0:00:02 > 0:00:04Really, up until the Victorian times,
0:00:04 > 0:00:07we'd been basically an agricultural nation
0:00:07 > 0:00:12and, of course, bit of war in trying to conquer half the world.
0:00:12 > 0:00:16And then along came the Victorians and the...
0:00:16 > 0:00:22unbelievable engineering abilities that they had, and they all had tons of self-confidence -
0:00:22 > 0:00:25all these people like Brunel and Stephenson -
0:00:25 > 0:00:30and, er, no doubt a great deal of faith in what they could do.
0:00:30 > 0:00:32I mean, they... some of the things they built,
0:00:32 > 0:00:37were, at the time, bordering on you know the limits of...
0:00:37 > 0:00:41Well, nobody else in all the world had done such great things
0:00:41 > 0:00:44as what we did in that period of our history.
0:01:07 > 0:01:12Fred Dibnah's heroes were the great engineers of the Victorian age.
0:01:12 > 0:01:15His interest in their work and his belief in the values of hard work
0:01:15 > 0:01:20and enterprise that drove them on shone through in all that he did.
0:01:22 > 0:01:26Isambard Kingdom Brunel. My hero, you know?
0:01:26 > 0:01:28I think, today, in his honour,
0:01:28 > 0:01:32I shall wear this tall hat while I have a look round his ship.
0:01:32 > 0:01:37Really, if it had anything to do with engineering on a grand scale,
0:01:37 > 0:01:40Mr Brunel were the man to have a go at it.
0:01:40 > 0:01:43Perhaps every generation has to rediscover
0:01:43 > 0:01:45its own heroes from the past.
0:01:45 > 0:01:51And Fred's championing of the great engineers like Stephenson and Brunel
0:01:51 > 0:01:54is part of helping us to rediscover those heroes.
0:01:54 > 0:01:57And obviously that's worked - Brunel was voted one of the greatest
0:01:57 > 0:02:01Britons that ever lived, quite recently, in a national contest.
0:02:01 > 0:02:05Whilst he was constructing the Great Western Railway,
0:02:05 > 0:02:10he got this grand vision to link New York with Bristol
0:02:10 > 0:02:12and the Great Western Railway,
0:02:12 > 0:02:16and this is the second of the three ships that he made -
0:02:16 > 0:02:18the SS Great Britain -
0:02:18 > 0:02:24which lies here now in the very dock that it were constructed in, in 1843.
0:02:24 > 0:02:27He was able to spend his life among machines,
0:02:27 > 0:02:31er, among the buildings of the Victorian age and he obviously
0:02:31 > 0:02:33identified very much with that, erm,
0:02:33 > 0:02:37and that's part of the charm of the attraction, I think.
0:02:37 > 0:02:41Here in me garden, I've got this lovely little steam engine
0:02:41 > 0:02:46which is almost identical to the one on the SS Great Britain.
0:02:46 > 0:02:48It's a lot smaller, of course.
0:02:48 > 0:02:51It'd be easier for me to explain
0:02:51 > 0:02:55the engine of the SS Great Britain with this thing.
0:02:55 > 0:02:59When Brunel first envisaged the SS Great Britain,
0:02:59 > 0:03:02it were gonna be propelled by paddles, and, of course,
0:03:02 > 0:03:04if you think about this,
0:03:04 > 0:03:07if this shaft went transverse across the whole of the ship
0:03:07 > 0:03:10with a paddle here and a paddle on the other side,
0:03:10 > 0:03:14it would be a paddle ship engine, but he kept the same engine, I think,
0:03:14 > 0:03:17and turned it round through 90 degrees
0:03:17 > 0:03:21and on the SS Great Britain, this great wheel here ended up
0:03:21 > 0:03:25as summat like a 20-odd foot diameter chain wheel
0:03:25 > 0:03:28with a chain like a bicycle that went down to the bottom
0:03:28 > 0:03:32and went round another sprocket in the bottom of the hole,
0:03:32 > 0:03:36hence to the propeller shaft in the stern of the ship.
0:03:36 > 0:03:37But it is exactly the same -
0:03:37 > 0:03:40two cylinders down in the bowels of the ship
0:03:40 > 0:03:46and the crank shaft practically sticking through the deck at the top.
0:03:46 > 0:03:50I've never had it going, this one, but I will do, some day.
0:03:50 > 0:03:53It's quite an interesting sort of piece of tackle.
