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The Queen of steam
Mallard set the world steam speed record 70 years ago this month, and no other locomotive has ever bettered it. Here, some famous fans celebrate the anniversary. By Caroline Brannigan
Eight–year–old Alan Titchmarsh was sitting on the train from Leeds to London, fretting that he hadn’t caught a glimpse of Mallard, the fastest steam locomotive ever.
As they got off at King’s Cross, his Dad said: “Never mind, maybe we’ll see it another day.” But as they hauled their luggage along the platform towards the front of the train, an unmistakably sleek and shiny blue shape slowly became visible through the steam and smoke. Mallard had been pulling them.
Today you can still hear the little boy’s excitement as Titchmarsh, 59, recalls the thrilling moment. “There it appeared and we stood with our mouths open, it was wonderful.” he says. “There was steam all around it and rivulets of condensation running down the sooty blue paint. It really seemed to be alive.
“I waved at the driver and he waved back and gave me a wink. Then he looked at his watch and shouted down, ‘Quick enough for you?’ ‘Yes thank you,’ I said.”
This was the Fifties and just about every small boy – and a lot of girls – adored the streamlined locomotive which on July 3, 1938 had roared and shuddered to a world steam speed record of 126mph. It has never been broken. The iconic machine now stands gleaming but silent at the National Railway Museum in York, a powerful evocation of the golden age of steam, when train travel was at its most exciting and romantic.
Jenny Agutter’s heart was captured by the thrill of steam at the age of 14 when she starred in The Railway Children. “I was hugely impressed by the gleaming metal, powerful engines, even the smell and hypnotic sound of the steam trains chuntering down the tracks.
“Mallard is a marvellous design, with its sparkling blue paintwork and polished metal. It looks like a fairytale version of a steam train. These days the pinnacle of train travel is Eurostar. London to Paris is a great journey but Eurostar isn’t a great train. How wonderful if planners brought back some of the elegance and grace of that bygone era. Think about it. The Orient Express or Eurostar? I know which one I’d choose.”
Agutter, 55, accepts that steam also produced soot and smoke, but won’t concede that it was inefficient (one of the principal arguments for electrifying the railways). “Hardly,” she says dismissively. “Mallard still holds the steam record of 126mph. If only our trains today could run consistently with even half the speed and ‘inefficiency’ of a train like that.”
For all its star quality, it was just a machine. Pop impresario Pete Waterman, a passionate fan, says it would have been nothing without the men in the cab.
“This record is more about the driver and fireman than the engine, because they put their lives on the line to do that speed,” he says. “They were probably unable to read or write but they were highly skilled and knew the exact moment when to close it down; when the engine couldn’t take any more.”
Waterman’s first job was on the railways as a fireman. “I love steam engines, the atmosphere and the smell, and I loved working on them. I can’t think of anything I’d rather do but I’m not going to kid people. It was the hardest job I’ve ever had in my life,” he recalls.
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