 --> 00:20:17,000
One of my chores

284
00:20:17,000 --> 00:20:23,440
was to deal with letters from the
public, asking for information

285
00:20:23,440 --> 00:20:29,240
relating to locomotive names and
numbers and principal dimensions.

286
00:20:29,240 --> 00:20:32,720
It was then that I said,
"Well, why go to all this trouble

287
00:20:32,720 --> 00:20:35,080
"writing separate letters to people?

288
00:20:35,080 --> 00:20:39,040
"We should do this book which
would encompass the whole thing."

289
00:20:40,880 --> 00:20:46,440
The book contained all of the
information about Southern Railway
trains that the enthusiast needed.

290
00:20:46,440 --> 00:20:50,080
Engine classes,
numbers and dimensions.

291
00:20:50,080 --> 00:20:52,440
The first run sold out immediately.

292
00:20:52,440 --> 00:20:56,080
He published guides to other regions
and train spotting took off.

293
00:20:57,600 --> 00:21:01,400
There was very little else
on the market

294
00:21:01,400 --> 00:21:05,440
for boys or girls to participate in.

295
00:21:05,440 --> 00:21:10,520
Because...there wasn't anything on
during the war.

296
00:21:10,520 --> 00:21:13,240
Everything was on a war basis.

297
00:21:13,240 --> 00:21:18,040
And here was something that they
could go down to the local station,

298
00:21:18,040 --> 00:21:19,600
and watch the trains.

299
00:21:21,360 --> 00:21:25,200
Railways did have a romance
attached to them,

300
00:21:25,200 --> 00:21:28,520
they were in a sense a hangover
from the great Victorian period.

301
00:21:28,520 --> 00:21:32,720
There was a sort of a wonderful
permanence about the permanent way.

302
00:21:32,720 --> 00:21:36,040
It was efficient. It did
on the whole run on time,

303
00:21:36,040 --> 00:21:39,440
it brought everything
and took everything away.

304
00:21:39,440 --> 00:21:43,680
The platform, the greeting,
the departing, the arriving,

305
00:21:43,680 --> 00:21:48,440
everything about the station
and the train was exciting,
particularly to children.

306
00:21:48,440 --> 00:21:56,560
So it's not surprising that
it attracted the romantic attachment
that train spotting represented.

307
00:21:56,560 --> 00:21:59,520
Don't you like to do
anything else but the railways?

308
00:21:59,520 --> 00:22:02,640
Well, yeah, there's girls and
horses and...

309
00:22:02,640 --> 00:22:05,600
Yeah, there's other things,
but steam engines are nice,

310
00:22:05,600 --> 00:22:09,440
you feel you have to have a steam
engine, every now and again.

311
00:22:09,440 --> 00:22:13,080
All these chaps say the same,
they've got to have a steam engine.

312
00:22:13,080 --> 00:22:16,800
You might be able to go a fortnight,
then you've got to find one.

313
00:22:16,800 --> 00:22:19,400
That thing's got a voice,
it's making a noise,

314
00:22:19,400 --> 00:22:22,240
it's speaking, it's a terrific
noise, it makes...

315
00:22:22,240 --> 00:22:24,160
Well, it just makes lovely noises.

316
00:22:24,160 --> 00:22:27,080
When it's raising steam,
90 tons of it,

317
00:22:27,080 --> 00:22:29,920
it sings like a kettle,
it's terrific, a lovely thing!

318
00:22:32,240 --> 00:22:36,760
Train spotting was at the heart
of British culture for decades.

319
00:22:36,760 --> 00:22:41,080
Far from being the anorak activity
that its reputation now has,

320
00:22:41,080 --> 00:22:42,880
it was a social activity,

321
00:22:42,880 --> 00:22:45,040
a way for youngsters to meet.

322
00:22:48,240 --> 00:22:52,320
One group of young lads used to
meet up in Southall in London

323
00:22:52,320 --> 00:22:55,160
to share their passion
for the railways.

324
00:22:55,160 --> 00:22:59,880
I suppose it's interesting how we
all got together, we met, which was

325
00:22:59,880 --> 00:23:03,920
basically Southall, the railway
bridge, as far as I'm concerned.

326
00:23:03,920 --> 00:23:08,880
The footbridge was a meeting place
for us, evenings, weekends.

327
00:23:08,880 --> 00:23:11,440
It was a social gathering point.

328
00:23:11,440 --> 00:23:14,000
Exactly. There was
always somebody there.

329
00:23:14,000 --> 00:23:18,520
I often hear this mimicked
in today's society,
"Oh, there wasn't a lot to do."

330
00:23:18,520 --> 00:23:21,600
But in fairness,
in the late '50s, early '60s,

331
00:23:21,600 --> 00:23:23,760
there wasn't a great deal to do.

332
00:23:23,760 --> 00:23:27,400
And we had to find our own fun.

333
00:23:27,400 --> 00:23:33,000
Well, you'd arrive on the bike,
park up your bike on the bridge.

334
00:23:33,000 --> 00:23:37,360
Erm, possibly stock up
with frozen Jubbly and...

335
00:23:37,360 --> 00:23:39,360
Frozen Jubblies, yes! Ha ha!

336
00:23:39,360 --> 00:23:42,880
I mean, you could see right the way
down the line as far as Hanwell,

337
00:23:42,880 --> 00:23:46,000
so you could see trains coming
well over a mile away,

338
00:23:46,000 --> 00:23:49,360
and there was this sort of
crescendo as they approached.

339
00:23:49,360 --> 00:23:52,840
And then the thrill of the thing
going past, getting the number...

340
00:23:52,840 --> 00:23:55,640
Smoke and steam.
Seeing what sort of train it was,

341
00:23:55,640 --> 00:23:59,240
it might have been a milk train,
might have been a parcels or goods...

342
00:24:01,320 --> 00:24:05,000
Many of the pre-war trains were
still running on the main lines,

343
00:24:05,000 --> 00:24:07,120
as well as the new
standard classes.

344
00:24:07,120 --> 00:24:10,320
Locomotive diversity
was at its height.

345
00:24:10,320 --> 00:24:12,840
There was more to see
than there is now.

346
00:24:12,840 --> 00:24:15,200
There were different kinds
of locomotives.

347
00:24:15,200 --> 00:24:19,960
Now, there are only three or four of
the motive units that we might see.

348
00:24:19,960 --> 00:24:23,720
Then you'd see lots and lots of
different engines.

349
00:24:23,720 --> 00:24:27,640
Pre-nationalisation, the coaches
would have different liveries,

350
00:24:27,640 --> 00:24:31,280
it was easier to get to see
really quite odd things.

351
00:24:31,280 --> 00:24:34,000
You would see little
tank engines doing jobs,

352
00:24:34,000 --> 00:24:36,240
or big steam engines coming through.

353
00:24:36,240 --> 00:24:40,760
So there were lots more
things to see.

354
00:24:40,760 --> 00:24:43,760
The nation's youth
celebrated the new steam age.

355
00:24:43,760 --> 00:24:47,600
Britain's romantic view of steam
appeared to be as strong as ever.

356
00:24:49,640 --> 00:24:54,000
The romance that people
attached to it very rarely applied
to the actual workers.

357
00:24:54,000 --> 00:24:58,000
Nothing illustrates the ambivalence
of the British towards modernisation

358
00:24:58,000 --> 00:25:00,520
so much as their attitude
towards a steam train.

359
00:25:00,520 --> 00:25:02,440
No, they wouldn't do it themselves.

360
00:25:02,440 --> 00:25:07,560
But, yes, they wanted someone else
to do it, because they rather liked
the romance of it.