0:03:53 > 0:03:57I've not turned it round for a day or two. It's a bit stiff, you know?
0:03:57 > 0:04:00He read pretty well every book that was available,
0:04:00 > 0:04:02I think, on IK Brunel,
0:04:02 > 0:04:07who was primarily a civil engineer, of course,
0:04:07 > 0:04:10and became a ship builder
0:04:10 > 0:04:12but, er, I think he, er...
0:04:12 > 0:04:17The one thing he did which Fred had no intention of doing
0:04:17 > 0:04:20was he worked himself into the ground.
0:04:20 > 0:04:23I think he died at 59, didn't he, due to overwork?
0:04:23 > 0:04:26But Fred didn't believe in overwork.
0:04:26 > 0:04:28That's not to say he were... Don't get me wrong,
0:04:28 > 0:04:30he wasn't lazy in any way,
0:04:30 > 0:04:33er, but, er, if the job could be finished next week
0:04:33 > 0:04:36rather than tomorrow it would get finished next week,
0:04:36 > 0:04:39but by Jove, it would be right when it was done.
0:04:39 > 0:04:46So, was Fred anything like any of the great Victorian engineers he admired so much?
0:04:46 > 0:04:50The other engineers, the more craftsman-like ones -
0:04:50 > 0:04:53the Stephensons, people like that -
0:04:53 > 0:04:58I think were much more like Fred, you know, just down-to-earth people,
0:04:58 > 0:05:01who were very knowledgeable in practical things
0:05:01 > 0:05:05and it was that skill which allowed them
0:05:05 > 0:05:07to become the important people they were.
0:05:07 > 0:05:10It's Northumbria you gotta come to,
0:05:10 > 0:05:13to discover the early days of the railways
0:05:13 > 0:05:17and of course, great men like George Stephenson,
0:05:17 > 0:05:19who were the pioneers of steam and iron.
0:05:19 > 0:05:22Here, on the Pockerley Waggonway,
0:05:22 > 0:05:25which is situated in the Beamish Open Air Museum,
0:05:25 > 0:05:27up here in the north-east,
0:05:27 > 0:05:33they've recreated what the railways of the period actually looked like.
0:05:33 > 0:05:37This magnificent shed is a perfect replica
0:05:37 > 0:05:40of the Timothy Hackworth's engine shed
0:05:40 > 0:05:43at Shildon in County Durham, long demolished.
0:05:43 > 0:05:47And, of course, Hackworth was the chief mechanical engineer
0:05:47 > 0:05:52and engine foreman for the world's first passenger-carrying railway -
0:05:52 > 0:05:54the Stockton to Darlington railway
0:05:54 > 0:05:59and it were Hackworth's job to make sure all the locomotives kept going.
0:06:00 > 0:06:04Visitors to Beamish can have the unbelievable experience
0:06:04 > 0:06:07of travelling in carriages with no springs
0:06:07 > 0:06:13behind George Stephenson's reproduction Locomotion Number One.
0:06:13 > 0:06:15Hiya, you all right?
0:06:15 > 0:06:17Yep.
0:06:17 > 0:06:21The engine has four wheels and, of course, the tender's got four wheels as well.
0:06:21 > 0:06:25The driver, his position when the thing's under way,
0:06:25 > 0:06:29is up there, stood on the side, on a plank, which is rather precarious.
0:06:29 > 0:06:32He works all the levers on the valve gear
0:06:32 > 0:06:35that lets the steam into the cylinders.
0:06:35 > 0:06:37And down here of course, the stoker,
0:06:37 > 0:06:41he's gotta do his business with his coal shovel, well, coke actually,
0:06:41 > 0:06:46and then, when he's got it going and a full head of steam, he's quite within his rights
0:06:46 > 0:06:51to go on this plank on this side, but that's even more hairy cos there's nothing to hang on to.
0:06:51 > 0:06:56I think we'll have a little trip down the line, maybe not quite a far
0:06:56 > 0:06:58as Shildon to Stockton but nevertheless,
0:06:58 > 0:07:00it'll be quite an experience.
0:07:00 > 0:07:02Right my mate, are we ready?
0:07:09 > 0:07:12Like all early locomotives,
0:07:12 > 0:07:14it had no brakes, you know.
0:07:14 > 0:07:18To stop the thing, the fireman actually had to jump off
0:07:18 > 0:07:21and pin down the brakes on the...on the coal wagon.
