The London & North Eastern Railway (HB)
While two of the railway Groups formed under the 1921 Railways Act brought together, as uneasy bedfellows, lines that had been incessant competitors, with greatly differing organisational methods, the London & North Eastern Group had an easier task. For many years the GNR, NER and NBR had been associated as partners in the East Coast Route, while the GNR, GCR and GER had earlier plans for amalgamation which the capricious Mother of Parliaments had thwarted but now compelled. Even so, fusion was not without its problems, and this book describes the rivalries as to the proportion of directors that each constituent should contribute to the Board of the new company, and the fears of undue dominance by the wealthy and influential North Eastern Railway.
Also revealed for the first time, as part of an extensive survey of LNER locomotives and their performance, is the surprising fact that the historic LNER-GWR locomotive exchange of 1925 was arranged without the knowledge of Sir Nigel Gresley, the LNER Chief Mechanical Engineer. One valuable feature of this book is its detailed description of the financial vicissitudes through which the LNER passed during its 25-year life. As a member of the LNER staff during all but the final year of that life, no author could be better equipped than Cecil J. Allen to compile this record, and he has done so with a thoroughness which places the book in a class apart among recent railway histories.
Hardback, 14x21cm, 228 pages, black & white photographs
Condition: Good/Very Good
ISBN: 9780711002500
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