361
00:25:07,560 --> 00:25:10,960
As a teenager, Peter Gransden
worked for British Railways

362
00:25:10,960 --> 00:25:15,400
stoking the fires on locomotives
in the last years of steam.

363
00:25:15,400 --> 00:25:17,240
The only light thing on the railways

364
00:25:17,240 --> 00:25:18,800
was the wage packet.

365
00:25:18,800 --> 00:25:21,200
Everything else was pretty hard.

366
00:25:21,200 --> 00:25:24,640
Some jobs were easy, but the
majority of actually running

367
00:25:24,640 --> 00:25:27,000
the railway
were very difficult jobs.

368
00:25:27,000 --> 00:25:29,600
You know, not much money
and long hours.

369
00:25:31,880 --> 00:25:35,160
The fireman, he literally
looks after the fire

370
00:25:35,160 --> 00:25:39,120
and also looks after the water
in the boiler for making steam,

371
00:25:39,120 --> 00:25:41,840
and he also has to look out
for the signals,

372
00:25:41,840 --> 00:25:47,800
because the driver is on
the opposite side of the train
to where the signals are.

373
00:25:47,800 --> 00:25:51,200
So he has quite a lot to do.
Yeah, it was dirty.

374
00:25:51,200 --> 00:25:55,360
I mean, you got bloody filthy.

375
00:25:55,360 --> 00:25:58,800
And, like, you had no
washing facilities on the sheds,

376
00:25:58,800 --> 00:26:01,480
and you had a bucket,
and you filled the bucket up

377
00:26:01,480 --> 00:26:04,920
from the overflow from the
injectors, you'd get a bar of soap,

378
00:26:04,920 --> 00:26:07,520
and you'd have the best wash
you could from that.

379
00:26:07,520 --> 00:26:10,560
And if you was on some turns,
and you were going out

380
00:26:10,560 --> 00:26:14,120
with your girlfriend of an evening,
you'd get as much dirt off

381
00:26:14,120 --> 00:26:17,040
as you could and hope it didn't rain
because if it rained

382
00:26:17,040 --> 00:26:20,200
you'd have all dirty streaks
down your face out of your hair!

383
00:26:20,200 --> 00:26:22,080
Which didn't look very good, really.

384
00:26:28,000 --> 00:26:30,560
As time wore on,
it wasn't just the railwaymen

385
00:26:30,560 --> 00:26:33,560
who had had enough of
the dirty Victorian technology.

386
00:26:33,560 --> 00:26:36,960
The general British public were
starting to tire of it as well.

387
00:26:40,400 --> 00:26:45,400
In the immediate years after
the war, rail was the only option
for long distance travel.

388
00:26:45,400 --> 00:26:50,640
During the '50s, what happened was
that the railways were slow,

389
00:26:50,640 --> 00:26:53,360
they weren't desperately keen.

390
00:26:53,360 --> 00:26:57,440
Most people took their holidays
from Saturday to Saturday

391
00:26:57,440 --> 00:27:00,040
over eight or nine weeks
in the summer.

392
00:27:00,040 --> 00:27:03,640
The railways actually
couldn't handle the development

393
00:27:03,640 --> 00:27:09,280
of holidays with pay, as it
became known in the early 1950s.

394
00:27:09,280 --> 00:27:13,520
And many people and many families'
only experience of long-distance
rail travel

395
00:27:13,520 --> 00:27:17,320
was on summer Saturdays
in dirty, clapped-out coaches

396
00:27:17,320 --> 00:27:19,520
with trains running
increasingly late.

397
00:27:19,520 --> 00:27:22,560
And as soon as they had the
opportunity to buy a family car,

398
00:27:22,560 --> 00:27:25,040
they just never travelled
on the train at all.

399
00:27:25,040 --> 00:27:28,960
They may have done
if they were commuting to work in
London or another city.

400
00:27:28,960 --> 00:27:32,880
But the thought of getting
on the train to go on your holidays,

401
00:27:32,880 --> 00:27:35,880
by the mid 1960s,
fewer and fewer people did so.

402
00:27:37,720 --> 00:27:41,560
Not only was BR losing its public,
but also their freight services

403
00:27:41,560 --> 00:27:46,560
were increasingly in decline, as
more goods were transported by road.

404
00:27:46,560 --> 00:27:50,400
British Railways ceased to be
a profitable company.

405
00:27:51,920 --> 00:27:55,040
Well, quite simply,
what happened in 1948 to 1955

406
00:27:55,040 --> 00:27:57,640
is that British Rail
began to lose money.

407
00:27:57,640 --> 00:28:01,920
It began to register operating
deficits,

408
00:28:01,920 --> 00:28:06,080
having not done so previously,
and it was

409
00:28:06,080 --> 00:28:10,080
being challenged by road transport,
both on the freight side,

410
00:28:10,080 --> 00:28:13,000
and on the passenger side,
for the first time.

411
00:28:13,000 --> 00:28:15,240
And I think, therefore,

412
00:28:15,240 --> 00:28:19,160
this is the origin of what was
called the British Rail problem.

413
00:28:19,160 --> 00:28:23,280
And I think this informs attitudes to
motive power.

414
00:28:23,280 --> 00:28:26,280
How can we get operating costs down?

415
00:28:26,280 --> 00:28:31,160
And one of the ways
that one could do that was to
replace steam with diesel.

416
00:28:31,160 --> 00:28:35,880
After the war, it had not been
seen as cost effective to leave

417
00:28:35,880 --> 00:28:39,200
steam behind because coal
was still cheap and plentiful.

418
00:28:39,200 --> 00:28:42,680
Within a few years,
coal prices were on the rise,

419
00:28:42,680 --> 00:28:44,920
and oil prices were dropping.

420
00:28:44,920 --> 00:28:49,600
The time had come to make the
big switch to diesel power.

421
00:28:49,600 --> 00:28:54,000
By the middle of the 1950s it was
becoming apparent that steam was not

422
00:28:54,000 --> 00:28:57,400
going to be easy to perpetuate.
Several things were working

423
00:28:57,400 --> 00:29:00,960
against it. The price of coal was
going up fairly dramatically.

424
00:29:00,960 --> 00:29:04,920
Of course, steam locomotives
are messy things that tend to need

425
00:29:04,920 --> 00:29:08,720
maintenance 24 hours a day, and it
was becoming more and more difficult

426
00:29:08,720 --> 00:29:10,240
to get people to work on them.

427
00:29:10,240 --> 00:29:13,720
In 1955,
the British Transport Commission,

428
00:29:13,720 --> 00:29:18,280
which by that point had
taken over all responsibility for

429
00:29:18,280 --> 00:29:20,600
strategic planning on the railway,

430
00:29:20,600 --> 00:29:25,080
announced a modernisation plan
to spend really quite considerable

431
00:29:25,080 --> 00:29:27,880
amounts of capital for
modernisation of the railways.

432
00:29:27,880 --> 00:29:31,520
A key element of the plan
was the abolition of steam traction

433
00:29:31,520 --> 00:29:35,960
because it was now felt that
diesel traction had developed

434
00:29:35,960 --> 00:29:38,600
to the point where it was a viable,
workable technology.

435
00:29:38,600 --> 00:29:40,880
And also that there should be some

436
00:29:40,880 --> 00:29:44,680
large-scale electrification
of Britain's main lines.

437
00:29:44,680 --> 00:29:49,040
So by the mid-1950s it was widely
recognised within the industry and

438
00:29:49,040 --> 00:29:52,880
outside the industry that
steam traction was coming

439
00:29:52,880 --> 00:29:55,040
to the end of its useful life.

440
00:29:55,040 --> 00:29:57,240
Steam overreached itself.

441
00:29:57,240 --> 00:30:01,720
The world moved on, and steam
paid little heed to change.