0:07:21 > 0:07:25You know, quite a hairy occupation.
0:07:25 > 0:07:28I said to him on a few times, "You know, if you HAD been born
0:07:28 > 0:07:31"50 years ago, you wouldn't have been interested in steam engines.
0:07:31 > 0:07:33"You'd have been interested in horses!
0:07:34 > 0:07:37"Before the days of steam," I said, "Steam engines...if you'd
0:07:37 > 0:07:41"have been born when you think you'd like to have been born,
0:07:41 > 0:07:43"they'd have represented modern technology
0:07:43 > 0:07:46"and I don't think you'd have been interested in that!"
0:07:46 > 0:07:51On the opening day, George Stephenson actually drove the locomotive
0:07:51 > 0:07:54and his two bothers acted as firemen.
0:07:54 > 0:07:58I mean, it must have been quite exciting, when you think about it.
0:07:58 > 0:08:01I suppose the equivalent to being an airline pilot.
0:08:01 > 0:08:05If Fred had been born in the 19th century, he'd have been
0:08:05 > 0:08:08there chatting with Stephenson about his ideas and thoughts.
0:08:08 > 0:08:12Stephenson was very much into the latest thing - not just railways.
0:08:12 > 0:08:17He was into all sorts of different scientific and technological ideas.
0:08:17 > 0:08:19And I think that would have appealed to Fred.
0:08:19 > 0:08:22Fred raised the profile of the great engineers
0:08:22 > 0:08:25in a very accessible way.
0:08:25 > 0:08:28He took them out of the realms of the history books,
0:08:28 > 0:08:31he took them away from the dry Open University academics
0:08:31 > 0:08:35in the tweed suits, and he took them and made them alive.
0:08:35 > 0:08:38You only have to look at a lot of the programmes that he made
0:08:38 > 0:08:42to see that this man actually knew what he was talking about
0:08:42 > 0:08:45as well as just going round doing the business.
0:08:45 > 0:08:49He knew about these guys, their lives, and achievements.
0:08:49 > 0:08:55Got lovely ball joints on it, so you know, there's no friction, really.
0:08:55 > 0:08:58It'll all go about in its ponderous way
0:08:58 > 0:09:01without rubbing on each corner of a straight bearing.
0:09:01 > 0:09:03He thought they were fantastic.
0:09:03 > 0:09:07He admired their ability to think on their feet, he admired their ability
0:09:07 > 0:09:11to take risks and do things that they thought were unthinkable.
0:09:11 > 0:09:13George Stephenson once said,
0:09:13 > 0:09:17"I will do something that is going to astonish the whole world,"
0:09:17 > 0:09:20and I think Fred would have agreed with that wholeheartedly.
0:09:20 > 0:09:25This is a replica of the world-famous Stephenson's Rocket,
0:09:25 > 0:09:27and they're going to let me have a go on it.
0:09:27 > 0:09:29I'm really looking forward to it!
0:09:29 > 0:09:33Now then, how you doing, mate?
0:09:33 > 0:09:35I'm really looking forward to this.
0:09:35 > 0:09:38Let's see if we can get the thing under way.
0:09:38 > 0:09:40HE SOUNDS HIS HORN
0:09:40 > 0:09:43Oh, we're off, Fred!
0:09:56 > 0:09:58Hey, everything's OK, mate, yeah.
0:10:01 > 0:10:05It's quite long-legged, Fred. You can imagine...to keep it going...
0:10:05 > 0:10:06Yeah!
0:10:07 > 0:10:11He seemed to like the idea of...
0:10:11 > 0:10:13The wheels are 47-inch diameter.
0:10:14 > 0:10:18Fred made it much easier to understand.
0:10:18 > 0:10:19He - how shall we say?
0:10:19 > 0:10:23He was one of us, as it were, he was a man off the street.
0:10:23 > 0:10:26He was somebody born in Bolton, Lancashire,
0:10:26 > 0:10:28he had no pretensions of going to college,
0:10:28 > 0:10:31he was a straightforward, down-to-earth man.
0:10:31 > 0:10:34- This is fantastic! - We're just going over the crossing. I'll toot my hooter.
