Welcome to the Railway Studies Friends

The Railway Studies Collection is administered by Devon County Council's Libraries Service. It is based at Teign House, Kingsteignton Road, Newton Abbot.

As from the 1st October 2011 the Collection is open on the following days:-

• Mondays 10am to 1pm.
• Wednesdays 10am to 1pm, 2pm to 5pm.
• Saturdays by appointment only.

The Railway Studies collection is manned by a Librarian on weekdays and volunteers on Saturdays.

FRIENDS OF THE RAILWAY STUDIES COLLECTION

Established in 1992 the Friends support the collection by various means including volunteering for Saturday opening hours, fund raising for the purchase of new titles for the Collection or giving specialist advice on the many unidentified photographs and slides held by the Collection.

Membership of the Friends costs £6 per annum and membership details are available from:

The Secretary, G. Walker, 68 Mile End Road, Newton Abbot TQ12 1RW.

The Friends also hold a series of talks /slide shows throughout the year, details of which for the current year are in the News Section of this web site. Collections are often left to the Railway Studies Collection and these are dealt with by the Library Service. Volunteers are on hand to assist in sorting out such collections. If there are any duplicate titles these are donated to the Friends who then dispose of them and then use the money raised to buy new titles for the Railway Studies Collection.

NEWS

The Friends of The Railway Studies Meetings now take place on the 3rd Tuesday of each month at the Newton Abbot Town Council Offices in Great Western House, St Pauls Road Newton Abbot commencing at 7pm. All are welcome.

The programme for meetings is as follows :-

17th January 2012
From Steam to Diesel: A talk by Councillor Richard Westlake on his railway career.Venue Newton Abbot Town Council Chamber.

21st February 2012
The London Underground- a talk by Mr David Mead, former Chief Engineer of London Underground. Venue Newton Abbot Town Council Chamber.

20th March 2012
The local railway scene - an illustrated talk by Paul Webber. Venue Newton Abbot Town Council Chamber.

17th April 2012
The Lynton & Barnstaple Railway An illustrated talk by Ian Cowling. Venue Newton Abbot Town Council Chamber.

15th May 2012
FRSC AGM followed by photographs from the Collection. Venue Newton Abbot Town Council Chamber.

19th June 2012
Views of a changing Railway: Edward Hopper 1925–1968 an illustrated talk by Maurice Hopper.

17th July 2012
Improving the South Western Branch line network- A talk by Julian Crow, West of England Regional Manager for First Great Western. Venue Newton Abbot Library.

18th September 2012
The American Railway Scene -an illustarted talk by DG Walker.Venue Newton Abbot Library.

16th October 2012
Yeovil to Hemyock - the long way round. An illustrated talk by Bernard Mills. Venue Newton Abbot Library.

20th November 2012
TBA.

All meetings to commence at 7pm, all are welcome to attend with Friends of the Railway Studies Collection having free entry, guests are also welcome and are invited to make a small donation of £1 which adds to the funds for the purchase of new books for the Collection.

NEWS FROM THE LIBRARY

News from the Collection.

Refurbishment and new build work on the old Library is well under way with the Devon County Council web site showing a completion date of April 2012.

A decision has been taken by the County Library Service that the Collection will no longer retain any foreign railway books, tickets, railway stamps or pocket timetables. The foreign books are currently available for purchase. Contact Graham Walker for details. (01626 352077). Space requirements is the reason for these decisions.

Archiving the Photographic Collection.

The Collection's images have been sorted into the following categories:

Railway Works, Steam & Diesel Railcars, Monorails, Cliff Railways, Viaducts, Bridges, Stations, Railway Art, Locomotives, Minature Railways, Narrow Gauge Railways, Preserved Railways, Model railways, Accidents & war damage, ambulance trains, Ships belonging to the Railway Companies, Freight trains, wagons, vans & carriages, Railway Road vehicles, permenant way, line side equipment, signalling and signal boxes, advertising, tickets, railway art and posters, industrial railways, trams, underground trains, nameplates Broad Gauge pictures and cranes.

On the database there appears for each image a title, a description of the photograph, a date when the image was taken, the format & size of the image, a box number where the image is stored, and any details of copyright.

The team are currently identifying images from the GWR and it's Constituent Companies.