442
00:30:01,720 --> 00:30:03,760
In the kingdom of the railways,

443
00:30:03,760 --> 00:30:07,120
diesel and electric have usurped
the throne.

444
00:30:07,120 --> 00:30:09,680
The glory of steam is played out.

445
00:30:09,680 --> 00:30:11,960
Finished. Gone.

446
00:30:14,840 --> 00:30:17,480
Despite the fact that nearly
2,000 standard

447
00:30:17,480 --> 00:30:20,760
and non-standard engines
had been built by the mid '50s,

448
00:30:20,760 --> 00:30:23,720
the writing was on the
wall for steam power.

449
00:30:27,000 --> 00:30:30,960
British Railways were
promised a new lease of life.

450
00:30:30,960 --> 00:30:33,840
A vast modernisation plan to be
carried out

451
00:30:33,840 --> 00:30:39,000
over 15 years at a
cost of more than £1,500 million.

452
00:30:39,000 --> 00:30:43,160
The days of the grand old
steam locomotives were numbered.

453
00:30:46,840 --> 00:30:50,720
These sleek
new giants began to take their place.

454
00:30:50,720 --> 00:30:54,600
The transition from steam to
newer forms of traction

455
00:30:54,600 --> 00:30:57,040
was not an altogether smooth one.

456
00:30:57,040 --> 00:30:59,120
HORN BLOWS

457
00:30:59,120 --> 00:31:01,120
The result was, on the one hand,

458
00:31:01,120 --> 00:31:04,880
that the rate of withdrawal
of steam traction increased.

459
00:31:04,880 --> 00:31:09,200
So steam locomotives were taken out
of service more and more rapidly.

460
00:31:09,200 --> 00:31:11,560
But the new diesels often
broke down.

461
00:31:11,560 --> 00:31:15,360
They were often unreliable, or
some of them were unreliable.

462
00:31:15,360 --> 00:31:20,000
So quite often in the late 1950s
and early 1960s, British Railways

463
00:31:20,000 --> 00:31:23,000
was faced with the unenviable image

464
00:31:23,000 --> 00:31:27,440
of brand-new diesel locomotives
being hauled back,

465
00:31:27,440 --> 00:31:30,400
rescued, as it were, from breakdowns

466
00:31:30,400 --> 00:31:33,760
by the old-fashioned
steam locomotive.

467
00:31:35,280 --> 00:31:37,640
The passing of steam was happening.

468
00:31:37,640 --> 00:31:39,840
Even the railway enthusiasts
could see

469
00:31:39,840 --> 00:31:42,080
that the age of steam
could not carry on.

470
00:31:42,080 --> 00:31:44,640
The age of steam had to finish

471
00:31:44,640 --> 00:31:49,560
because it is an inefficient
means of transportation.

472
00:31:49,560 --> 00:31:51,520
Burning coal to turn water
into steam

473
00:31:51,520 --> 00:31:53,280
is very, very, very inefficient.

474
00:31:53,280 --> 00:31:56,400
It's dirty, and it's
manpower intensive,

475
00:31:56,400 --> 00:32:01,360
and I don't think it could've
survived into the 21st century.

476
00:32:01,360 --> 00:32:03,960
Even if they'd had
the will to do so.

477
00:32:03,960 --> 00:32:07,880
Steam was dirty, noisy
and impractical.

478
00:32:07,880 --> 00:32:10,040
New diesels were clean,
safe and quiet.

479
00:32:10,040 --> 00:32:13,560
For many of the people
working on the trains every day,

480
00:32:13,560 --> 00:32:17,640
the end of steam could
not come soon enough.

481
00:32:17,640 --> 00:32:20,920
Bill, how do you like
driving one of these new diesels?

482
00:32:20,920 --> 00:32:24,440
Oh, I like them very much, I think
they're a driver's dream, you know.

483
00:32:24,440 --> 00:32:28,320
It's vastly different
altogether to the old steam engine,

484
00:32:28,320 --> 00:32:29,640
they're much cleaner.

485
00:32:29,640 --> 00:32:32,240
Do you get as much satisfaction
out of the job

486
00:32:32,240 --> 00:32:35,120
as you did driving the old
steam locos? I think so,

487
00:32:35,120 --> 00:32:37,520
and as a matter of
fact, now I'm used to it,

488
00:32:37,520 --> 00:32:41,240
I get more satisfaction.
Why I say that is because,

489
00:32:41,240 --> 00:32:45,040
with the old steam engine
with its faults and that,

490
00:32:45,040 --> 00:32:48,120
we did have some difficulty in
maintaining the schedule

491
00:32:48,120 --> 00:32:49,200
when we got behind,

492
00:32:49,200 --> 00:32:52,600
but owing to the enormous
amount of reserve power that

493
00:32:52,600 --> 00:32:55,240
we've got with these,
we can pick up

494
00:32:55,240 --> 00:32:58,960
quite a lot of time and maintain an
on-time schedule.

495
00:33:01,840 --> 00:33:07,080
The modernisation plan had promised
an end to steam-powered locomotives,

496
00:33:07,080 --> 00:33:10,480
but steam engines carried on
being built for several years.

497
00:33:14,640 --> 00:33:19,640
British Railways continued to
make steam locomotives until 1960.

498
00:33:19,640 --> 00:33:22,880
The modernisation plan of 1955
had said that steam locomotives

499
00:33:22,880 --> 00:33:26,960
will eventually be eliminated,
though it didn't give a timescale.

500
00:33:26,960 --> 00:33:32,840
And the steam locomotives that
were being built into 1960 had,

501
00:33:32,840 --> 00:33:36,440
essentially, a useful life
of between 25 and 30 years.

502
00:33:36,440 --> 00:33:40,560
And it wasn't until March 1960 that
the last steam locomotive

503
00:33:40,560 --> 00:33:43,560
was built for
Britain's mainline railways.

504
00:33:43,560 --> 00:33:46,920
It was built at Swindon,
and in the tradition

505
00:33:46,920 --> 00:33:51,160
of the Great Western Railway and
Swindon Works of naming engines after

506
00:33:51,160 --> 00:33:56,120
the stars in the heavens, it was
called, appropriately, Evening Star.

507
00:33:58,280 --> 00:34:02,240
Evening Star was, in many ways,
a normal steam engine,

508
00:34:02,240 --> 00:34:06,200
built to haul
heavy freight and passenger trains.

509
00:34:06,200 --> 00:34:09,560
But the men who built and named
her knew the significance she held.

510
00:34:09,560 --> 00:34:13,680
The ceremony to launch Evening Star
was a sombre and poignant affair.

511
00:34:16,200 --> 00:34:19,640
And d'you know, the
incredible thing about Evening Star

512
00:34:19,640 --> 00:34:24,720
is, having been completed in 1960,
it was out of service by 1965.

513
00:34:24,720 --> 00:34:28,280
Five years' work, just gives you
an idea of the, almost the...

514
00:34:28,280 --> 00:34:32,320
if not undue haste,
certainly the ill-planned haste

515
00:34:32,320 --> 00:34:35,760
with which the transition to
steam and diesel took place.

516
00:34:35,760 --> 00:34:38,320
HORN BLOWS

517
00:34:40,040 --> 00:34:42,880
There was this assumption that
steam would keep going

518
00:34:42,880 --> 00:34:44,600
until the early or the mid 1970s,

519
00:34:44,600 --> 00:34:47,040
so it wasn't completely crackers

520
00:34:47,040 --> 00:34:50,240
to build Evening Star,
on that assumption.