0:10:37 > 0:10:44And he understood things on his level, and he had a great ability to communicate that understanding
0:10:44 > 0:10:46in a way that the layman, person on the street,
0:10:46 > 0:10:48a person watching his programmes,
0:10:48 > 0:10:52could just communicate with and just see what he was talking about,
0:10:52 > 0:10:54rather than get tangled up in academia.
0:10:54 > 0:11:00- Oh, it's unbelievable. - More stream, Fred. We're coming up to the buffers.
0:11:00 > 0:11:03To stop it, you basically bang it in reverse.
0:11:03 > 0:11:06Aye, don't try it with your Ford Fiesta, Fred.
0:11:06 > 0:11:08Don't try it with a Ford Fiesta.
0:11:08 > 0:11:13No, no, no, no. The world's first successful passenger engine.
0:11:13 > 0:11:15Imagine what people would think when they saw it.
0:11:15 > 0:11:20- Yeah.- They were saying that your lungs would collapse with such speed.
0:11:20 > 0:11:23In fact, the man, one man who actually drove this thing,
0:11:23 > 0:11:27I've read in a history book somewhere that he got so uptight about it
0:11:27 > 0:11:30he asked to be taken off the job, you know?
0:11:30 > 0:11:32It went too fast at 35mph!
0:11:35 > 0:11:39Here inside the museum, they have a full-size cutaway replica
0:11:39 > 0:11:43of the Rocket, and you can actually see how the features of it...
0:11:43 > 0:11:47Even in the most modern locomotive, steam locomotive,
0:11:47 > 0:11:50all the main features have never, ever altered,
0:11:50 > 0:11:53like, this is the exhaust pipe or the blast pipe.
0:11:53 > 0:11:58There's one on each side which makes the locomotive woof-woof-woof.
0:11:58 > 0:12:01When Fred talks about people like Brunel and Stephenson,
0:12:01 > 0:12:02he's excited by them
0:12:02 > 0:12:06because they don't just work with their head, they could work with their hands
0:12:06 > 0:12:11and they knew how machines operated, they knew what it took to make them run smoothly.
0:12:11 > 0:12:16He knew that they were excited about the mechanics - the insides of machines.
0:12:16 > 0:12:18This engine here behind me
0:12:18 > 0:12:23is the only long-boilered tender main-line engine in existence,
0:12:23 > 0:12:28and it's a design that were done by Robert Stephenson in the 1830s.
0:12:28 > 0:12:31I mean, this were made quite a lot later,
0:12:31 > 0:12:33but it's the basic shape of it -
0:12:33 > 0:12:37inside cylinders and six wheels - had been around since 1830.
0:12:37 > 0:12:40When you really look at it and you compare it with the Rocket,
0:12:40 > 0:12:46which were 1829, rapid advances were made in a very short time, you know,
0:12:46 > 0:12:50so a thing as big as this from something like Stephenson's Rocket,
0:12:50 > 0:12:53which is only half the size of it.
0:12:54 > 0:12:57Robert Stephenson and his company, of course,
0:12:57 > 0:13:00didn't just build locomotives, they built the lines
0:13:00 > 0:13:03and the bridges and all the engineering works
0:13:03 > 0:13:07involved in the construction of a full-sized railway.
0:13:07 > 0:13:12Newcastle's high-level bridge was designed by Robert Stephenson
0:13:12 > 0:13:15and opened in 1849 by Queen Victoria
0:13:15 > 0:13:19and it's rather an interesting structure, really, when you think.
0:13:19 > 0:13:23Of course, it's basically made of cast iron arches
0:13:23 > 0:13:26with wrought-iron tie rods stiffening it all up,
0:13:26 > 0:13:29and it stands on five sandstone pillars.
0:13:29 > 0:13:32But the interesting bit is the railway's on the top
0:13:32 > 0:13:36and the roadway is underneath and when you think, really,
0:13:36 > 0:13:40it's a credit to Mr Stephenson - it's still here today
0:13:40 > 0:13:42and still functioning quite well,
0:13:42 > 0:13:45and when you think of the weight of all the stuff that goes over it,
0:13:45 > 0:13:50railway trains are much heavier now than they were 1849,
0:13:50 > 0:13:56motor cars have replaced horses and carriages, which, of course, are heavier...and motor wagons.
0:13:56 > 0:13:58And it's still going strong.
0:13:58 > 0:13:59It's a credit to him, really.
0:13:59 > 0:14:03He's very comfortable with things the Victorians had made.
