# Talk:Great Western Railway

The Infobox used in this article can be found at {{Infobox GWR}}.

Quote "After 1902 G. J. Churchward developed a distinctive style of locomotive in 4-4-0 ...".
Should that be 4-4-2?
Songwriter 09:46 5 Jul 2003 (UTC)

I had the 4-4-0 "City" class in mind, which (as I understand it) were designed while Dean was still nominally in charge, and built in about 1903. I believe Churchward tried out 4-4-2, bringing over three French "Atlantics", converting Albion to a 4-4-2 as a comparison, and building North Star as a 4-4-2 (though it ended up as a 4-6-0). There may have been other 4-4-2 designs. --rbrwr
Ah!  I was forgetting about the City class.  I was thinking of North Star in its initial form.  Thank you.
Songwriter 13:24 5 Jul 2003 (UTC)

The name of the Flying Dutchman Racehorse came from an old story, and has nothing to do with Maarten Tromp, Trom was never the Flying Dutchman, that story is way older. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.80.157.6 (talk) 03:38, 31 December 2015

The Internet Archive has two volumes of MacDermot's History of the Great Western Railway. The second volume, naturally, is named "Vol. II", but the first volume is named "Vol. I Part I". Is there a "Vol. I Part II", or is Part II the same as Vol. II? -- Verbarson  talkedits 11:27, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

@Verbarson: There are two editions.
The first edition, published in 1927-31, was two volumes but three physical books - volume I, which was published in 1927 and covered the period to 1863, was bound as Volume I Part I and Volume I Part II but these two were sold as a pair - the pagination continued across the split so the page numbers are unique to Vol. I even if you don't know which of the two parts the page is in. Both Prts have a Contents, but only Part II has an index. Volume II, which was published in 1931 and covered the 1863-1921 period, was a single physical book, so has no part numbering. Its pagination restarts at 1.
The second edition, published in the 1960s, was revised by O.S. Nock, and not only is the pagination completely different, volume I is now bound as a single physical book. A Volume III was also added, taking the story from 1921 to 1947. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 12:39, 9 July 2024 (UTC)
@Redrose64: Thanks for that. Therefore the "Vol. I Part I" in archive.org, which has no index, is indeed only Part I, and "Vol. I Part II" is not in the archive. "Vol. II" is present, as is Nock's "Vol. III".
Since "Vol. I Part I" takes the history up to 1863, and "Vol. II" picks up from 1863, what is in "Vol. I Part II"? Judging by the contents list of "Vol. II", it would be more detailed coverage of services, locomotives and rolling stock. Is that so? -- Verbarson  talkedits 14:48, 9 July 2024 (UTC)
I'm not at home right now, I'll check later. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 18:16, 9 July 2024 (UTC)
Here are the cite templates that I normally use:
MacDermot, E.T. (1927). History of the Great Western Railway, vol. I: 1833–1863. Paddington: Great Western Railway.
MacDermot, E.T. (1931). History of the Great Western Railway, vol. II: 1863–1921. Paddington: Great Western Railway. OCLC 55853736.
Note that I don't distinguish the two Parts of vol. 1, since the pagination is continuous (see below). I don't have the second editions of these two volumes, but I do have vol. 3:
Nock, O.S. (September 1967). History of the Great Western Railway, vol. III: 1923–1947. Shepperton: Ian Allan.
Both parts of Vol. I take the story up to 1863-64, ending in one sense with the amalgamation of the GWR, West Midland Railway (WMR) and South Wales Railway in 1863, and in another sense with the retirement of Charles A. Saunders, who had been Secretary of the GWR from before its incorporation until 1864. Part I (pages i-xvi and 1-456 plus a fold-out map of the system as of 1855) is a largely chronological history of the development and expansion of the GWR during this period, and includes previous histories of railways that amalgamated or were absorbed before 1863, such as the Shrewsbury and Birmingham Railway and Shrewsbury and Chester Railway. Part II (fold-out map as of 1863, pages i-x and 457-902) begins with the pre-amalgamation histories of the WMR and SWR, and continues with chapters about signalling, services, staff, locomotives and rolling stock. It also includes appendices and the index. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 21:16, 9 July 2024 (UTC)
Thanks for bringing this together so comprehensively. -- Verbarson  talkedits 21:50, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

It has been a while since this article has been reviewed, so I took a look and saw lots of uncited statements, including entire paragraphs. Should this article go to WP:GAR? Z1720 (talk) 02:31, 29 March 2025 (UTC)

@Redrose64 do you happen to know which reprint of Track Topics is cited? There are several, but typically the combination of a 1935 publication year and the Great Western Railway as the publisher would indicate the original publication. Thanks, Mackensen (talk) 20:40, 21 April 2025 (UTC)

The best person to ask is the person who made this edit, i.e. Geof Sheppard (talk · contribs), who is still around. But they didn't add the ISBN, that came a couple of years later in this edit by Citation bot 1 (talk · contribs).
My own copy is Chapman, W.G. (1987) [1935]. Track Topics: A Book of Railway Engineering for Boys of All Ages (3rd ed.). Newton Abbot: David & Charles. ISBN 0-7153-8953-X. which is a reprint. But my local model railway club has an older edition, I don't know from when. They might not have it any more; there was a clearout of duplicate books a few months back, and in some cases they kept the one that was in better condition, even if they were different editions. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:58, 21 April 2025 (UTC)
I used an original copy from 1935. Geof Sheppard (talk) 15:57, 22 April 2025 (UTC)
Great, thank you. In that case, I'd like to reinstate my edit. An ISBN shouldn't be used to identify the original edition. Mackensen (talk) 20:31, 22 April 2025 (UTC)