521
00:34:50,240 --> 00:34:52,440
But what happens is, you get
this shift

522
00:34:52,440 --> 00:34:54,520
at the end of the
'50s where they say,

523
00:34:54,520 --> 00:34:56,960
"Well, we've got
to build diesels

524
00:34:57,000 --> 00:34:59,800
"because they're going
to be cheaper,"

525
00:34:59,800 --> 00:35:01,520
and there's this momentum.

526
00:35:01,520 --> 00:35:06,120
You can't just stop construction
programmes just like that.

527
00:35:06,120 --> 00:35:08,280
The unions object,
this kind of thing.

528
00:35:11,600 --> 00:35:15,840
Perfectly good steam trains started
to be taken off the railway

529
00:35:15,840 --> 00:35:17,440
and out of use for ever.

530
00:35:17,440 --> 00:35:21,000
The locomotives and carriages
were sent to scrap yards.

531
00:35:21,000 --> 00:35:24,080
But BR recognised the importance
to the nation's heritage in some

532
00:35:24,080 --> 00:35:26,640
of these locomotive engines,

533
00:35:26,640 --> 00:35:31,000
and decided to save a number
of them for posterity.

534
00:35:31,000 --> 00:35:34,880
British Railways produced a list of
the 71 steam locomotives

535
00:35:34,880 --> 00:35:36,960
it felt ought to be preserved.

536
00:35:36,960 --> 00:35:41,320
That was a huge commitment,
because they weren't thinking about

537
00:35:41,320 --> 00:35:45,600
populating a whole network of
heritage railways. This was...

538
00:35:45,600 --> 00:35:49,160
Their perception
was of static museums.

539
00:35:49,160 --> 00:35:53,560
I think it's a pretty long list
rather than a short one, when you

540
00:35:53,560 --> 00:35:57,760
consider what they were committing
future generations to holding on to.

541
00:35:59,280 --> 00:36:02,800
The list of 71 contained
many well known engines,

542
00:36:02,800 --> 00:36:05,160
covering steam's long history.

543
00:36:05,160 --> 00:36:07,680
But most were from
the previous century,

544
00:36:07,680 --> 00:36:12,360
ignoring the working locomotives
known and loved by trains potters.

545
00:36:12,360 --> 00:36:15,560
Some enthusiasts were
bound to be disappointed.

546
00:36:17,080 --> 00:36:19,960
Well, I think we got together on
the footbridge,

547
00:36:19,960 --> 00:36:23,040
and we though we'd
better have a meeting about this.

548
00:36:23,040 --> 00:36:26,560
So we had this meeting and,
because I'd got a typewriter,

549
00:36:26,560 --> 00:36:30,320
I said, "Well, I'll write a letter
to The Railway Magazine."

550
00:36:31,840 --> 00:36:35,600
The letter called for donations
from fellow enthusiasts

551
00:36:35,600 --> 00:36:38,800
to buy a 14XX
steam engine from British Railways.

552
00:36:38,800 --> 00:36:40,400
A couple of months went by,

553
00:36:40,400 --> 00:36:43,240
and to be fair, we may
have thought, "Ah, well,

554
00:36:43,240 --> 00:36:46,200
"it's not gonna happen, but
it's nice while it lasted."

555
00:36:46,200 --> 00:36:50,160
And I was on holiday in the Lake
District, on a camping holiday,

556
00:36:50,160 --> 00:36:53,960
and my post was forwarded
to me by my mother,

557
00:36:53,960 --> 00:36:57,480
and I opened up this envelope in the
middle of the Lake District,

558
00:36:57,480 --> 00:36:59,720
to find a £10 cheque
in it from somebody,

559
00:36:59,720 --> 00:37:03,880
subscribing to my appeal for the
money to buy this engine,

560
00:37:03,880 --> 00:37:05,840
and I thought, "Goodness!

561
00:37:05,840 --> 00:37:09,120
"What are we gonna do now?!" Yeah,
what are we gonna do now, yeah!

562
00:37:12,040 --> 00:37:15,560
Within a few months, they had
received enough money

563
00:37:15,560 --> 00:37:18,400
to buy the engine
and begin restoring it.

564
00:37:20,040 --> 00:37:22,240
Well, it's not looking so bad.

565
00:37:22,240 --> 00:37:26,640
Although, er, how many hundred pounds
did we have to pay for it now?

566
00:37:26,640 --> 00:37:29,520
950. No, six hundred and...

567
00:37:29,520 --> 00:37:31,680
I think it was £690.

568
00:37:31,680 --> 00:37:33,840
There was certainly
change out of £1,000.

569
00:37:33,840 --> 00:37:37,000
And a £50 delivery charge, I think.

570
00:37:38,080 --> 00:37:39,200
Dear me! So...!

571
00:37:44,560 --> 00:37:48,320
Then we thought,
where are we gonna put it?

572
00:37:48,320 --> 00:37:50,520
You know, who's got the biggest
back garden?

573
00:37:52,920 --> 00:37:55,840
We had a steam engine,
a good steam engine, that worked.

574
00:37:55,840 --> 00:37:59,240
And we thought, "Well,
we wanna make it work."

575
00:37:59,240 --> 00:38:01,120
None of us had ever driven
a steam engine,

576
00:38:01,120 --> 00:38:02,880
didn't know how to light it up.

577
00:38:02,880 --> 00:38:05,360
Eventually, we found somebody

578
00:38:05,360 --> 00:38:07,640
who could give us some advice. 

579
00:38:18,360 --> 00:38:21,200
Literally, we steamed this
engine on a bit of track,

580
00:38:21,200 --> 00:38:22,960
which had a road right next to it.

581
00:38:22,960 --> 00:38:26,360
We were puffing this
engine up and down.

582
00:38:26,360 --> 00:38:30,760
I've always thought, right from the
earliest days of the society, that,

583
00:38:30,760 --> 00:38:33,040
erm, because we were 16,

584
00:38:33,040 --> 00:38:38,080
we weren't experts at raising funds,
buying railway engines,

585
00:38:38,080 --> 00:38:40,600
doing any of this type of thing.

586
00:38:40,600 --> 00:38:42,880
And I think that meant
that we had no conception

587
00:38:42,880 --> 00:38:47,560
of the fact that probably what we
were trying to do wasn't possible.

588
00:38:47,560 --> 00:38:49,280
Which is why we went on and did it.

589
00:38:59,960 --> 00:39:02,880
The Southall boys were
not alone in their crusade.

590
00:39:02,880 --> 00:39:09,120
Others were racing against the clock
to preserve steam's heritage.

591
00:39:09,120 --> 00:39:13,120
The axing of trains and
lines continued apace.

592
00:39:13,120 --> 00:39:15,080
The modernisation
plan hadn't worked.

593
00:39:15,080 --> 00:39:17,600
The railways were losing
more money than ever.

594
00:39:24,240 --> 00:39:27,040
Well, from the mid '50s,
things began to change.

595
00:39:27,040 --> 00:39:31,440
There was no fuel rationing affecting
private motoring,

596
00:39:31,440 --> 00:39:37,520
road transport
began to get a great impetus
from new road building, culminating

597
00:39:37,520 --> 00:39:42,480
in the first motorway,
the M1, in 1959.

598
00:39:42,480 --> 00:39:45,840
It was a period of
economic prosperity.

599
00:39:45,840 --> 00:39:48,800
It was important that the
railways didn't fall behind.

600
00:39:48,800 --> 00:39:52,520
But one could say that they were
already in a difficult position.

601
00:39:54,320 --> 00:39:57,720
Within the Ministry of Transport,
there was a feeling that road

602
00:39:57,720 --> 00:40:03,520
transport was important to invest in
because rail transport was declining.

603
00:40:03,520 --> 00:40:07,000
It was certainly losing market share.