0:14:03 > 0:14:05He liked their technology, er, he liked the way
0:14:05 > 0:14:08they expressed themselves. I think he liked their confidence.
0:14:08 > 0:14:11I think if you went back to Victorian times,
0:14:11 > 0:14:13you'd have found a lot of people like Fred.
0:14:14 > 0:14:17And this is the sort of place they might have worked -
0:14:17 > 0:14:22Robert Stephenson's locomotive works in Newcastle.
0:14:22 > 0:14:27This is the visitors' staircase, where people like Brunel
0:14:27 > 0:14:31and Daniel Gooch would come when they were doing deals.
0:14:31 > 0:14:38It leads up to Mr Stephenson's private office up there near the drawing office.
0:14:43 > 0:14:48Yeah! This is Mr Stephenson's personal office.
0:14:48 > 0:14:52How sad, eh? A bit of cornice left and half a fireplace.
0:14:54 > 0:14:59And these lovely windows with beautiful, narrow sash bars, you know?
0:14:59 > 0:15:01Even the shutters still work.
0:15:04 > 0:15:08It's all really good-quality joinery in this, you know,
0:15:08 > 0:15:10and I know, living in a house that were built
0:15:10 > 0:15:16in the 1850s, that this is right for that period,
0:15:16 > 0:15:19and all. Yeah.
0:15:19 > 0:15:25I do hope they can raise enough money and restore it to its past glory.
0:15:25 > 0:15:28Next door, here, through in this drawing office,
0:15:28 > 0:15:31you can imagine them all scratching away,
0:15:31 > 0:15:37drawing four-wheeled locomotives for the world market, as you might say.
0:15:37 > 0:15:41Undoubtedly, the great British engineers
0:15:41 > 0:15:43who built the Empire...
0:15:43 > 0:15:45You know, Fred was not
0:15:45 > 0:15:47a great man for political correctness
0:15:47 > 0:15:52and would talk about "The Colonies", referring to America
0:15:52 > 0:15:55and other parts of the world that we, you know...
0:15:55 > 0:15:58We built the world's railways, if you like, and Fred
0:15:58 > 0:16:02would talk endlessly about that, and I think they were
0:16:02 > 0:16:05the sort of people who he really admired.
0:16:05 > 0:16:09They were his heroes from boyhood days, I would imagine.
0:16:09 > 0:16:12This, of course, was the drawing office, you know,
0:16:12 > 0:16:15where I suppose all the early locomotives of England,
0:16:15 > 0:16:19most of them, were possibly designed here and of course,
0:16:19 > 0:16:22all that lot there were all filled in with windows,
0:16:22 > 0:16:24and down below, the assembly shop.
0:16:24 > 0:16:27They've got to have it blocked in because the muck would come up,
0:16:27 > 0:16:32and I suppose there would be a constant supply up these stairs,
0:16:32 > 0:16:34of people wanting to know measurements
0:16:34 > 0:16:39and different dimensions for the bits they were machining downstairs.
0:16:41 > 0:16:45Down here, this is where the locomotives were actually assembled.
0:16:45 > 0:16:47I like places like this -
0:16:47 > 0:16:50you can imagine, in 1836 or something like that,
0:16:50 > 0:16:56they'd be really going hammer and tongs in here, all the beautiful shiny brass and copper.
0:16:56 > 0:17:02Over here, there were great, big, long, flat-belt driven lathes
0:17:02 > 0:17:04and some smaller ones at the end
0:17:04 > 0:17:09which possibly were used for doing the finer bits of brackets and bits and pieces.
0:17:09 > 0:17:12Somewhere very nearby, in a building similar to this,
0:17:12 > 0:17:16they would have had the foundry, where the wheels, the cylinders
0:17:16 > 0:17:21and small sort of brackets that were nearly always under compression
0:17:21 > 0:17:23that would be cast and then, of course,
0:17:23 > 0:17:27they'd come here to be machined over there against that wall
0:17:27 > 0:17:29and then be assembled
0:17:29 > 0:17:32on the locomotive that were being constructed.
0:17:32 > 0:17:35Victorian engineers and men of that ilk,
0:17:35 > 0:17:38miners and workers in factories,
0:17:38 > 0:17:44anybody with any degree of skill was somebody in Fred's mind
0:17:44 > 0:17:48that deserved recognition, because they didn't mind getting their hands dirty.
0:17:48 > 0:17:50They suffered, you know?
