The featured image for this article is the title page of the first issue of ‘Bradshaw’s Railway Guide’. In 1961, the only known copy of the first guide was held by the Bodleian Library in Oxford. [2: p308]
Beeching …
The Editorial of The Railway Magazine in May 1961 reported on the appointment of Dr. Beeching and the state of railways in Britain. [1: p297-298]
The report said that, “Dr. Richard Beeching, Technical Director of Imperial Chemical Industries, has been chosen by the Minister of Transport as Chairman Designate of the new British Railways Board. The appointment carries a gross salary of £24,000 a year (about £6,530 net). This compares with £10,000 gross (about £4,720 net) paid to Sir Brian Robertson, the present Chairman of the B.T.C., but it has been emphasised that Dr. Beeching will not benefit financially, because he was receiving a similar amount from I.C.I. As is usual with the B.T.С., the contract is for five years, but with the difference that renewal is envisaged. Dr. Beeching is to succeed Sir Brian Robertson as Chairman of the B.T.C. on 1st June, pending the establishment of the new board. During the next five years he has to tackle the problem of restoring prosperity to the railways. This, as the Minister has pointed out, will be a challenging task. … The appointment of Dr. Beeching has aroused mixed feelings both inside and outside the railway service. Surprise and concern have been expressed because the choice did not fall on a senior railway officer who could have brought to the new board many years of specialised experience of the intricacies of railway administration. Dr. Beeching lacks this qualification, but, as a member of the Stedeford Committee, he must be fully aware of the magnitude of his task. It may be that a man who has attained a high position in the scientific industrial world at a comparatively early age will prove equally successful in the railway sphere, and it would be unfair to prejudge the appointment. A noteworthy feature is that Dr. Beeching’s present intention to return to I.C.I. after five years probably will cause him to be regarded in railway circles as a surgeon rather than a railwayman.” [1: p297]
The writing was clearly on the wall, those in the know already understood that Beeching was placed at the head of the new British Railways Board to implement a particular agenda!
Wikipedia tells us that, “Sir Ewart Smith, who retired from ICI in 1959, was asked by the Conservative Minister of Transport, Ernest Marples, to become a member of an advisory group on the financial state of the British Transport Commission to be chaired by Sir Ivan Stedeford. Smith declined but recommended Beeching in his place, a suggestion which Marples accepted. [4] Stedeford and Beeching clashed on a number of issues connected with Beeching’s proposal to drastically prune Britain’s rail infrastructure. In spite of questions being asked in Parliament, Sir Ivan’s report was not published until much later.” [5]
It seems that Beeching’s agenda was abundantly clear and was probably the reason he was appointed.
As an aside, The Railway Magazine editorial also reflected on the impact of apparent staff shortages: “A note of warning is struck in the recently-published report for the year 1960 of the Central Transport Consultative Committee for Great Britain in commenting on the serious staff shortage on British Railways. In the Midlands, freight traffic is still subjected to serious delays, because of lack of staff; even experienced long-service drivers and signalmen have taken other jobs where the work is lighter and the pay higher. The recent pay increases granted to railway workers do not appear to have solved the problem, and further reductions in passenger services may become necessary in some areas. Unpunctuality also is attributed to the same cause, and at the present time it is hard to see what steps could be taken to these difficulties effectively. The report suggests that this, like other matters, is not always explained sufficiently to passengers, who might grumble less if they were told more.” [1: p297]
Bradshaw …
Also worthy of note was that the May 1961 issue was to be the final issue of Bradshaw: … “Sherlock Holmes, in ‘The Valley of Fear’, commented that ‘the vocabulary of Bradshaw is nervous and terse, but limited’, and yet John Bright is said to have expressed the opinion that the two most widely read books in English were the Bible and Bradshaw. Only a public institution could be mentioned thus, and therefore the recent announcement that the issue of Bradshaw is to be discontinued is of far wider interest than even the abandonment of a very old-established publication. …. If John Bright’s remark be rendered ‘consulted’ rather than ‘read’, it probably was true while the number of railway companies exceeded 100, and the price of the book remained constant at 6d. for 75 years. Since grouping the unique influence of Bradshaw has declined, and in present circumstances publication has become uneconomic. Doubtless, copies of the final (May) issue will long be treasured.” [1: p 298]
Later in the same issue, Charles E. Lee’s obituary entitled ‘Farewell to Bradshaw’ said that,
“By the turn of [the 20th century] Bradshaw’s Railway Guide had grown from its modest beginning in 1839 to a publication of well over a thousand pages, which gave details of the services of some 160 separate railways in the United Kingdom, working a total of more than 21,000 miles of line. It was then 61 years old, and, as we now know, had reached the midway point in its career, for the final issue is to be published [in May 1961]. … The publisher’s decision to discontinue was announced ‘with regret’ on 9th March 1961, and this regret will be shared by both railway enthusiasts and a wider circle of traditionalists, for Bradshaw has been virtually a public institution for most of its career.