604
00:40:07,000 --> 00:40:11,920
The Beeching report of 1963
advocated the closure

605
00:40:11,920 --> 00:40:14,080
of money-losing regional lines,

606
00:40:14,080 --> 00:40:17,840
and speeded up the changeover
to diesel powered trains.

607
00:40:17,840 --> 00:40:20,000
Of course, some of you will say,

608
00:40:20,000 --> 00:40:23,040
"Well, what about all
this modernisation?

609
00:40:23,040 --> 00:40:26,400
"Can't we have
the branch lines as well?

610
00:40:26,400 --> 00:40:31,240
"Can't you attract enough traffic
to them to make them pay?"

611
00:40:31,240 --> 00:40:32,800
But unfortunately, we can't.

612
00:40:32,800 --> 00:40:35,520
We cannot make them pay,

613
00:40:35,520 --> 00:40:40,200
because the traffic is not there,
and so many people have motor cars.

614
00:40:40,200 --> 00:40:45,320
The real question is whether you,
as owners of the railways, want us

615
00:40:45,320 --> 00:40:48,800
to go on running these services,
at very high cost,

616
00:40:48,800 --> 00:40:53,000
when the demand for
them has very largely disappeared.

617
00:40:53,000 --> 00:40:55,920
Steam was being withdrawn
at a time

618
00:40:55,920 --> 00:41:00,200
when the nature of the
railway itself was changing.

619
00:41:00,200 --> 00:41:03,880
The railway was now being seen by
railway managers

620
00:41:03,880 --> 00:41:05,960
and many politicians alike

621
00:41:05,960 --> 00:41:09,640
as something which
would become much more specialised.

622
00:41:09,640 --> 00:41:13,320
The railway would do
what it could do best -

623
00:41:13,320 --> 00:41:17,560
fast, inter-city passenger
trains, bulk freight trains...

624
00:41:17,560 --> 00:41:20,520
Yes, there was gonna be money for
modernisation, but it was going

625
00:41:20,520 --> 00:41:24,080
to be modernisation money spent
on a much smaller railway system,

626
00:41:24,080 --> 00:41:26,320
a much more specialised
railway system.

627
00:41:27,840 --> 00:41:32,120
To reclaim the market being
lost to private motoring,

628
00:41:32,120 --> 00:41:34,200
BR introduced a new
and elite service.

629
00:41:34,200 --> 00:41:38,320
Naturally, the ultra-modern trains
used diesel engines, not steam.

630
00:41:39,840 --> 00:41:42,640
Luxury Pullmans provide
one of the answers.

631
00:41:42,640 --> 00:41:46,440
Here's the first, introduced
on the Manchester to London run.

632
00:41:46,440 --> 00:41:48,600
It's good but pricey.

633
00:41:48,600 --> 00:41:51,320
It's already called the
Expense Account train.

634
00:41:51,320 --> 00:41:56,520
The coaches are air conditioned
and draught proof.

635
00:41:56,520 --> 00:42:00,200
The food is excellent,
all cooked in a spotless kitchen.

636
00:42:02,120 --> 00:42:05,400
And as it cruises along comfortably
at an average speed of 90mph,

637
00:42:05,400 --> 00:42:09,160
it cocks a snook at
the traffic on the M1.

638
00:42:13,360 --> 00:42:17,360
Beeching regarded the
electrification of the railway

639
00:42:17,360 --> 00:42:19,720
and the dieselification of the
railway, if that's the word,

640
00:42:19,720 --> 00:42:22,680
he regarded it as simply the emblem
of modernisation.

641
00:42:22,680 --> 00:42:25,000
The new Britain, the Britain
of the '60s,

642
00:42:25,000 --> 00:42:27,960
had nothing to do with
this filthy, old technology.

643
00:42:29,960 --> 00:42:31,760
He also had to grapple with
the fact

644
00:42:31,760 --> 00:42:35,400
that he was running steam engines
on branch lines with no passengers.

645
00:42:35,400 --> 00:42:38,320
And the fact that
people appeared to love them hadn't

646
00:42:38,320 --> 00:42:42,400
made them use them. So Beeching saw
the end of steam as the advent of

647
00:42:42,400 --> 00:42:45,920
rationalism, as well as of
modernisation, in British Industry.

648
00:42:45,920 --> 00:42:49,160
I mean, he wasn't a railwayman
himself. He was just sensible.

649
00:42:49,160 --> 00:42:51,880
And he realised this had
to be the great battle,

650
00:42:51,880 --> 00:42:53,600
and he fought it and he won it.

651
00:42:58,640 --> 00:43:01,520
The closure of underused
branch lines

652
00:43:01,520 --> 00:43:04,640
upset and
isolated rural communities.

653
00:43:04,640 --> 00:43:07,600
The final steam services could
draw huge crowds,

654
00:43:07,600 --> 00:43:10,360
as people came
to lament the passing of an era.

655
00:43:18,200 --> 00:43:22,480
Living appropriately in a station 14
months derelict, Miss Laurence Aston,

656
00:43:22,480 --> 00:43:26,800
35 years a railways worker, broods on
the injustice of bureaucracy

657
00:43:26,800 --> 00:43:29,080
and the wrongs
of the Great Western Railway.

658
00:43:29,080 --> 00:43:30,760
Were you here when
the last train left?

659
00:43:30,760 --> 00:43:32,880
Yes, I was. Tell me about that.

660
00:43:34,960 --> 00:43:39,200
Well, it was a long train
with a big engine, and crowded.

661
00:43:39,200 --> 00:43:41,480
Of course they
couldn't crowd it before.

662
00:43:41,480 --> 00:43:44,160
But this was the last trip.

663
00:43:45,480 --> 00:43:49,120
And to most of them, it was
just a junket thing, a party,

664
00:43:49,120 --> 00:43:50,920
an excuse to make a noise.

665
00:43:50,920 --> 00:43:55,200
But to me it was like riding
behind a hearse, it really was.

666
00:44:04,080 --> 00:44:07,480
Throughout the country,
throughout the '60s,

667
00:44:07,480 --> 00:44:10,840
steam was clinically
removed from

668
00:44:10,840 --> 00:44:14,320
first railway sheds,
but then from complete regions.

669
00:44:14,320 --> 00:44:19,640
For instance, the Western region,
which covered an enormous area,

670
00:44:19,640 --> 00:44:23,280
was basically steam free
by the end of 1965.

671
00:44:24,960 --> 00:44:28,880
And another one of the last of the
300 steam locomotives

672
00:44:28,880 --> 00:44:32,360
in service with
British Railways comes to the end

673
00:44:32,360 --> 00:44:36,760
of the line, to its final resting
place in a sidings

674
00:44:36,760 --> 00:44:41,160
which is becoming
known as the graveyard of steam.

675
00:44:41,160 --> 00:44:48,480
In one year alone, 500 locomotives,
4,000 coaches, 130,000 wagons

676
00:44:48,480 --> 00:44:53,320
and 250,000 tons of rail
were destroyed without sentiment.

677
00:45:00,200 --> 00:45:03,520
David Shepherd is one of
Britain's most well known artists,

678
00:45:03,520 --> 00:45:05,600
who made his name painting
wildlife.

679
00:45:05,600 --> 00:45:10,520
In 1967, he dropped everything
to paint the last days of steam.

680
00:45:10,520 --> 00:45:15,040
In my days as an artist,
I had suddenly realised,
like everybody else in England

681
00:45:15,040 --> 00:45:17,160
who were interested in railways,

682
00:45:17,160 --> 00:45:18,800
that it was going, and going fast.

683
00:45:18,800 --> 00:45:21,040
And through the eyes of
a painter, I thought,

684
00:45:21,040 --> 00:45:22,560
I have to do something about this.