0:17:50 > 0:17:53There was great toil in the old days and suffering,
0:17:53 > 0:17:56and Fred, he had an empathy with that, really.
0:17:56 > 0:18:03Here, at the Victorian iron foundry at Ironbridge Gorge Museum, you can actually see how they would
0:18:03 > 0:18:07have cast a locomotive wheel in the mid-Victorian period.
0:18:07 > 0:18:10In fact, all the bits of steam locomotive that were
0:18:10 > 0:18:15made of cast iron, like the funnel, the brake blocks, the blast pipe
0:18:15 > 0:18:20you know, there were a heck of a lot of cast iron in a locomotive.
0:18:20 > 0:18:24But the wheel is the main thing, really.
0:18:24 > 0:18:26It went very well that, very smoothly, you know,
0:18:26 > 0:18:30and you see how the molten metal ran from the pouring hole
0:18:30 > 0:18:33and all the way around and then into the centre,
0:18:33 > 0:18:35and then how it sunk in the middle.
0:18:35 > 0:18:39They do that and got to keep putting a bit on in the middle.
0:18:39 > 0:18:43I think I'd better move on because me trousers are nearly on fire!
0:18:45 > 0:18:49Bloody hell! Hot, that!
0:18:49 > 0:18:51It was these people who made Britain great,
0:18:51 > 0:18:54and I think that was, for many years, forgotten.
0:18:54 > 0:18:57There's been this recent revitalisation in the idea that
0:18:57 > 0:19:00it's OK to say Britain was industrially mighty.
0:19:00 > 0:19:03It's not politically incorrect to say that any more,
0:19:03 > 0:19:06and I think there was certainly a phase we saw,
0:19:06 > 0:19:08where we felt guilty about our empire
0:19:08 > 0:19:11and our aspirations for world domination.
0:19:11 > 0:19:13People like Brunel, Hackworth...
0:19:13 > 0:19:15certainly, you know, the Stephensons,
0:19:15 > 0:19:19we've kind of reinterpreted their importance and their roles,
0:19:19 > 0:19:22and all of these people contributed to that kind of industrial knowledge
0:19:22 > 0:19:25that people like Fred would recreate in their garden.
0:19:25 > 0:19:27Right.
0:19:28 > 0:19:32Right, really the equipment that they had or would have had
0:19:32 > 0:19:35in Robert Stephenson's place, up in Newcastle-on-Tyne
0:19:35 > 0:19:39wouldn't have been a great deal different than this,
0:19:39 > 0:19:43and it would be definitely driven from a line shaft via a steam engine.
0:19:43 > 0:19:49I mean, even the drills, they'd be almost identical apart from maybe
0:19:49 > 0:19:51the gears would be exposed, you know,
0:19:51 > 0:19:53make even more row than this!
0:19:53 > 0:19:57I mean, when you think about it, it does a superb job.
0:19:57 > 0:20:01Very slow, though, compared with modern equipment.
0:20:01 > 0:20:07I mean, they'd have used this for boring all the brackets
0:20:07 > 0:20:11and bits and pieces for the motion of a locomotive.
0:20:11 > 0:20:14I mean, they'd have had bigger versions
0:20:14 > 0:20:18for, you know, drilling holes in ends of cranks and things like that.
0:20:18 > 0:20:21Fred's main interest is steam
0:20:21 > 0:20:25and all the machines that he uses and loves are driven by steam.
0:20:25 > 0:20:30Steam is the driving medium of the Victorian age,
0:20:30 > 0:20:34so I think he sees himself
0:20:34 > 0:20:37as a contemporary of the likes of Stephenson,
0:20:37 > 0:20:41Hackworth, Brunel, in the big steam age.
0:20:47 > 0:20:50He's raised their awareness tremendously.
0:20:50 > 0:20:53I mean, he mentions them in all his programmes.
0:20:53 > 0:20:56They're obviously his heroes of the past
0:20:56 > 0:21:01and they would be forgotten if it wasn't for people like Fred
0:21:01 > 0:21:03who remind us of the contribution
0:21:03 > 0:21:05that they made to our industrial heritage.
0:21:18 > 0:21:20I think he brought the whole story
0:21:20 > 0:21:26of Britain's great industrial development to people's awareness,
0:21:26 > 0:21:29and particularly, through some of the famous people involved,
0:21:29 > 0:21:34the Stephensons, the Hackworths etc, but it probably too came over
0:21:34 > 0:21:38that there were a lot of people like him in the Victorian era,
0:21:38 > 0:21:41who through their graft and through their work,
0:21:41 > 0:21:45got Britain to be where it was as a leading industrial nation.
