An Illustrated History of Edinburgh's Railways.
A fascinating account of the buildup and decay of the miriad of lines which used to run around and into
Edinburgh in the heyday of the railways. The photographs are again monochrome with some from our own Stuart
Sellar.
The British Steam Locomotive 1925-1965 by O.S.Nock. A tome for the technocrats. Lots of explanations of how steam locomotives were developed highlighting the different approaches used by the different CME's involved. Great reference material - there is a chapter on the engines which "might have been" - the prototypes which didn't quite make it longterm, such as the Turbomotive, the Gresley high pressure compound, the GWR pacific "Great Bear", the Gresley P1 and the LNER Garret which was too powerful! The trains it could pull were so long that the passing loops were all too short to accommodate them. The other problem was that the tractive effort was so high that truck couplings kept breaking!
The Twilight of Scottish Steam
by David J Hucknall is another photograph based publication which catalogues Scottish motive power in the
final days before complete dieselisation. The photographs are monchrome on non-glossy paper. The various
locomotive classes are dealt with in turn rather than grouping the photographs by geographical area. This
book is focussed much more on the main line and big engines then on branch lines and smaller types.
On the Waverley Route by Robert Robotham. A (colour) pictorial guide to the Edinburgh to Carlisle line so mis-guidedly closed in the 60's under the direction of the infamous Dr Richard Beeching. The book is full of excellent photographs of the line and many of the branches therefrom mostly taken during the 50's and 60's. The vast majority of the illustrations represent steam. A superb nostalgic trip for anyone who knew the line.
