Here’s a small home-front window display poster by the Polish designers, George Him and Jan Lewitt. They worked in Britain from the 1930s onwards…I’ve posted about them before.
This design makes a visual connection between bread, as a symbol of food, and the train, as a symbol of logistics and distribution… There’s a text message which links the distribution to the energy economy of WW2.
All that on a small bit of paper.
Here is a poster announcing the newly-nationalised French railways, called SNCF. The French railways were nationalised in 1938. I’m not sure exactly when this poster was made. I thought 1940s, but it could be earlier. I’ll have to check.
The poster is by Paul Colin, one of the great masters if French poster design. During the 1920s and 1930s he created many great entertainment posters, especially for the American dancer, Josephine Baker. Colin helped to create the dynamic image of Baker.
Colin ranks along with Cassandre and Loupot as one of the great poster designers of the 1930s.
Interestingly, Colin started his own school of design…and taught many of the next generation of poster designers!
Here is a wonderful railway engine from Japan. It was spotted by my friend and colleague, Dave Hendley. The engine is named after the Power-Rangers…and the front of the engine is modelled so as to look like their helmets!
Brilliant.
There are a lot of films about trains on TV…And, there always have been.
John Betjeman made films of himself sitting on rural station platforms all through the 1960s. The humourist, Miles Kington made films about old steam trains during the 1970s…Nowadays the former politician, Michael Portillo, travels the network around the UK, and ventures abroad with his Bradshaw’s Guide (published 1914).
The ex-Python star, Michael Palin, has travelled all around the world by train, courtesy of the BBC. And now, there is a whole sub-genre of films about the Indian railway, its employees and its passengers.
But, this is all much harder to get right than you would think.
The comic, Griff Rhys Jones, has just set off on a train trip through Africa on ITV. This was really disappointing and set me thinking about what makes a good railway film…I’ve posted before about feature films; but this is a post about TV, documentary-style, films.
Part of the appeal of trains, from a producer’s point-of-view, is that they are relatively inexpensive…the action is contained, and the scenery moves past the window. In addition the films have a natural story-arc of journey; with beginnings, middles, and ends, all in the right place and at regular (train time) intervals. If you’re shameless, like Stephen Fry, you can do it all as a kind of holiday programme, and you get to stay in nice hotels along the way.
From the viewer’s point of view, the films are compelling for their mixture of people, places, machinery and history…what’s not to like there?
Griff’s film didn’t really work…there were not enough characters along the way…and the immediate social context was sort of African bi-polar, with extremes of poverty and prosperity.
Amazingly, I can’t ever remember a series about the railway in the USA…
The plan is this…
Begin in NYC and travel to Chicago, along the route of the 20th Century Limited. That’s Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint in Hitchcock’s, North by Northwest (1959). Once in Chicago, explore the skyscrapers of downtown Chicago, and the stockyards of the railhead. Reading a bit of Upton Sinclair along the way.
Next, down to New Orleans retracing the story of the Blues, from the Delta to Chicago and via Memphis and Nashville, along the way. From New Orleans to the west coast, and from LA, through the Rockies, up to Canada.
Then, back along the Canadian Pacific route and home…
That’s a series of films that would include amazing landscapes, amazing machines and amazing people…all against a background of popular music and imagery deriving from the unique cultural context of the north American railroad.
It’s a no-brainer, except that people don’t think of America and trains; they think of the US and cars. Jack Kerouac was on the road, not on the track!
Oh well.
The pop music producer, Peter Waterman, is selling part of his collection of model railway locomotives.
Mr Waterman is well known amongst railway conservation and preservation groups. The sale is an attempt to make space and to underwrite the restoration of his various full-size steam locomotives…if the sale is a success, the resulting endowment will guarantee the project. Well done him.
There are some amazing models…hand-built from scratch and according to the measured drawings from the original manufacturers.
We usually think of models in relation to train sets. The more larger scale detailed models might have been made to attract investment or to provide a guide to the engineers building the actual machines….
But, quite apart from the technical quality of the models and the delight in miniature; the models are elements in an important historical archive….
Most full size steam locomotives have disappeared. Obviously there are are a number of preserved engines, but these are relatively few in number. Especially in relation to the whole story of the mechanical development of the steam locomotive…so, the models provide for a sort of record of mechanical and design development. In the absence of the actual machines, all we have are the models.
Here is a lovely early Victorian drawing of a steam loco from 1846. The drawing is by the engineer, David Joy.
This kind of technical drawing is distinguished by its precision. The drawing has to be big enough to carry the detail and, at the same time, remain clear enough to be useful…
The Institute of Mechanical Engineers has a wonderful archive of this material.
More recently, the artist William Fenton made coloured versions of this kind of image. These images were published in a series of large-format picture books during the 1970s. These books are now quite rare, as they were often broken up for framing.