0:21:45 > 0:21:50And one of them was the great Victorian industrialist, Sir William Armstrong.
0:21:50 > 0:21:53William Armstrong, really, were actually a lawyer.
0:21:53 > 0:21:56He studied the law, you know, but he had this other
0:21:56 > 0:21:58interest in science and technology
0:21:58 > 0:22:01and of course, one of his great things were hydraulics.
0:22:01 > 0:22:08It's an astonishing fact that Armstrong never had any formal training in engineering, you know.
0:22:08 > 0:22:11Everything he knew, he taught himself,
0:22:11 > 0:22:12and at the beginning of his company
0:22:12 > 0:22:16for the first 15 years, he never had a holiday, you know.
0:22:16 > 0:22:17He were a bit like me, really,
0:22:17 > 0:22:24and of course like Brunel, he, like, were dedicated to the job.
0:22:24 > 0:22:27If there were a great problem wanted solving, you know,
0:22:27 > 0:22:30he didn't even go home, he would sleep on the job.
0:22:30 > 0:22:33There have been a number of biographies of Brunel.
0:22:33 > 0:22:35He is much the most famous engineer in history -
0:22:35 > 0:22:37perhaps TOO famous, some would say.
0:22:37 > 0:22:41There's been one biography of George and Robert Stephenson
0:22:41 > 0:22:43and one of Robert Stephenson.
0:22:43 > 0:22:45There hasn't yet been a proper biography
0:22:45 > 0:22:47of Sir William Armstrong at all.
0:22:47 > 0:22:50They're names which are known to - WERE known to -
0:22:50 > 0:22:53maybe, in the order of 50,000, 100,000, 200,000 people,
0:22:53 > 0:22:56but after Fred's programmes, their names were known
0:22:56 > 0:22:57to several million people,
0:22:57 > 0:23:00which is a huge contribution in public education,
0:23:00 > 0:23:02if you think about it.
0:23:02 > 0:23:06By 1847, Armstrong had given up practising law.
0:23:06 > 0:23:10He opened his Elswick works on the banks of the river Tyne,
0:23:10 > 0:23:14where he manufactured the hydraulic cranes
0:23:14 > 0:23:18and all sorts of other engineering equipment
0:23:18 > 0:23:21like lathes and steam engines and steam pumps.
0:23:22 > 0:23:24The business was a huge success,
0:23:24 > 0:23:28and went on to provide engines and hydraulic machinery
0:23:28 > 0:23:29for some of the greatest
0:23:29 > 0:23:33civil engineering projects of the Victorian age,
0:23:33 > 0:23:37including Tower Bridge and the Manchester Ship Canal.
0:23:38 > 0:23:44By 1867, the Armstrong company had begun to build iron warships,
0:23:44 > 0:23:49and in the first 15 years, they built 20.
0:23:49 > 0:23:52And in the last quarter of the last century,
0:23:52 > 0:23:58they became like world leaders in armaments and warship building.
0:23:58 > 0:24:00By this time, he'd become a lord
0:24:00 > 0:24:03and he'd also become a great landowner,
0:24:03 > 0:24:05and this here is his parlour.
0:24:05 > 0:24:08Very beautiful - he must have made a lot of money.
0:24:08 > 0:24:11And here he entertained foreign envoys and princes
0:24:11 > 0:24:15who'd all come down to have a look at his big guns.
0:24:15 > 0:24:17And at first, he was very patriotic.
0:24:17 > 0:24:20He only sold them to the British government,
0:24:20 > 0:24:22but they terminated his contract
0:24:22 > 0:24:24and then he threw patriotism through the window
0:24:24 > 0:24:28and started selling them to everybody all over the world,
0:24:28 > 0:24:33and became the greatest armaments supplier of the time.
0:24:33 > 0:24:37What Fred grasped is that you don't have to throw out
0:24:37 > 0:24:41the whole of Victorian culture and deride all of its achievements
0:24:41 > 0:24:45simply because there are some aspects of it which -
0:24:45 > 0:24:50perhaps for good reasons - we find politically incorrect
0:24:50 > 0:24:53or unpleasant or difficult to deal with now.
