Railways Fred Dibnah's Industrial Age

I've not got one of these in my garden. I've always wanted one.

I've always been interested in locomotives,

but they had more humble beginnings than this one.

It were a slight detour on my way home from school

to go to the engine sheds on Crescent Road.

The vision never really left me.

Row upon row of steam locomotives all getting steam up, and nearly dark in winter.

All the smoke and the windows seemed to be yellow in't corners in all the little offices.

And that wonderful smell, you know. Fog, coal and black oil everywhere.

It were quite... To me, it were quite romantic.

Like all little boys' dreams, I wanted to be an engine driver.

On me way to school, we actually got as close to the railway as what these pictures are.

It always seemed quite exciting and romantic.

All me relations worked on the railway - engine drivers and signal men.

Some did the telegraph poles - maybe that's why I can climb!

To find out all about the railways and their history,

this is the place to head for.

The National Railway Museum in York

has the world's greatest collection of locomotives,

from the latest diesel and electric machinery,

way back to Stephenson's Rocket.

The original's inside the museum and there's a working replica too.

They're going to let me have a go!

I'm really looking forward to this.

-Now, Dave. How you doing, mate?

-Welcome to the museum.

-I'm really looking forward to this.

-Aye. Let's get this under way.

We need to get some water in as it's getting low.

-No injector?

-No, it wasn't invented.

-No brakes.

-No whistle, even!

-We'll blow this horn.

-The audible sounding device of our approach?

The audible means of approach, as they say!

-We're off, Fred. Good 'un.

-We are.

This was the prototype for the steam locomotive as we know it.

Rocket was designed and built by Robert Stephenson at his works in Newcastle.

It was a breakthrough in locomotive design.

MUSIC DROWNS SPEECH

For 25 years prior to the Rocket,

engineers had tried to design an engine to pull wagons along a track.

Richard Trevithick built the first one in 1804,

but in the early ones, performance was limited by the design,

which was basically that of a mobile beam engine.

Rocket increased the power and speed of the engine, relative to its weight.

It was built to compete in the Rainhill Trials,

set up to decide what motive power should be used

for a new railway between Liverpool and Manchester.

Three other engines entered, but Rocket outperformed them all.

I used to dream about this thing.

I used to do drawings of it when I were a lad.

On the old Trinity Street Station, there used to be a model of it in a glass case.

-You'd put a penny in and it went!

-I'll show you it.

We've got it in the workshop!

No vacuum brakes!

Did you like that? Better than knocking chimneys down!

There's one you can't knock down!

I'll come and paint it for you.

But it was Robert Stephenson's father, George,

who is credited as being the father of the railways.

He was a mining engineer.

It was in the coal fields of the north-east that railways really began to operate.

Originally, railways were an industrial transport system.

Bowes Railway Centre is near the south bank of the River Tyne.

Here, you can see one of Stephenson's early efforts to use steam power to transport coal.

But his engine on this railway didn't go anywhere.

From the top of the hill, it pulled wagons of coal with a rope.

Here we are, on top of a big hill between Sunderland and Gateshead-on-Tyne,

in an engine house that's got a bloody great winch in it.

A wire goes down the hill and down the other side to God knows where.

This is Alan who actually operates the winch.

How many tons of coal did they let down in't olden days?

-Going that way, about 12 trucks with about ten tons.

-Bloomin' 'eck.

Coming up the other way, there's six trucks.

Bowes Railway is claimed to be the world's only preserved standard gauge rope-hauled railway.

Stephenson's original engine has been replaced by an electric engine,

but the mechanics of the operation are still as they were when Stephenson designed it.

-The trouble is, it's not a steady gradient all the way down. It varies.

-Yeah.

Of course, with this handbrake,

you apply it, and about three days later...

Try again.

-Yes!

-That's it.

-Keep going till it won't go any further. That's the ticket.

-Super.

-Right.

-We're in gear.

Passenger railways weren't long in coming

and it was George Stephenson who was the engineer for the first ones.

This is where it all started.

This is North Road Station in Darlington,

the original route of the Stockton to Darlington Railway.

In 1825, George Stephenson came steaming through here, driving this thing,

pulling the first passenger train.

This is one of the world's first successful locomotives.

It's rather a ponderous piece of tattle.

The guy who drove it sat on this buffet.

He'd alternate between sitting down and playing with these two handles,

which, of course, altered the valve timing of the thing.

To me, it looks more complicated than a modern locomotive.

Basically, it's just a twin cylinder beam engine and a boiler.

From Darlington, I went to Shildon

which played an important part in the early history of the railways.

This is a very historic spot in the history of the railways of England.

This is Shildon in County Durham where the Stockton to Darlington line once ran.

It didn't really run from Stockton to Darlington -

it started at some coal mines about two miles down the road.

It ran to Stockton, down to the sea, where coal was loaded onto ships.

Timothy Hackworth, the superintendent engineer of the line,

lived in a cottage over there.

These buildings were his workshops,

where he built new locomotives and did major repairs on existing ones.

