British Steam Sunset: A Vision of the Final Years 1965–1968 - Hardcover

Blake, Jim

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1473857104 ISBN 13: 9781473857100

Publisher: Pen and Sword Transport, 2018

Synopsis

In this new album from Pen & Sword, transport historian and photographer Jim Blake presents a selection of pictures he took around the country in British steam's final years.

British Railways withdrew their last steam engines with almost indecent haste in the mid- to late-1960s, many having seen only a few years' service before consignment to the scrapheap. Jim's pictures graphically show how not only the locomotives themselves were neglected in their final years, but also their working environment. Their motive power depots were also badly run down, particularly when slated for closure upon steam's demise.

Most of Jim's pictures of steam locomotives, taken fifty years ago, are previously unpublished. In BR steam's last two years, they were based in two distinctly different areas on the London & South Western main line, and in the industrial north. However, their decline was just as sad and depressing in both areas once proud depots such as London's Nine Elms, with broken windows and roof open to the sky, not repaired after wartime, piles of ash and clinker everywhere, were just as derelict as those in such places as Wigan or Sunderland. Many scenes herein invoke the sad, eerie atmosphere of steam's last months.

Ironically, it was London Transport who operated the last publicly-owned standard gauge steam locomotives in 1971, some three years after BR's had gone. These are included within these pages too.

About this title

About the Author

Jim Blake was born at the end of 1947, and he soon developed a passionate interest in railways, buses and trolleybuses. In 1965, he bought a colour cine-camera, with which he captured what is now very rare footage of long-lost buses, trolleybuses and steam locomotives. These transport photographs have been published in various books and magazines. Jim also started the North London Transport Society and, in conjunction with the group, he has compiled and published a number of books on the subject since 1977, featuring many of the 100,000 or so transport photographs he has taken over the years.

Edition details

• Publisher: Pen and Sword Transport
• Publication date: 2018
• ISBN 10: 1473857104
• ISBN 13: 9781473857100
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 112