“George Bradshaw, the man whose surname was to become a household word in his lifetime, was born at Pendleton, Lancashire, on 29th July 1801. On leaving school, he was apprenticed to a Manchester engraver named Beale, and then set up in business for himself in this trade in Belfast in 1820, but the enterprise was not successful. … He returned to Manchester in 1821, and there established the business now known as Henry Blacklock & Co. Ltd. At first he engaged in general engraving, but from about 1827 specialised in maps, many of which were beautifully executed and coloured. Beginning in 1829, he issued area maps showing canals, navigable rivers, and ‘Rail Roads’ (railways from 1830), and thus showed a keen interest in transport. Incidentally, although Bradshaw had become a member of the Society of Friends (Quakers) at the age of 19, these early productions were dated normally. Later, he objected to the use in the calendar of the names of heathen deities, and numbered the months. His ‘Map & Sections of the Railways of Great Britain’, accompanied by 28 pages of letterpress giving tables of gradients and lengths, was dated 1st. Mo. 1839 [(January 1839)].” [2: p309]
Bradshaw wanted to add letterpress printing to his activities He also had large stocks of unsold small maps of England and Wales which he needed to sell. “He found the solution in launching Bradshaw’s Railway Time Tables. In The Railway Magazine for June, 1935, Canon Reginald B. Fellows examined and summarised the evidence for the publication of a one-page Bradshaw in 1838, showing the Liverpool & Manchester trains, accompanied by a small map of England and Wales. No copy has yet been discovered, but, should one come to light, it could scarcely be regarded as the first general timetable. The first to justify such a description, and the earliest known copy, was dated 10th. Mo. 19th. 1839 [(19th October 1839)]. It was priced 6d. and contained details of the northern railways only, but it was followed within a week by one giving timetables for the whole country, price 1s. This was dated 10th. Mo. 25th. 1839 [(25th October 1839)], and may be regarded as the ancestor of the Bradshaw’s Guide whose demise we are recording after nearly 122 years. The page size was 4 in. x 3 in., and the timetables extended across an ‘opening’, or two facing pages. There were numerous maps and town plans.” [2: p 309-311]
Lee continues: Subsequently books were issued at frequent but irregular intervals, “under the title of Bradshaw’s Railway Companion, and from April, 1841, large monthly sheets called Bradshaw’s Railway Time Tables were published for 3d., from which revised tables could be cut and pasted into the book. Bradshaw’s Railway Guide, a regular monthly publication measuring approximately 6 in. x 4 in., in yellow wrappers, first appeared in December, 1841, and this is the direct ancestor of Bradshaw of today. Only one copy is known to exist, preserved in the Bodleian Library, Oxford. From the title page … it will be seen that conventional dating was used, but the next issue was called 1st. Mo. (January) 1842, a form which survived until 1939.” [2: p311]
“The Guide was a 6d. publication and thus virtually destroyed the demand for the 1s. Companion. Nevertheless, the latter continued to be issued until the end of 1848, almost certainly because of Bradshaw’s enthusiasm as an engraver for the fine engraved and tinted maps it contained. The page size adopted for the Guide was approximately twice that of the Companion, and, in fact, the timetable setting was the same. While the three publications were running side by side, a two-page opening of the Companion was one page of the Guide, and also a section of the large sheet Time Tables. Thus continuity from the first issue of 1839 was preserved, despite changes in title, frequency of publication, and size of book. Probably to give an air of even older establishment than was the case, at a time when competition from newer timetables was severe, the serial number jumped by 100 from No. 40 in March, 1845, to No. 141 in April. This has never been rectified.” [2: p311]
“Evidence of the success with which Bradshaw met such competition is provided by the fact that three years later the founder’s name was being used widely as almost synonymous with timetable. In J. R. Planché’s Lyceum pantomime for 1848, ‘The King of the Peacocks’,b a character is given the lines:
“… Luck’s a lord, and may provide … A special train not marked in ‘Bradshaw’s Guide’.