Timothy Hackworth was also the builder of another engine that competed in the Rainhill Trials.

Ever since I was a little lad, I've called this the Sasperella engine.

I know it's French, but I can't really pronounce it right.

Perhaps Alan can tell me what it's really called.

-She's really called Sans Pareil which means without parallel or without equal.

-Oh!

Timothy was taught French at an early age by his mother,

although he couldn't remember where he knew French from,

hence a lot of his locomotives had strange names compared to today.

When I was small, I read that there was a bit of industrial espionage.

Mr Stephenson was responsible for casting the cylinders,

and the core moved a bit and when they bored them out,

they were thin on one side and thick on the other.

Initially at Rainhill, it did well, and then BANG! - it blew the side off the cylinder.

It should have been one and three quarter inches thick, it was actually five eighths of an inch.

So, during the trials under a real load, unfortunately it went.

Hackworth's supporters were up in arms against the Stephenson supporters, saying espionage.

As Hackworth had 24 of these cast, and selected two, I don't think so.

Hackworth is definitely an unsung hero in the development of the railways.

In many ways, he's known around the globe more than in this country.

-This is something else - it's a biggun' isn't it?

-Superb engine.

We've just finished conserving her.

Here's something that may surprise you.

This wheel is inside the blue spot on the £5 note.

Timothy Hackworth's plug wheel.

I never knew that about £5 notes.

That's a wheel that was on nearly all these locomotives.

George Stephenson actually credited Hackworth with re-inventing the wheel. This is how he did it.

He cast the inside and it was fitted onto the axle.

Then the outside was also cast.

The two parts were joined with these wooden pegs.

Then at the four points - north, south, east and west - he put these bolts in.

-That would stop it flying off.

-You trued it up, as with bicycle spokes.

At a time when 60% of the workforce is building and fixing wheels,

with this wheel, that fell to 20%.

By the 1830s, the locomotive had the basic shape

that we are now familiar with.

Different locos were designed for passenger trains and goods.

Passenger locos had large driving wheels so they could run fast.

This is my favourite locomotive.

Patrick Stirling's single wheeler.

The one I dream about.

They're going to let me climb on board and fiddle with the controls!

It must have been fantastic to do 70 miles an hour

on a cold winter's night, with a full moon out.

It's quite simple - almost like a big traction engine.

Air-conditioning - windows! Not that you need it in this cab.

It mustn't have been so bad going forwards,

but going backwards would have been uncomfortable.

It's still me favourite engine.

The railways brought about a transport revolution.

People could travel around in safety, in large numbers,

much more quickly than they could by stagecoach.

By the 1890s, branch lines were being built into some of the most remote parts of the country.

When I was at Killhope lead mines in the north Pennines,

I visited South Tynedale railway.

It follows the route of the old Haltwhistle to Alston branch line.

It was built when there was still a lot of lead mining activity in these remote parts.

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That's fine. Excellent.

The trains here are all hauled by restored steam and diesel engines from Britain and abroad.

Like most preservation society lines, it's run by volunteers.

There's a lot of hard work involved, but it's enjoyable.

That's it! Just a little bit.

That's it. You're in.

Steam locomotives were built to last.

There were some 19th century locos that I ran when I was a lad.

This is one of them.

All small boys call someone their uncle, who isn't really their uncle.

I had one when I were a little lad.

He drove an old Aspinall locomotive like that on the marshalling yards,

in Bolton, near Trinity Street station.

On Saturday mornings, I used to ride with him. It were wonderful.

As you can see, it's got hardly any cab at all.

When it rained, they hooked a sheet on the cab, down to the tender.

It were lovely and snug and warm.

I used to drink out of his brew can.

One day he disappeared. I suppose he died.

The engine disappeared. In fact, only one of these engines survived.

That's it over there. It's a beautiful engine.

As speeds increased and train loads grew heavier, locomotives grew in size.

In the 1920s, the Great Western Railway locos were amongst the most advanced.

By the 1930s, famous streamlined locomotives like Mallard were built.

The Coronation Class was one of the most powerful express passenger locomotives in Britain.

I remember these quite vividly.

It were exciting when a streamlined one came past Bolton.

Early after the war, I never saw many,

but later, I think they came round our way more.

That were quite a thing to remember.

TRAIN BLOWS WHISTLE

But the excitement of steam was soon to go.

It was replaced by this.

In 1955, the first diesel locomotive, Deltic, was built.

It signalled the end of the line for the steam locomotive.

In the '60s, these lovely engines started to rust away in scrap yards.

There were too many people who loved the romance of the steam loco

to let it disappear completely.

The Railway Preservation Movement was born.

Middleton Railway in Leeds was the first UK standard gauge railway to be run by volunteers.

It was the world's first railway established by an act of Parliament.

This was in 1758.

The Middleton Railway Trust has a big collection of industrial locos.

They run on a track that follows the original route of a horse-drawn wagon-way,

built to carry coal from collieries south of Leeds to the city centre.

