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2025 is the 200th anniversary of the birth of the modern railway. The opening of the Stockton & Darlington Railway connected places, people, communities and ideas and, ultimately, transformed the world. Part of the Railway 200 celebrations, Great Rail Tales tells the story of our railway by the people who live, work and travel the tracks. So, join us and help celebrate the past, the present and the future of our national railway. Discover more about Railway 200 online: https://railway200.co.uk/
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200 years of the Stockton & Darlington Railway - the railway that got world on track
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Rupert Furness – My Grandma and the Sutton Coldfield rail disaster
7:48
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Norman and Marjorie Fairy lived most of their lives in Sutton Coldfield, their house backing onto the railway line. A silver dish on their mantlepiece had always fascinated Rupert when he would stay with his grandparents. On 23rd January 1955 Marjorie heard a huge crash from the line. She rushed out and looking down the line saw the aftermath of a …
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Anjali Devadasan – Powering the railways into the future
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Founder and CEO of innovative renewable energy company, Treeva, Anjali Devadasan is exploiting the wind turbulence caused by passing trains to generate predictable renewable power on the rail network. The technology has been proven on the roadside and is now appearing trackside. With double the energy efficiencies and increased durability Treeva’s …
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Philip Dunn – the 1980’s version of Francis Bourgeois
6:31
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Executive Director of Finance and Operations at Alzheimer’s Research UK, one of the charities supported by Railway 200, Philip’s love of trains goes right back to Shildon and his school days at the Timothy Hackworth Primary school. His father and grandfather worked at the local wagon works which meant he benefitted from free rail travel. Family hol…
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Samuel Gómez Fernández – The railway as a beacon of hope
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As a young boy in Costa Rica while Samuel loved playing with his model trains, he always dreamed of seeing a steam train in real life. His models gave him more than joy though, they gave him hope during periods of difficulty with his mental health. It was watching the Talyllyn Railway You Tube channel that persuaded him to travel across the world t…
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Dan Richards – Riding the overnight mail trains
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Writer and broadcaster Dan Richards has a fascination with the night. Inspired by his grandfather, Robert Daniel Butler who worked on the Travelling Post Office (TPO) train between Bristol and Plymouth his love of these unique and vital sorting offices was born. A meticulously planned and timed operation, the TPOs would collect, sort and drop mail …
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Lizzie Lovejoy – The poetry of the people on the rails
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Railway enthusiast and performance poet, Lizzie Lovejoy takes us on a journey through her poetry into some of the lives of the people she has met as she spends her time travelling the rail network collecting stories up and down the line at Darlington. To find out more about Railway 200 and to listen to more Great Rail Tales visit our website: https…
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Scott Dolling – A childhood spent on the rails
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Scott’s mum and dad were crossing keepers at a station so his Great Rail Tale began long before he was born. Day to day and family revolved around the timetable and life at the station they called home for 40 years. By 10 years old, Scott was volunteering at the station and jumping on the trains to go up and down the line with the drivers. Today Sc…
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Alistair Johnson – Expanding the rail network coming at a personal cost
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Recently retired Alistair Johnson describes historical links between the railway and abolition of the slave trade. To find out more about Railway 200 and to listen to more Great Rail Tales visit our website: https://railway200.co.uk/By Railway 200
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Mike and Andrew Lamport – Generations on the rails
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Father and son, Mike and Andrew Lamport are just the latest generation of Lamports to be working on the UK rail network. Their family’s connection however to the rails can be traced back to 1846 when Mike's Great Great Grandfather became a guard at Waterloo. Can you trace your family connection to the railways further back than Mike and Andrew? To …
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Vice President of Middleton Railway Trust, Ian Smith explains how the railway standardised time across the country. From Kent to Kendal, from Penzance to Perth railway time bought the entire network and nation together to operate smoothly and in synchronicity wherever you were. To find out more about Railway 200 and to listen to more Great Rail Tal…
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Adam Sergent – modelling every tunnel in the UK
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A lifelong passion for the railways led Adam to develop his career on the network. Today he is the founder of the Neurodiversity in Transport network and in 2024 was the Young Rail Professionals Volunteer of the year. As a systems support manager he has developed a model profile of every tunnel in the UK that examines the acoustic characteristics o…
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Andrew Mitchell – It’s the people that make the railway move
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Railway Mission Chaplain Andrew shares some of the more amusing encounters of his life and career providing support to railway industry staff who are going through difficult times. To find out more about Railway 200 and to listen to more Great Rail Tales visit our website: https://railway200.co.uk/By Railway 200
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Helen Bartlett – Providing support on life’s journey
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Railway Mission Chaplain to Northeast England, Helen has spent the last decade providing a listening ear to railway staff at stations from Berwick to Thirsk, from Carlisle to Whitby. Every day is different and the surprises are varied, for Helen though it is giving her support and care to those that need it that drives her on. To find out more abou…
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Bessie Matthews – Living out your childhood dream as a freight driver