685
00:45:22,560 --> 00:45:24,200
So I got involved with
the steam sheds,

686
00:45:24,200 --> 00:45:25,840
Nine Elms and Guildford particularly.

687
00:45:25,840 --> 00:45:28,400
Nine Elms shed was more
full of railway enthusiasts

688
00:45:28,400 --> 00:45:29,680
than it was of railwaymen.

689
00:45:29,680 --> 00:45:31,800
It was clamouring with railway
enthusiasts,

690
00:45:31,800 --> 00:45:34,520
trying to experience in
one way or another the end of steam.

691
00:45:34,520 --> 00:45:36,520
There was no control.
I felt sorry for BR, as they

692
00:45:36,520 --> 00:45:39,160
were trying to run a railway
while all this was going on!

693
00:45:39,160 --> 00:45:41,480
This one is actually one of my
favourites,

694
00:45:41,480 --> 00:45:43,720
in the sense that
it's one of the toughest I did.

695
00:45:43,720 --> 00:45:47,640
Three different angles of a circle,
which is in itself bloody difficult.

696
00:45:47,640 --> 00:45:49,320
Wheels that way, body that way.

697
00:45:49,320 --> 00:45:52,000
But that's the most valuable part
of this painting,

698
00:45:52,000 --> 00:45:54,360
and I don't
believe you could get that colour,

699
00:45:54,360 --> 00:45:56,240
sensitivity of colour,
in a photograph.

700
00:45:56,240 --> 00:46:00,160
And the dirt, lovely, much more
exciting than a red buffer beam.

701
00:46:00,160 --> 00:46:02,000
I don't paint happy railway pictures,

702
00:46:02,000 --> 00:46:05,400
shafts of sunlight coming through
a soot-encrusted hole in the roof.

703
00:46:05,400 --> 00:46:08,080
Everything was falling apart,
little plays of light

704
00:46:08,080 --> 00:46:09,520
on the oil on the shed floor.

705
00:46:09,520 --> 00:46:11,440
People say,
what's that white stripe?

706
00:46:11,440 --> 00:46:14,920
It's the light, the sunlight catching
the edge of the inspection pit.

707
00:46:16,480 --> 00:46:19,200
You know, you have to go in and see
it, to do that,

708
00:46:19,200 --> 00:46:21,280
it never would have occurred to me.

709
00:46:21,280 --> 00:46:24,080
Happy days, wonderful days.
The sheer hell of doing it was,

710
00:46:24,080 --> 00:46:26,440
oh, God, the painting I
did at Wilson's sheds,

711
00:46:26,440 --> 00:46:28,360
the snow was coming through the roof.

712
00:46:28,360 --> 00:46:30,280
And it was black by the
time it hit the ground!

713
00:46:30,280 --> 00:46:32,920
The main thing was, I was
trying to record the last

714
00:46:32,920 --> 00:46:35,760
days of steam through the eyes of an
artist, rather than a photographer.

715
00:46:35,760 --> 00:46:37,640
It's the colours that were
interesting, not the shape of

716
00:46:37,640 --> 00:46:39,720
the wheels, that didn't matter,
cos the camera did that.

717
00:46:39,720 --> 00:46:42,640
That's why those sketches
are so valuable to me.

718
00:46:42,640 --> 00:46:45,720
They're not worth any money, but
they're irreplaceable to me,

719
00:46:45,720 --> 00:46:49,880
because they were done in the heat of
the moment, the dying days of steam.

720
00:46:49,880 --> 00:46:52,240
One of my many rushed
visits to Guildford shed,

721
00:46:52,240 --> 00:46:54,200
just down the road from where
we lived.

722
00:46:54,200 --> 00:46:56,240
Just at the right moment,
I saw this loco,

723
00:46:56,240 --> 00:46:58,920
half in the sun and
half in the shadow, just by chance,

724
00:46:58,920 --> 00:47:02,400
and I thought, what an opportunity,
with the subtle colours

725
00:47:02,400 --> 00:47:05,000
on a dirty engine, in
the sun and in the shade.

726
00:47:05,000 --> 00:47:09,800
And also, I noticed they had cleaned
the number around so that they could

727
00:47:09,800 --> 00:47:12,280
at least identify the number
of the engine,

728
00:47:12,280 --> 00:47:15,960
otherwise that would have
been invisible like everything else.

729
00:47:15,960 --> 00:47:18,400
I think it was premature urge to,
of necessity,

730
00:47:18,400 --> 00:47:20,040
go into diesels and electrics.

731
00:47:20,040 --> 00:47:22,600
Steam could have lasted longer, but
it wouldn't have done

732
00:47:22,600 --> 00:47:25,040
because you wouldn't get the people
to put up with it now,

733
00:47:25,040 --> 00:47:27,000
all the dirt and everything I've
described.

734
00:47:27,000 --> 00:47:30,000
People don't want to get filthy dirty
when they go to London,

735
00:47:30,000 --> 00:47:33,320
or anywhere for that matter. So it
would have died, and it had to die,

736
00:47:33,320 --> 00:47:36,640
but it was just disgusting the way it
went out. Get rid of it, filthy.

737
00:47:36,640 --> 00:47:38,960
We should have been proud of our
steam engines.

738
00:47:42,040 --> 00:47:45,280
As the engines were removed,
jobs went, too.

739
00:47:45,280 --> 00:47:48,960
Some of the men who operated them,
the drivers and the firemen,

740
00:47:48,960 --> 00:47:51,560
were retrained,
but many found themselves

741
00:47:51,560 --> 00:47:55,880
redundant, skilled in a job that
belonged in the last century.

742
00:47:57,520 --> 00:48:02,200
Most of the drivers
actually went to Oxford to work,

743
00:48:02,200 --> 00:48:05,560
but I think
nearly all the firemen left.

744
00:48:05,560 --> 00:48:07,640
Yeah, it was a sad day.

745
00:48:07,640 --> 00:48:11,400
It's... You know, nothing
we could do about it.

746
00:48:13,240 --> 00:48:17,160
When it closed, I started working on
building sites,

747
00:48:17,160 --> 00:48:21,720
you know, and erm...whatever
jobs you could get, because

748
00:48:21,720 --> 00:48:26,360
you end up with what you thought
you were, a skilled man

749
00:48:26,360 --> 00:48:30,040
when you was a fireman, you
found you had no skills whatsoever.

750
00:48:31,600 --> 00:48:34,040
Steam needed to come to an end.

751
00:48:34,040 --> 00:48:38,160
I suppose the issue is, did it
need to come to an end in 1968?

752
00:48:38,160 --> 00:48:40,440
The answer is probably no.

753
00:48:40,440 --> 00:48:44,040
There was a determined assault
on steam locomotion

754
00:48:44,040 --> 00:48:45,760
in the Beeching period.

755
00:48:45,760 --> 00:48:50,200
Having been slower than many
European countries

756
00:48:50,200 --> 00:48:55,400
to phase out steam, we suddenly
embarked on a headlong rush

757
00:48:55,400 --> 00:48:58,720
to get rid of steam
from 1963 to 1968.

758
00:48:58,720 --> 00:49:00,760
And I think that was unfortunate,

759
00:49:00,760 --> 00:49:04,600
because I think the diesel
alternative wasn't always there.

760
00:49:04,600 --> 00:49:08,960
I mean, you've got to understand
that when you go from steam

761
00:49:08,960 --> 00:49:11,840
to diesel,
you've got to go overnight.

762
00:49:11,840 --> 00:49:15,320
You've got to stop all your coaling
plants, you've got to stop all your

763
00:49:15,320 --> 00:49:18,640
water points, you've got
to retrain all the drivers.

764
00:49:18,640 --> 00:49:20,480
It's crazy to run a double system.