William Fenton has worked for London Transport. You can see his work in the archive of the LT Museum.
We found this lovely toy steam engine in a local charity shop. It’s an early twentieth century tinplate miniature, or penny-toy. It was made in Germany, by the firm of JLH; That’s for, Johann Leonard Hess.
The locomotive came with three carriages and some trucks. There was also a TPO carriage. That is for travelling post-office; my favourite.
The toys are made from thin steel sheeting that has been printed and folded to make the models. The colour printing is by chromo-litho.
The history of lithography is of how this printing process became, during the second half of the 19C, the main printing process of manufacturing and industrially scaled enterprise. Posters, point-of-sale advertising, labels, and packaging, were each produced using this process.
Printing on metal was pioneered by biscuit manufacturers. Their experiments led to the development of offset lithography. That’s where a roller picks up the design, from the printing plate, and transfers it onto the paper or tin. The addition of a roller did several things…it speeded up the whole process by turning the action of the press into a rotary movement.
Spinning is always much quicker than shifting left-to-right or whatever. Also, the roller kept the colour plates tidy. So, you could print for longer and at a higher speed…that was obviously more profitable.
The make-ready of colour separations was also improved. The addition of a roller meant that you no longer had to print in negative format. The machine went positive to negative, on the roller, and back to positive, on the metal or paper. That made life much easier and reduced costs again.
I was in the studio last week and was shown this…it’s a hand drawn and watercolour iteration of the famous London Underground map by Harry Beck…I didn’t see the exact date, but I think it is from the 1930s.
Beck was an obsessive, who worked to perfect his conceptual diagram of London’s underground railway network, by constantly amending various details…so, there are an endless stream of variations and improvements. Sometimes he went back to first principles…
The diagram is based on a few simple rules…it has become the default model for mapping urban transport systems around the world. Beck’s London Underground map is the original and still the best. It’s never been bettered.
This comes from the London Transport Museum, where Ken Garland has placed the Harry Beck archive.
That’s good. Ken was the first designer to understand the design significance of Beck’s diagram…and discovered Beck living in, I believe, slightly reduced circumstances. Certainly, Beck’s relationship with LT had deteriorated….his diagram work wasn’t officially commissioned and he was viewed as a maverick obsessive.
Beck’s unsolicited work was acknowledged by a small additional payment in addition to his official salary as an electrical engineering draughtsman at LT.
Ken saved the archive and wrote the story. Without him, this would all have been lost.
So, well done Ken Garland, well done Harry Beck, and well done the London Transport Museum…Good sense all around.
Here is an image of Bradshaw’s railway map of the UK. It’s dated 1852. I love the decorative engraving of the title and the clever way some of the more important cities have their own detailed maps, ranged to the edge of the sheet.
Bradshaw is a key figure in the cultural history of railways. He was the first to publish an integrated timetable for all the railways of Britain. He also published guide books for railway travellers. Later, the business expanded to provide international timetables and guides.
Michael Portillo uses a Bradshaw for his Great Railway Journeys TV programme…
I will look for images of other railway maps from around the world…
Anyone who knows me will know that; apart from trains, I enjoy restaurant meals…quite often and as I’ve posted before, these two go together…the development of the railway system facilitated the all-day dining and fast-food environments that are familiar today.
The early railways provided picnic hampers and it wasn’t long before there were dining cars and railway hotels. The scorched-earth food offer of modern travel is an indictment of how these businesses are run…there’s no room for pleasure; but that’s where the value is.
My own preference is for the French style of brasserie cooking…hearty classics from the oyster bar and grill-room. I like the food, the scale, and the movement, of these busy places.
Good news!
Dishoom has just arrived at the next platform from CSM at KX. It’s Indian tappas-style served in their version of the faded glory of old-school Indian railway stations….this manages to combine informality and scale, with style and flavour…perfect, for me, at least.
I could quite easily spend the whole day there…
I remember that Indian railway stations are famous for their tiffin lunches. These are ready-meals delivered in lovely stacking boxes. The boxes are painted so as to be recognisable. Unlike in the UK, these railway lunches are generally prepared, fresh, in ordinary kitchens at home…
The tiffin system is combines many small businesses into an operation of scale…and without the corporate organisation that standardises and economises. It’s so unusual that even the Harvard Business School have looked at tiffin logistics as a worthwhile model.
It’s not really railway food…but the system of logistical delivery is organised through the railway system. You see railway platforms covered with tins…but they don’t stay there.
Dishoom is big business. It’s a lifestyle and leisure brand spun-out of the Tilda rice empire…I can already see more of these.
I recommend the roasted cheese, paneer tikka, a nan bread, and an iced beer. Perfect.
Well done Dishoom.
