The Great Reunion: ‘once-in-a-lifetime celebration’ marks Mallard steam speed record anniversary
I’ve been to York today partially on RSN business. I didn’t realise that my meeting at the railway station was a coal shovel’s throw from the famous reunion profiled in this article. I did know “Mallard” was an A4 Pacific and I knew who Nigel Gresley was. Largely because in the 70s my Dad aspired to be one of the soot besmirched railway enactment people glued to the footplate of a restored steam engine. In the era before DVDs he used to listen to train LPs and he once owned the holy grail of Ken Hoole Railway Books “Great Northern Engine Sheds.” All of which makes me wistful and keen to go and read “The Night Mail”. It also makes me reflect on what railway restoration has bought to rural tourism and why such massive iconic lumps of speeding steel have rurally resonant names like “Bittern” and “Mallard”. The article itself tells us:
For no more than a couple of minutes on 3 July 1938, Mallard thundered along at speeds that have remained unmatched by any steam locomotive for three-quarters of a century.
A handful of men in soot-stained overalls had pushed the roaring engine to 126mph, and in doing so had marked the pinnacle of steam power.
Today, 75 years to the day, Mallard will be reunited with her five surviving sister locomotives – two of which have been shipped from North America and restored – to commemorate her record-breaking run.