Engine Driving Lives

In 416 pages and around 400 illustrations, plus tables and ephemera, this book recounts the history of footplatemen in considerable detail. From William Richards, who drove the first train on the Penydarren Tramroad at 5mph in 1804, through to the men and women who are daily at the controls of trains running from St Pancras to Brussels and Paris at up to 186mph, this is a very thorough account of a profession which has never been explained in full before. This book offers deep insights into the joys and sorrows, the disciplines and dangers, and the complex shift patterns which so impact family lives. The author has researched over 1,400 named individuals and has explored, in seventy human vignettes, something of their achievements, career moves and glimpses of their lives away from the railway. This work not only fills a huge gap in our railway history but reveals fresh insights into the daily challenges of driving locomotives and running trains over the past 200 years.