26,000 images have now been entered on the database. These include a wide variety of photographs from 1948 onwards to the present day. Pre grouping Company images now on the data base include, London North Western Railway, Furness Railway, Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway, London , South Eastern and Chatham Railway, London, Chatham and Dover Railway and London, Brighton and South Coast Railway.

Images of the Southern Railway and London Midland and Scottish Railway from 1923 to 1947 are also on the database.

The archive has numerous postcards and photographs of Stations through the ages and these images are now on the data base listed in alphabetical order.

The team are currently working on the GWR photographs, Bridges, Viaducts and Tunnels and Photographs of the Great Northern Railway.

COLLECTION DETAILS

The Collection which opened in 1991 is housed on the first floor of Newton Abbot Library which is a Grade 1 Listed Building. Newton Abbot was chosen because of the town's significance as a railway centre. Newton Abbot has a main line station, and was the site of a large locomotive shed [Shed code 83A] engine repair works and carriage and wagon works.

All aspects of Britain's Railways are covered by the collection with material of interest to railway and social historians, writer's modellers, researchers and people concerned with the contemporary scene.

There is comprehensive material on West Country Railways from the Great Western and London South Western/Southern periods up to the present day. In addition there is a substantial amount of information on the remainder of the UK's railway network with limited dealings with railways in other countries.

As well as providing info on standard gauge railways, the Collection caters for other key areas of interest such as :-

• Broad Gauge
• Narrow gauge
• Industrial Lines
• Miniature railways
• Underground Railways
• Preserved railways

This wealth of data is arranged according to a classification scheme based on that devised by George Ottley for his Bibliography of Railway History. A guide to this scheme is available in the Library.

Items in the Collection form part of the Devon Library service catalogue on the web where a list of periodical holdings is also available.
Click here to view details of the Railway Studies Collection at Teign House, Kingsteignton Road, Newton Abbot.

The Railway Studies Collection contains:-

• Books
• pamphlets
• Timetables
• Photographs
• Post Cards
• Slides
• Drawings
• Maps
• Magazines
• Videos and railway related jig saw puzzles

Periodicals/Newsletters/Books provided by the Friends.

The London Record is now purchased by the Friends.

The following new titles have been purchased by the Friends for the Collection :-
Middleton Press: Cardiff to Swansea, Swansea to Carmarthen, Carmarthen to Fishguard. RCTS BR Standard Locomotives Part 2, Bradshaw Railway Timetable 1913 edition, Southern Railway Timetable 1931, DMU Compendium, Somerset Stations — then and now, "This is your way sir" LMS Publicity Posters 1923-1947, BR Standard Class 5 4-6-0's,West Coast Blue Electrics, British Railway Steam Allocations, South West Trains, Bullied-Man, Myths and Machines.

Please click here to view a full list of our Periodicals

It's a Mystery

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  Photo ID: MYS001

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  Photo ID: MYS002

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  Photo ID: MYS003

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  Photo ID: MYS004

Can you help identify these photos?

Copyright of all photos DG Walker

DIRECTIONS

By Road: there is a large car park at the rear of Teign House. It is called Cricketfield Road Car park and is a pay on exit car park.

By Rail: Newton Abbot is served by main line services provided by First Great Western and Arriva Cross Country Exeter to Plymouth main line, with local services provided by First Great Western from Exeter, Teignmouth, Dawlish, Torquay and Paignton.

The library is 20 minutes walk from the railway station. Buses run regularly from the Railway station to the town's bus station which is less than five minutes walk to the library.

Click here to view a map of how to find us
(Teign House is situated at the rear of the large sports field on google maps and is the grey roofed building)

CONTACTS

Chairman of the Friends of the Raiway Studies Collection,
Mr P Rowledge,
5 Shobrook Hill,
Newton Abbot TQ12 1UZ

Secretary,
G. Walker,
68 Mile End Road,
Newton Abbot TQ12 1RW.

Saturday Rota Secretary,
G. Walker,
68 Mile End Road,
Newton Abbot TQ12 1RW.

The Railway Studies Collection,
Teign House,
Kingsteignton Road,
Newton Abbot, Devon.

Site last updated - January 2012

Copyright 2012 Railway Studies Friends | Copyright of all photos DG Walker