The great growth of railway preservation movements

means that the engineering skills needed to keep these locos running

have not disappeared completely.

One of the main centres for work on steam locomotives today,

is here, at the Birmingham Railway Centre.

-Hello, Fred.

-Hello.

-How many of them have you got to pull out?

-107.

-Bloomin' 'eck!

Dave's busy cutting them out.

-These are the super heater tubes, aren't they?

-That's right.

-The super heaters go up inside.

-Even more tubes go down the middle of them.

-That's right.

The workshops are full of locos that are being repaired and renovated,

including some very famous ones.

Bob here is in charge of the works.

Bloomin' 'eck - it looks like you've got a tall order on here.

What are you about with this one?

This one is Princess Elizabeth.

The most famous loco that London, Midland and Scottish Railway possessed before the war.

It's obvious who it was named after.

I remember it many years ago, in the days when train spotting was a popular hobby.

This was one of the regular locos which went through here - 46201.

One of the engines they've restored here is the Great Western loco Rood Ashton Hall.

What a magnificent job they've done.

-Alistair! How you doing?

-All right.

I believe you've done a great deal of the restoration on this thing.

-A bit of it, yeah.

-Yeah. All this pipe-work!

Were all these lovely fittings still here? Some look new.

The gauge glass and gauge frame are original.

So is the regulator stuffing box.

But the manifold, the brake valves and the lubricators are new.

-Somewhere round there, in't it?

-Yeah, that'll do.

-Right.

-You've got 25 inches on the gauge.

-So, the brakes are off now?

-Yeah.

-Is the tender brake off?

-The handbrake's off.

-Right.

-Away we go.

-Give a whistle.

-Oh, yeah!

-Can I notch it up a bit?

-Yeah, bring it back to 45%.

-Somewhere round there, in't it?

-That's it, just there.

We're all right. That's it - where it says "stop", in't it?

In the middle of the night, you'd hear this steam whistle howling,

and main line locomotive would come.

It would pass by this narrow entry

between Uncle Fred's temperance bar and the local barbers.

They'd have the fire door open.

The driver was silhouetted against the light coming from the cab.

It must have been, to me as a small boy,

an unbelievably exciting thing to do - being an engine driver.

I like big engines, but I've seen some great little trains too.

The Ffestiniog railway runs from the sea at Porthmadog

to the slate quarries at Blaenau Ffestiniog.

Most of the early railways were built around mines of some sort.

Here in Snowdonia, they took the slate down to the sea by pack horse,

until the 1830s, when they built a railway to Porthmadog.

As railways developed, narrow gauge lines were constructed

where the landscape made standard gauge impossible.

Ffestiniog railway is one of the typical slate quarry lines in Wales.

It was first worked by horse power,

but in 1863 it became the first narrow gauge line to use steam locomotives.

'A lot of young volunteers work here.

'When I rode on the footplate,

'David Williams was taking charge of the loco for the first time.'

I'm in charge of the water.

The Ffestiniog is a really good example of railway preservation.

In the workshops, they're building complete new locos

using the latest computer design technology.

-This flange fits on.

-Yeah, on the studs.

-That's it.

This smoke box was drawn by a guy who lives 65 miles from New York.

When the drawing was complete, he e-mailed the drawing here

and we've actually constructed it.

I doubt your workshop has a computer.

-Oh, no!

-We just use them as a tool.

-I'm still on feet and inches!

-Yeah.

So we're building this from scratch.

It's changed recently, you see.

It's not actually a replica now. It's a rebuild.

-We found the reversing lever from the original engine.

-Yeah?

That's turned it into a rebuild.

My old steam roller's like that. It's going to be a splendid thing.

Everywhere you go round here, someone's making a new engine.

It's becoming a habit! We've got to help the old timers - not you!

This is the oldest working engine in the world, when it's working.

-This one's a brand new one.

-That's right.

-This is the frame.

There's a replica of a London to Barnstaple locomotive.

That railway was scrapped in 1935, but we have got one original bit.

That's a chimney off one of the engines.

Like Roland's Taliesin, this is a rebuild.

North Wales is famous for its great little trains, like Ffestiniog.

There are some big ones here too.

These are the sort of engines that I remember best.

One of the most common round where I lived were the LMS Black Fives.

Whilst in Wales, I got a chance to ride one at Llangollen Railway.

'Travelling here reminds me of the first time I rode on the footplate.'

TRAIN WHISTLE BLOWS

On reaching sort of early manhood, I met this engine driver in a pub.

He immediately recognised my great interest in locomotives.

He said, "If you want to ride on my engine, buy a penny platform ticket

"and sit on the very end of the platform."

I did and this great, thundering engine came rolling in on a dirty winter's night.

He beckoned me to jump on it.

I went all the way to Rochdale and back.

I had the job of firing the locomotive.

He said, "It don't matter what you do. Just don't lose the shovel."

It were really good fun. I did that lots of times.

TRAIN WHISTLE DROWNS SPEECH

30 miles an hour. Ha ha!

Subtitles by Annie Dodwell BBC - 1999