Once again as I’ve been wandering around the Internet I came across an interesting site.

The British National Railway Museum in York has a wonderful poster collection exceeding 7,000 items.  Their website claims it is “the single most important and comprehensive collection of British Railway posters in the world.”

The poster on the left was the first to catch my eye.  Initially I suppose because I had never heard of “Third Class”.  According to the description, the railway  provided fast fast access to Britain’s coasts… where visitors were not always welcome ans where day-visitors were particularly disliked.

This poster is believed to be from 1901 and was for the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway.

The next poster to catch my eye was this one which had the catchy phrase “I’m taking an early holiday cos I know summer comes soonest in the south.” It’s believed to be from around 1936 and depicts a tiny little girl, looking up at a huge locomotive and talking to the engineer.  Cute!

The start of the Second World War of course had an effect on the British railway system. The railway industry took on its essential role as part of the war machine and delays were common.  As a result, this poster explained to the British people that of course food, shells and fuel must come first.  The railway companies also painted out the Station names to confuse the enemy in the event of invasion.  I’m sure it also had some confusing effect on the civilian passengers who were riding the trains.

After the war of course things started to return to normal and over time train travel resumed and became profitable.  In the 1960′s modern diesel and electric trains replaced steam locomotives and  the whole railway system was re branded as British Rail.  But as more and more people started to turn to automobiles, the railways had to produce advertising media that would tempt back to the trains.  Posters such as this one became popular and often included media personalities.  This one from 1975 shows a fellow named Jimmy Saville, a well known British DJ, actor and television and radio personality.

Saville, as an aside,was knighted in 1990 for his services in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List and also honored with a papal knighthood from the Vatican.

The story of railways in Britain is reflected in the development of the railway poster.This commercial art form illustrates the major changes that have occurred in British society over the years and captures the spirit and character of British life. They are social documents of British culture, illustrating the changing styles of art, patterns of holiday making, urban and rural landscapes, architecture and fashion. They also reflect the development of railway companies and their design and advertising standards.

If your interest is in the British Railway system, or perhaps in railway posters, or perhaps just in Ephemera in general, you’ll want to take a wander over to the British Railway Museums image gallery.

From the gallery you can access any number of posters based on some groupings that they have established.  You can also visit a number of other collections, not necessarily ephemera related, that are available at the Museum.  Because of the time I lived in Japan, and rode the Shinkansen “Bullet Train” I know I’ll be going back to learn about how the head of the Museum’s Engineering Collection brought Car No 22-141′s to York.

I’m Tom Murphy and thanks for helping me give Ephemera the encore it deserves.

Tom

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