“The year 1848 also saw the publication of a humorous 6d. brochure by Angus B. Reach, entitled ‘The Comic Bradshaw, or Bubbles from the Boiler’. … In ‘The Prince of Happy Land’, Planché’s Lyceum pantomime for 1851, Bradshaw has dropped the quotation marks and acquired the status of a stock joke:
“… I sooner might in Bradshaw light … On a train I wanted there!” [2: p311]
George Bradshaw’s interests were broad – one of which was the ‘friends of peace’, another was work for the poor in Manchester – supporting the provision of soup kitchens and schools. “His work, referenced in classic literature, is remembered for its detail and reliability. He died in 1853 from cholera while travelling in Norway.” [3]
Lee continues: the “‘friends of peace’ … held congresses in various continental cities. [Bradshaw] produced his first Continental Railway Guide, dated 6th. Mo. (June) 1847, and this survived until August, 1914, as a monumental work. It was revived after the first world war in more modest form, and, as such, lasted until the outbreak of war in 1939. [Bradshaw’s] travels furthered the interests of this publication, and in 1853 took him to Christiania (now Oslo), Norway, when cholera was raging. He was one of the victims, and died on 6th September [1853], aged 53. … By the time of his death, Bradshaw’s publications, although unofficial, were produced in the friendliest co-operation with the numerous railway companies, but not always had this been so. In earlier years some were ‘vehemently opposed’ to timetables showing arrival times, fearing that this would ‘make punctuality a sort of obligation’. The traditional price of 6d. survived until the end of 1915, the increasing bulk of the volume being offset comfortably by increases in the advertisement revenue. In January, 1916, the price was increased to 1s.; in April, 1918, to 1s. 6d.; and in July 1918, to 2s. Bradshaw thus emerged from the first world war at four times its old price, and it remained at 2s. until 1937. With the issue of 27th September 1937, it became 2s. 6d., but the second world war destroyed any semblance of price stability. Successive increases [were] to 3s. in August 1940; to 3s. 6d. in January 1942; to 4s. in April 1943; to 5s. in April 1948; to 7s. 6d. in April 1951; to 10s. in June 1955; and to its final price of 12s. 6d. in January, 1958.” [2: p311]
The buff cover was used until 1939, as also did the Quaker numbering of the months, but with the conventional name in brackets. “From the 5th Mo. (May) 1939 issue, a cream cover printed in blue and gold was adopted to mark the centenary year, and a gold cover was planned for October. The outbreak of war upset these arrangements, and, when Bradshaw did produce its October number (on the 23rd), it was in a simple red and white cover, bearing the new title Bradshaw’s Guide to the British Railways by special arrangement with the (wartime) Railway Executive Committee.” [2: p312]
Interestingly, “During the first world war some railways had used Bradshaw excerpts as their official timetables, beginning with the GWR in April, 1917. This was only a war emergency, but the Southern Railway adopted the practice regularly in 1924, and the LNER in May, 1939.” [2: p312]
“In war conditions, the LMS took a similar step, with the result that the official use of Bradshaw excerpts became general in the second world war (with the exception of the GWR), and this lasted into nationalisation. Bradshaw kept to its traditional page size until the issue dated 13th June 1955, when the present size of 9 in. x 6 in. was adopted. [2: p312]
“Publication of Bradshaw’s Air Guide (first issued in November 1934), and of Bradshaw’s Manchester ABC Railway Guide (established in 1861), … also cease[d] with the May issue, but Henry Blacklock & Co. Ltd. [was] not severing its long railway associations. It [was still printing] five of the six BR Regional timetables.” [2: p312]
The final demise of the Bradshaw Guides was relatively closely followed by a significant dismantling of the rail network that Bradshaw did so much to serve. …………..
References
- The Railway Magazine, Volume 107, No. 721; Tothill Press, London.
- Charles E. Lee; Farewell to “Bradshaw”; in The Railway Magazine, Volume 107, No. 721; Tothill Press, London, p308-312.
- https://friendshouse.co.uk/george-bradshaw, accessed on 6th November 2026.
- R. H. N. Hardy; Beeching: Champion of the Railway?; Ian Allan Ltd., London, 1989, p44-48.
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Beeching, accessed on 6th November 2026.