765
00:49:20,480 --> 00:49:23,560
And Beeching's genius
was he realised that.

766
00:49:23,560 --> 00:49:26,200
He'd got to retrain all
his drivers at one go,

767
00:49:26,200 --> 00:49:29,520
you'd got to abandon steam,
you couldn't let it dribble on.

768
00:49:29,520 --> 00:49:32,280
It did dribble on in
various areas of the country.

769
00:49:32,280 --> 00:49:34,360
But essentially,

770
00:49:34,360 --> 00:49:37,600
the conversion of a railway from
one form of locomotion to another

771
00:49:37,600 --> 00:49:40,000
has to be overnight,
or you're doubling everything.

772
00:49:40,000 --> 00:49:41,560
And that's very, very expensive.

773
00:49:43,360 --> 00:49:46,200
On 11 August 1968,
the fires were lit

774
00:49:46,200 --> 00:49:51,400
for the final passenger train to
be pulled by steam on the main line.

775
00:49:52,920 --> 00:49:55,640
It was know as the 15 guineas
special,

776
00:49:55,640 --> 00:49:59,560
because a ticket to ride
that train cost 15 guineas.

777
00:49:59,560 --> 00:50:05,560
And it was a train that went from
Liverpool to Manchester,

778
00:50:05,560 --> 00:50:09,920
then to Hellifield, and over the
Settle-Carlisle line to Carlisle.

779
00:50:12,280 --> 00:50:15,280
And it was pulled by two types
of engine, one type called the

780
00:50:15,280 --> 00:50:20,640
Black Five, which ended up being the
major workhorse at the end of steam.

781
00:50:20,640 --> 00:50:24,120
And the last express
passenger engine,

782
00:50:24,120 --> 00:50:28,040
which was a Pacific
called Oliver Cromwell.

783
00:50:39,200 --> 00:50:41,480
But 1968 was not the end of steam.

784
00:50:41,480 --> 00:50:45,560
Though most engines lay
rusting in scrap yards,

785
00:50:45,560 --> 00:50:47,880
a steam revival lay ahead.

786
00:50:47,880 --> 00:50:50,120
And the centre of
that resurrection

787
00:50:50,120 --> 00:50:51,920
was a scrap yard in Barry in Wales,

788
00:50:51,920 --> 00:50:54,200
where many of
the engines had been sent.

789
00:50:54,200 --> 00:50:59,040
All the way through the 1950s and
'60s, when steam was being run down,

790
00:50:59,040 --> 00:51:02,920
the scrap yards of Britain were
buzzing with gas axes, because,

791
00:51:02,920 --> 00:51:06,080
you know, they had a lot of
engines to get through.

792
00:51:06,080 --> 00:51:08,960
And steam engines are
made of very thick steel.

793
00:51:08,960 --> 00:51:12,360
Now, one of the scrap yards
was called Barry Scrap Yard,

794
00:51:12,360 --> 00:51:15,920
it was owned by a guy called
Dai Woodham, who got, I think,

795
00:51:15,920 --> 00:51:19,960
approaching 200 engines into his
yard, but at the time,

796
00:51:19,960 --> 00:51:23,040
was cutting up
wagons and coaches,

797
00:51:23,040 --> 00:51:26,040
had enough of
those to be getting on with.

798
00:51:26,040 --> 00:51:28,120
The Government announced

799
00:51:28,120 --> 00:51:32,000
that there was to be a
£250 million programme

800
00:51:32,000 --> 00:51:34,840
to modernise British Rail.

801
00:51:36,400 --> 00:51:40,840
And I thought, "Well, that's a
gravy train! I'd better get on it!"

802
00:51:40,840 --> 00:51:43,400
And by the time the end of the '60s
came along,

803
00:51:43,400 --> 00:51:45,960
preservation societies
that had been set up

804
00:51:45,960 --> 00:51:49,160
after the end of steam were
beginning to have enough money

805
00:51:49,160 --> 00:51:50,680
to buy individual engines.

806
00:51:50,680 --> 00:51:52,800
And Barry Scrap Yard was the last
scrap yard

807
00:51:52,800 --> 00:51:55,200
where they were left in any number.
So, suddenly,

808
00:51:55,200 --> 00:51:58,000
Dai was getting phone calls from
preservation societies

809
00:51:58,000 --> 00:52:01,640
saying, "Can we buy that engine back
from you, we want to restore it?"

810
00:52:01,640 --> 00:52:05,280
And, you know, obviously, Dai was
gonna make a few quid out of that,

811
00:52:05,280 --> 00:52:07,400
probably a bit more
than scrap value.

812
00:52:07,400 --> 00:52:08,520
So he went, "Yeah."

813
00:52:08,520 --> 00:52:11,600
And it saved him the trouble
of having to cut them up.

814
00:52:11,600 --> 00:52:13,920
And over a 25-year period,

815
00:52:13,920 --> 00:52:20,400
every single engine in that yard was
bought by a preservation society.

816
00:52:20,400 --> 00:52:24,280
Without Barry scrap yard, actually,
the preservation industry wouldn't

817
00:52:24,280 --> 00:52:27,960
be that big, because there wouldn't
be enough engines to run on it.

818
00:52:28,960 --> 00:52:31,040
I had my easel in Barry's scrap yard.

819
00:52:31,040 --> 00:52:34,800
That engine will probably be
running now on a preserved railway.

820
00:52:34,800 --> 00:52:37,480
And look at the boiler cladding had
burst open,

821
00:52:37,480 --> 00:52:40,120
and white asbestos,
we were chucking it about.

822
00:52:40,120 --> 00:52:41,840
Terrifying to think

823
00:52:41,840 --> 00:52:43,520
what we were doing in those days.

824
00:52:43,520 --> 00:52:46,760
But what an end to a steam engine.
But she was saved by someone.

825
00:52:46,760 --> 00:52:51,320
David Shepherd didn't just paint
the steam engines that he loved.

826
00:52:51,320 --> 00:52:53,240
He bought several locomotives

827
00:52:53,240 --> 00:52:56,120
and began the long process
of restoring them.

828
00:52:57,880 --> 00:53:00,040
And look at this thing here.

829
00:53:00,040 --> 00:53:02,520
It's rather pathetic when you
think about it,

830
00:53:02,520 --> 00:53:04,440
cos these things live, don't they?

831
00:53:04,440 --> 00:53:06,560
Compared with a diesel,
they have life.

832
00:53:06,560 --> 00:53:10,160
Something's got to be done, you know,
we'll have to save some of these.

833
00:53:12,600 --> 00:53:14,400
And I went round to their
office,

834
00:53:14,400 --> 00:53:16,680
their office was
in the guard's van body,

835
00:53:16,680 --> 00:53:20,480
next to his Rolls-Royce, the whole
thing was so funny, his Rolls-Royce,

836
00:53:20,480 --> 00:53:22,440
covered in oil, it was marvellous.

837
00:53:22,440 --> 00:53:25,800
I said, "I've come for some spares."
He said, "OK, if you're fair,

838
00:53:25,800 --> 00:53:28,360
"and you treat us properly,
take what you want."

839
00:53:28,360 --> 00:53:30,320
And we borrowed their oxyacetylene.

840
00:53:30,320 --> 00:53:33,400
But for £110, I think I got
a whole set of coupling rods

841
00:53:33,400 --> 00:53:36,960
and a mechanical lubricator, which
would cost thousands to build now.

842
00:53:36,960 --> 00:53:40,080
He said, "What have you got in
the back of your estate car?"

843
00:53:40,080 --> 00:53:42,440
I said, "I've got a mechanical
lubricator." "What's that?"

844
00:53:42,440 --> 00:53:44,960
He didn't know what it was.
It was just hidden money to him.

