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Description

GWR 1910 The Great Western Railway Supplement

  • In 1910 "The Engineer" published an extensive supplement devoted to the Great Western Railway (GWR). There are numerous illustrations of the engines, rolling stock and architectural features of the line. This document focuses on the broad gauge era. It contains lists of locomotives and their classes.

    A "must have" for GWR enthusiasts. This document is broken down into sections to reduce server load.

    THE GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY.

    THE total length of the Great Western Railway permanent way is probably about 1000 miles in excess of that of any other line in the United Kingdom. There are now open 1515 ¼ miles of double, and 1430 miles of single line. On 54¼ miles there are three lines, and on 128½ miles there are four tracks. The total geographical length is 3128 ¼ miles. The number of independent lines now absorbed into and forming part of the Great Western system is as many as 115. The tonnage of merchandise and minerals carried during the year ending 30th June, 1909, was Over 51 millions, and excluding season ticket holders the passengers carried exceeded in number 104 millions.

    We have here a colossal undertaking. Its successful operation is of the last importance to the whole south and west of England, yet for some obscure reason it has never attracted popular attention to the same extent as the London and North-Western Railway. It has hardly ever been written about.

    Nevertheless, it is certain that the Great Western Railway, its history, its progress, and its working, possess features of quite unparalleled interest for engineers, and, indeed, for all who are concerned with railways. The history of the line is inseparably connected with a man who takes rank with the greatest of the engineers who have made civilisation what it is to-day. Isambard Kingdom Brunel possessed a far greater intellect than George Stephenson. The latter was talented. Brunel, for better or for worse, was a genius. Stephenson was essentially a mechanical engineer. Brunel was a mechanical engineer and a civil engineer as well. Stephenson always ran in fetters. He went "canny." Brunel combined extreme caution with unmitigated audacity in the most original fashion.

    But Stephenson was always, and is still, the popular Idol, because, by repute, he gave the world railways and the locomotive. Brunel did not originate that system of transport; but be developed the primary idea in a way all his own. The world will never again see a Brunel, because the modern engineer has not those demands made on his ingenuity or his resource which BruneI, and in a lesser degree George Stephenson, always met.

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    Downloads

  • GWR Supplement 1910 Part 1 (Size:2.38MB) Download

  • GWR Supplement 1910 Part 2 (Size:2.26MB) Download

  • GWR Supplement 1910 Part 3 (Size:2.44MB) Download