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As a freight driver for GB Railfreight, Bessie Matthews is living her childhood dream. A champion for women in the rail industry, Bessie drives a 66 Class from Southampton to Birmingham. In her Great Rail Tale, she describes the tranquillity of being in the cab and her passion to pass on her skills and experience to other women learning to become t…
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Recruited from his home in Barbados to work in Britain during the Windrush era, Siggy Cragwell had a passion for the railways. He started working on steam trains in March 1962 and in the following 63 years he has worked across the network, every day enlivened by the people he meets and talks to. To find out more about Railway 200 and to listen to m…
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David Meara – A lifetime on the sleeper train
8:30
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David Meara has been travelling on the sleeper trains from London to Scotland for over half a century. In this Great Rail Tale, David recalls the joy, excitement and romance of pulling down your blind in a grubby, dirty terminus one evening and reopening it the following morning to the sight of heather clad Highland mountains, deer walking beside t…
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Ken Davies first stepped into the cab of a train aged 4 with his dad Ken Davies. He first drove one when he was 12, when he’d go to work with his dad. What started as a young boy’s passion has become a career lasting over half a century that has taken Ken Davies across the country in a just about every class of train. To mark his achievement, the s…
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Ash Bhardwaj – A multi-sensory journey on the rails
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Award winning journalist, broadcaster and author Ash Bhardwaj shares his lifelong passion for the railways. It all started when he was a young boy, travelling through India with his family, a multi-sensory journey of discovery through his father’s homeland. Railways, Ash believes, give you access to culture and conversation like no other form of tr…
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2025 is the 200th anniversary of the birth of the modern railway. The opening of the Stockton & Darlington Railway connected places, people, communities and ideas and, ultimately, transformed the world.Part of the Railway 200 celebrations, Great Rail Tales tells the story of our railway by the people who live, work and travel the tracks. So, join u…
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Hello and welcome to the 12th and final episode of Tales from the Rails. In this concluding episode, titled End of the Line, hosts Caroline Hardie, Archie MacKay, and Angela Pickering reflect on the history of the S&DR through the lens of its darker episodes—accidents, deaths, and disfigurements on the railways. This episode recounts harrowing tale…
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Welcome to the 11th episode of Tales from the Rails, a podcast dedicated to uncovering the hidden stories of the Stockton & Darlington Railway. This month, hosts Caroline Hardie and Angela Pickering explore the overlooked contributions of women in the railway's history. Join Caroline and Angela as they delve into the lives of resilient women who de…
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Inventing Railway Stations on the S&DR This month we take a close look at how railway stations evolved on the Stockton & Darlington Railway. No such thing had been invented in 1825 when the railway opened, but quickly, the company started to provide facilities that would become the railway station as we know it today. The legacy of this was to ensu…
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This month on Tales from the Rails, we are talking about education. Who had an education or skills in the early days of the Stockton & Darlington Railway, who didn’t, and how did senior S&DR staff decide to improve educational standards amongst its workers? And did the workers appreciate this? Did engine drivers prefer to fry their pocket watches i…
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Happy 199th anniversary to the Stockton & Darlington Railway! In this month’s Tales from the Rails we are in party mood! From the laying of the first rail through to the days of British Rail, significant events and dates for the Stockton & Darlington Railway have been celebrated locally and nationally with visitors joining in the fun from abroad. W…
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We know that before, during and after the opening of the Stockton & Darlington Railway, engineers and railway promoters came to visit to see how a modern railway was run. By modern railway we mean a railway that was a publicly available, permanent transport infrastructure that carried anything, including passengers) for a fee. There was a period of…
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This month we are looking at the latest S&DR visitor attraction to entice people from near and far – that is Hopetown in Darlington. This major visitor attraction is centred on an internationally significant collection of S&DR railway buildings. This podcast will explore these buildings and the new attraction that is the result of £35 million worth…
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Welcome to the fifth episode of Tales from the Rails, our monthly podcast commemorating the Stockton and Darlington Railway. As we approach the 200th anniversary in 2025 of the opening of the S&DR, hosts Caroline Hardie and Archie MacKay delve into the fascinating history and legacy of this pioneering railway. In this episode, we take an in-depth l…
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Join hosts Caroline Hardie and Archie MacKay in the fourth episode of Tales from the Rails as they delve into the history of the Stockton and Darlington Railway, celebrating its upcoming 200th anniversary in 2025. This episode focuses on the crucial role of railway bridges, spotlighting the Gaunless Bridge and the Skerne Bridge, their design, const…
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In this month's Tales from the Rails … Experience the birth and transformation of the world's earliest railway station This month’s podcast is all about the S&DR’s station at Heighington on Aycliffe Lane, located half way between Shildon and Darlington. In 1826 the railway company commissioned a number of important buildings including a ‘cottage’ a…
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In this month's Tales from the Rails … We’ll focus on just what is so important about the Stockton & Darlington Railway? Why all the fuss? And why is the whole country marking its 200th anniversary in 2025, not just the residents of Stockton and Darlington? As usual we will also, in Stars of the S&DR, find out more about the pioneering people who w…
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Journey back in time to 1825 with our podcast series, Tales from the Rails. Hosted by archaeologist and trustee of the Friends of Stockton & Darlington Railway, Caroline Hardie, alongside South West Durham News Managing Editor, Archie MacKay, this engaging series brings to life the history and milestones of the Stockton & Darlington Railway; the ra…
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