Swindon, the hometown of the members of XTC, was the main junction of the Great Western Railway (GWR). The fame and importance of the railway was such that it was nicknamed "God's Wonderful Railway".
The GWR's first section
was opened from London to Taplow in 1838. The line was completed to Bristol in 1841 ...
By the juction at Swindon, then a small market town, was established the Great Western Railway's locomotive works. Swindon was expected to be the place at which trains would change engines ... the works remained at Swindon and went on to fame.
(Source: P.J.G. Ransom, The Archaeology of Railways, 1981, pp.64-65)
Phil Hetherington <ee92pmh@brunel.ac.uk> writes:
The GWR was Swindon, basically. Swindon Works was where the GWR built pretty near all of its locomotives for many years (and probably the coaches and goods wagons, too), as well as doing all of the major overhauls and so on. For several decades, the Works was Swindon's main employer, so its importance cannot be emphasised strongly enough. (See also "place of former employment" on Colin's map of Swindon in Go 2.) This importance continued long after the formation of British Railways in 1948, as the GWR had always been a fiercely independant company and this continued long after nationalisation. Swindon Works continued to build locomotives, in fact the last steam locomotive to be built by BR was built there in 1960. I'm not sure exactly when the Works closed, I think it was during the '80s but I may be wrong. It may still have been open when the album was made, but the writing would have been on the wall even then. Regardless, the run-down and closure of the Works must have been a disaster for Swindon, in terms of the town's heritage as well as employment.
(Source: the Chalkhills FAQ.)
The GWR's first locomotive was the
North
Star, and they later built
two famous classes of engine, Castles and Kings.
The locomotive that the band leans on in the inner sleeve of The
Big Express, #2516, is in the GWR Museum, Swindon. This
engine is one of the '2301' class 0-6-0 Dean standard goods (or
"Dean Goods"),
originally introduced in 1883 as a main line freight engine; and developed over the years to be an outstandingly successful light goods and branch line passenger engine. Some of these engines put in nearly 80 years of service.
(Source: O.S. Nock, The Railway Enthusiast's Encyclopedia, 1968, p.76)
Isambard Kingdom Brunel designed the Great Western Railway.
further reading:
appears on:
The caps the members of XTC don on the cover of the album The Big Express.