0:24:53 > 0:24:55I mean, I think he grasped that it was
0:24:55 > 0:24:58one of the most creative cultures that there has ever been
0:24:58 > 0:25:03and I think he grasped that that was a unique historical achievement
0:25:03 > 0:25:06that Victorian Britain produced,
0:25:06 > 0:25:11and that if there are nasty sides to it along the way -
0:25:11 > 0:25:13appalling poverty in the cities -
0:25:13 > 0:25:18that actually, the industrial revolution wouldn't have happened without them,
0:25:18 > 0:25:21and it doesn't mean that it wasn't a great achievement.
0:25:22 > 0:25:27By the 1890s, the manufacture of arms and battleships
0:25:27 > 0:25:31had become one of our major industries.
0:25:31 > 0:25:35Armstrong had turned a brilliantly successful engineering works
0:25:35 > 0:25:39into a symbol of imperial might, here at this spot.
0:25:39 > 0:25:42Down there, they made all the battleships and up there
0:25:42 > 0:25:47kept extending and extending, all the way to the Scott's woodworks.
0:25:47 > 0:25:51In fact, at home, in me shed, I've got a riveting hammer
0:25:51 > 0:25:56that says, "Sir WG Armstrong, Scott's Woodworks, Newcastle-on-Tyne"
0:25:56 > 0:26:00so I know they made riveting hammers up there!
0:26:00 > 0:26:01What an empire it must have been.
0:26:01 > 0:26:05It's lovely to think of the Victorian age as a heroic age.
0:26:05 > 0:26:10Erm, it wasn't always a heroic age for the people involved,
0:26:10 > 0:26:12and he understood that, made it clear
0:26:12 > 0:26:17that there was real hardship in running a steam engine,
0:26:17 > 0:26:21sort of, perfectly, and for hour upon hour,
0:26:21 > 0:26:26or being on the locomotive going up to Scotland, you know,
0:26:26 > 0:26:32with hardly any protection at all, and having to spot every signal,
0:26:32 > 0:26:34come rain, come shine, you know?
0:26:34 > 0:26:37These were very demanding jobs that people had,
0:26:37 > 0:26:40and I think he understood that.
0:26:42 > 0:26:47Fred has a very strong understanding of the traditions
0:26:47 > 0:26:50of the Victorian industrial revolution,
0:26:50 > 0:26:54and one of the great underpinnings of that was the idea of self-help
0:26:54 > 0:26:56that you could, if you worked hard enough,
0:26:56 > 0:26:59you would be able to achieve anything that you wanted.
0:26:59 > 0:27:02It wasn't always easy. There were sacrifices to be made,
0:27:02 > 0:27:05but he knew that a good day's work for a good day's pay
0:27:05 > 0:27:08was the best way in which you could live your life.
0:27:11 > 0:27:15I think Fred's contribution
0:27:15 > 0:27:21to understanding the great engineers is, in a sense, overshadowed
0:27:21 > 0:27:26by his ability that he's got people to understand the unknown engineers, you know,
0:27:26 > 0:27:31the riveters and the blacksmiths and the people who really did it.
0:27:31 > 0:27:34And there was this sense that yeah, the Victorians,
0:27:34 > 0:27:37they saw things going wrong in their world
0:27:37 > 0:27:41but they also felt that they were working towards a new era
0:27:41 > 0:27:44of peace and prosperity, and somehow all the things that were wrong,
0:27:44 > 0:27:47like slums or illness or whatever,
0:27:47 > 0:27:51would ultimately be swept away by material advancement,
0:27:51 > 0:27:54and that sense of optimism which we've so lost...
0:27:54 > 0:27:59We now know that imperialism has all these problems,
0:27:59 > 0:28:03that industrialisation brings global warming and pollution.
0:28:03 > 0:28:05And he was looking back to that world
0:28:05 > 0:28:08where people believed in what they were doing passionately
0:28:08 > 0:28:11and were trying, and believed they were making things better.
0:28:15 > 0:28:18I think, really, I'd have been a happy man then,
0:28:18 > 0:28:21putting all the poverty and, you know,
0:28:21 > 0:28:26awful things that there were in the Victorian period aside.
0:28:26 > 0:28:31I think if you were of mechanical bent, you could survive then.
0:28:31 > 0:28:33I reckon I'd have been all right.
0:28:33 > 0:28:36I don't think I'd have been out of work.
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