845
00:53:44,960 --> 00:53:47,400
He gave it a push,
and he said 12s 6d.

846
00:53:47,400 --> 00:53:50,000
So I gave him a quid and
he gave us the change!

847
00:53:50,000 --> 00:53:52,280
I mean, those days were unreal.

848
00:53:52,280 --> 00:53:58,440
And this particular example,
which is pretty rough,

849
00:53:58,440 --> 00:54:03,040
but I forecast that
when the preservationists

850
00:54:03,040 --> 00:54:07,440
are finished with it, she'll
be like the day she was built.

851
00:54:07,440 --> 00:54:10,480
Magic. Pure magic.

852
00:54:11,560 --> 00:54:13,720
I mean, steam hasn't come to an end,

853
00:54:13,720 --> 00:54:16,320
it was the beginning
of the enthusiasts'

854
00:54:16,320 --> 00:54:20,480
railways, and really that is a
tremendous story in its own right.

855
00:54:20,480 --> 00:54:25,920
It's a story that over the last 40
years has grown to include over 100

856
00:54:25,920 --> 00:54:32,920
separate heritage railways with
1,300 working steam locomotives.

857
00:54:32,920 --> 00:54:34,920
Six million visitors annually

858
00:54:34,920 --> 00:54:38,400
is proof that the public are
still in love with steam.

859
00:54:38,400 --> 00:54:40,080
Have your tickets ready, please.

860
00:54:40,080 --> 00:54:43,680
Certainly, railway
enthusiasm in Great Britain is...

861
00:54:43,680 --> 00:54:46,960
It's an industry now. It's huge.

862
00:54:46,960 --> 00:54:49,680
Literally millions of people travel
on preserved lines

863
00:54:49,680 --> 00:54:51,760
or preserved
steam trains every weekend.

864
00:54:51,760 --> 00:54:56,840
There are hundreds of thousands of
people who are members of a society,

865
00:54:56,840 --> 00:54:59,400
or at least part of
the wider circle

866
00:54:59,400 --> 00:55:03,200
of steam preservation societies
in this country. It is huge.

867
00:55:04,720 --> 00:55:08,960
These are
extraordinary enterprises, really,

868
00:55:08,960 --> 00:55:12,520
these are essentially
amateurs, railway enthusiasts

869
00:55:12,520 --> 00:55:14,480
in the best sense of that word.

870
00:55:14,480 --> 00:55:18,160
People who are seeing part of
British life disappearing,

871
00:55:18,160 --> 00:55:20,720
and who decide
to do something about it.

872
00:55:20,720 --> 00:55:25,120
To preserve it in some shape or
form, and to use their own time,

873
00:55:25,120 --> 00:55:30,560
their own money, their own energy to
do precisely that. And they succeed.

874
00:55:30,560 --> 00:55:34,520
One the biggest success stories in
railway preservation

875
00:55:34,520 --> 00:55:37,720
is the Great Western Society,
based at Didcot,

876
00:55:37,720 --> 00:55:40,040
and started by the Southall boys.

877
00:55:40,040 --> 00:55:42,360
And money was still coming in!

878
00:55:42,360 --> 00:55:45,160
We'd bought the engine, we'd
bought the coach,

879
00:55:45,160 --> 00:55:47,880
and then I suppose
we started getting greedy!

880
00:55:47,880 --> 00:55:50,880
What else should we do?
And in the end it began to...

881
00:55:50,880 --> 00:55:55,600
Not only engines and coaches,
it was the artefacts, as you say.

882
00:55:55,600 --> 00:55:58,640
People began to collect and
forward on to us

883
00:55:58,640 --> 00:56:01,680
or steer us in
the direction of, you know...

884
00:56:01,680 --> 00:56:04,360
The Southall boys gradually
assembled

885
00:56:04,360 --> 00:56:07,800
one of the finest
railway collections in the world.

886
00:56:07,800 --> 00:56:13,400
24 steam locomotives stand alongside
more than 80 wagons and coaches,

887
00:56:13,400 --> 00:56:17,280
and even signal boxes.
The Great Western Society

888
00:56:17,280 --> 00:56:22,280
is now the second biggest
tourist attraction in Oxfordshire.

889
00:56:22,280 --> 00:56:24,600
Different bell codes.

890
00:56:24,600 --> 00:56:26,000
Different means of operation.

891
00:56:26,000 --> 00:56:29,680
But then again you'd think that
this box had been here for ever.

892
00:56:29,680 --> 00:56:32,000
The love of
steam is no longer confined

893
00:56:32,000 --> 00:56:34,320
to looking back at the past.

894
00:56:34,320 --> 00:56:38,560
It's August 1st 2008
in Darlington.

895
00:56:38,560 --> 00:56:44,520
After 18 years, and funded by
private donations to the tune of

896
00:56:44,520 --> 00:56:45,960
£3 million, the brand new

897
00:56:45,960 --> 00:56:48,840
A1 Class Tornado
is finally ready to be launched.

898
00:56:58,640 --> 00:57:01,800
For me, it's the culmination
of a lifetime's ambition.

899
00:57:01,800 --> 00:57:03,440
When I was at school and bored,

900
00:57:03,440 --> 00:57:06,760
I used to draw steam locomotives
like this in my rough book.

901
00:57:06,760 --> 00:57:09,320
Subsequently, I've worked on
restoring them,

902
00:57:09,320 --> 00:57:12,080
building models of them, and the
chance to actually

903
00:57:12,080 --> 00:57:14,600
build a full size one, here in 2008,

904
00:57:14,600 --> 00:57:18,360
for me at the age of 57,
I just find it unbelievable.

905
00:57:18,360 --> 00:57:20,040
It's really a great privilege

906
00:57:20,040 --> 00:57:23,360
and I'm very pleased to have had
this chance, and to have had all the

907
00:57:23,360 --> 00:57:25,680
support that we've had
to enable it to happen.

908
00:57:27,320 --> 00:57:29,800
It's the 40th anniversary of
the end of steam.

909
00:57:29,800 --> 00:57:34,800
It's the 60th anniversary of
the first A1 entering service.

910
00:57:43,680 --> 00:57:45,840
HORN BLOWS

911
00:57:50,920 --> 00:57:53,880
It's been 40 years since the
last steam passenger train

912
00:57:53,880 --> 00:57:55,720
ran on a mainline in this country.

913
00:57:58,480 --> 00:58:04,200
With the launch of Tornado, steam
has again found a new lease of life.

914
00:58:10,960 --> 00:58:14,120
It's good, it's working,
it's doing what it's supposed to do.

915
00:58:14,120 --> 00:58:18,200
And hopefully she's putting
on a good show for the crowd.

916
00:58:20,080 --> 00:58:23,680
I can feel the hairs on the back of
my neck standing up at the moment,

917
00:58:23,680 --> 00:58:25,320
and the eyes are moistening.

918
00:58:28,480 --> 00:58:31,000
# There's an engine at the station

919
00:58:31,000 --> 00:58:33,520
# And the whistle blows my name

920
00:58:33,520 --> 00:58:35,960
# It's callin' callin' callin'

921
00:58:35,960 --> 00:58:38,480
# Come and get aboard the train

922
00:58:38,480 --> 00:58:43,240
# My baby's gone and I'm alone
to live in misery

923
00:58:43,240 --> 00:58:48,240
# I'm gonna call and make a
reservation for me

924
00:58:48,240 --> 00:58:50,320
# Gonna ride a blue train

925
00:58:50,320 --> 00:58:52,880
# Gonna ride a blue train. #

926
00:58:52,880 --> 00:58:54,800
Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd

927
00:58:54,800 --> 00:58:57,280
E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk