Liveries of the Ankh-Morpork and Sto Plains Hygienic Railway

[Schooner]

What it says on the tin really: given the AM&SPHRy Co's role as vessel for all our early railway archetypes, what would its liveries have been?

 

If one had to assign a single colour under a 'most proto-literate' scheme, my layman's understanding is that...

 

Goods engines - unlined black

Passenger engines - lined green*

Passenger stock - lined red*

NPCS - unlined brown

Specials - green sheep wagons, yellow butter vans etc. Was there anything approaching a norm?

Goods stock - grey* with black running fear and ironwork.

 

All freight lettering/signage in white, gold for PAX and locos.

 

*Some shade thereof, favouring the darker.

 

...would be reasonable. Is that right?

 

Corrections and improvements, suggestions of development over time, and other general trends, would be most welcome. Particularly interested in the freight side for things for the time being*, but keen to learn more about it all.

 

Cheers,

 

Schooner

 

*Not that I've found myself trying to establish a little goods-heavy mid-Victorian counter-factual or anything...

Edited April 11, 2023 by Schooner
Sp. Again.

[BR60103]

The paper cutout of Iron Girder that I downloaded is in a dark grey with gold lining.

 

[PeterStiles]

Have you read Mrs Bradshaws Handbook? If there's any "real" information outside of Raising Steam it'll be in there. Its on my bookshelf but i've not quite got there yet...

[Schooner]

Thank you both. @BR60103, I was smiling at North-South Junction, and burst out laughing at Diddlesex; @PeterStiles a good suggestion. I don't have it but it's probable where the 'right' answer lies.

 

However, it's not quite what I'm getting at. To me, and I think some others, the AM&SPHRy Co appears as it would if one asked a thousand (particularly well-informed) children to draw a Victorian railway. I tend to think of the Hattons Gensis coaches as a prime example - they describe no single 'real' practice, but are absolutely in keeping with typical features of their period, and so would make perfect coaches of the AM&SPHRy.

 

So in that vein, and at risk of having a not-dissimilar company to work out, I thought the fictional railway might make for a useful focus for discussion of typical railway liveries of the 1840s-80s.

 

Hopefully that makes a little more sense, both of the original post and the idea behind it :)

[rovex]

If I remember correctly AM is in the middle of a large brassica growing region, perhaps some specific brassica wagons/vans with their own livery?

[Edwardian]

1 hour ago, Schooner said:

Thank you both. @BR60103, I was smiling at North-South Junction, 

 

 

 

Is that the East Midland based North South Junction Railway?!?

I saw this as a Beyer Peacock customer, largely because I like them and the WNR is a Sharp Stewart customer, and has envisaged a Holly Green loco livery, lined white-black-white, perhaps with Indian Red

 

 

At various times have considered a sort of dark lake and cream carriage livery or a teak livery. Perhaps, like the GCR, it can have had both a teak and a two-tone livery. There was even talk of an amalgamation of more than one company. Latterly I had been eying ip the Hattons Genesis in GNR livery as the teaking is so good, though I have probably left it too late to get any; WNR must come first!

 

1 hour ago, Schooner said:

To me, and I think some others, the AM&SPHRy Co appears as it would if one asked a thousand (particularly well-informed) children to draw a Victorian railway. I tend to think of the Hattons Gensis coaches as a prime example - they describe no single 'real' practice, but are absolutely in keeping with typical features of their period, and so would make perfect coaches of the AM&SPHRy.

 

 

The more fanciful a creation, the more effort is necessary to make it credible. Here, the Disc World, we have a problem as things are represented by their archetype and the railway develops preternaturally fast, all of which militates against a coherent sense of period.

 

The films, centering on A-M, tend to go with a Victorian aesthetic that fits with the rather Dickensian London that A-M evolved into in the books. 

 

Having thought about this in the past, 

 

 

I saw the need to establish some visual coherence via a period. For me, and this is an entirely personal and subjective opinion, I thought something broadly consistent with the Primary World 1850s to 1870s, might work, with super-advanced Iron Girder having evolved further do something like the 1872 Stirling Single.  

 

Now, the thing about the Disc World is everything has its most archetypal appearance.  E,g. the guards clank around in armour, the Wizards dress like Renaissance Burgomasters, Heroes carry magic swords and wear scanty leather, and vampires, of course, wear evening dress, capes and widow's peaks.

 

So, the 'period' is confused and the style eclectic, but, in general, as the books progress, Ankh-Morpork becomes less like something imagined by Robert E Howard, and more like the London of Dickens. Film and other visualisations tend to the early Victorian look.  

 

And then Dick Simnel, with his flat cap and his sliding rule, invents a viable steam railway locomotive. 

 

I had thought long and hard about an appropriate 'look' for the Disc World's railway and concluded that a broadly 1850s appearance would be a good basis, so there we are, that lead to my pondering over the station layout. 

 

I think such a look could fit with the Dickensian City and its archetypal Victorian railway, of which we gain glimpses of in some of the art associated with the A M & S P H R, although 1860s-1880s might be more on the mark for some of these illustrations:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Based on this, I would have seen liveries as quite fussy Victorian ones., I would not have made goods engines any less colourful and would have gone for lots of polished brass and a green loco livery with elaborate lining, oh, wait, that's the West Norfolk Railway!

 

 

But something along these lines ....

 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 12, 2023 by Edwardian

[SRman]

Since the railway also involves Sto Lat, would a cabbage green be appropriate? 😉

I like the idea of the Hatton's Genesis coaches, although my first thoughts were to varnished teak, but I'm not sure how much wood like that would be available there. Maybe sapient pearwood for the first class? More practically, perhaps a green and off-white scheme for the passenger coaches, a bit like the Cambrian Railway used.

Just throwing a few ideas in for acceptance, modification and/or rejection.

Edited April 13, 2023 by SRman

[BR60103]

The North South East West Diddlesex Junction is W S Gilbert, from Thespis.

I used to say "Middlesex" until I checked my sources.

 

[PaulRhB]

2 hours ago, SRman said:

Maybe sapient pearwood for the first class?

Having seen what the luggage does would you willingly get inside a coach made of sapient pearwood?!? 😆

 

It would make an entertaining solo railmotor when lots of legs descend and it trundles ‘off piste’. Ideal for establishing new branches as you can test the potential without even laying track!

 

[SRman]

5 hours ago, PaulRhB said:

Having seen what the luggage does would you willingly get inside a coach made of sapient pearwood?!? 😆

 

It would make an entertaining solo railmotor when lots of legs descend and it trundles ‘off piste’. Ideal for establishing new branches as you can test the potential without even laying track!

 

 

Good point regarding the sapient pearwood. maybe it would be better to use it for the "Scum class" passengers! 😉

[Edwardian]

10 hours ago, SRman said:

Since the railway also involves Sto Lat, would a cabbage green be appropriate? 😉

I like the idea of the Hatton's Genesis coaches ... perhaps a green and off-white scheme for the passenger coaches, a bit like the Cambrian Railway used.

 

 

Or the West Norfolk Railway!

 

 

[Schooner]

Ideal @Edwardian, thank you, exactly the sort of thing I was after :)

 

Locomotives in green, then (although I feel there should be distinction between goods, mixed, and passenger locomotives - is this correct? The more lowly the darker shade, perhaps?)

 

I was under the impression that some shade of red was the go-to for passenger stock, as I think we've discussed elsewhere that almost every major company gave it a go...but would that be right for a nominal date around 1860-70? The two-tone effect is very pleasing though...

 

17 hours ago, Edwardian said:

Here, the Disc World, we have a problem as things are represented by their archetype

Absolutely! On the Disc I have no issue at all with the development from High Fantasty to sharp satire matching a shift in tone informed by High Medieval myth and legend, with the Wizards and adventurers suiting a kind of faux-1250 aesthetic; the City Watch seems to start around 1550 and end up nearer 1750; and Raising Steam firmly in the mid-1800s I'd say.

 

However, it does make it a little tricky to reverse engineer from Disc-ish to real-world archetypes!

 

8 hours ago, PaulRhB said:

Having seen what the luggage does would you willingly get inside a coach made of sapient pearwood?!? 😆

I think not, and woe betide any tree which had the temerity to fall across the line...!

[Schooner]

12 minutes ago, Edwardian said:

 

 

 

Yum :)

[Edwardian]

13 minutes ago, Schooner said:

Ideal @Edwardian, thank you, exactly the sort of thing I was after :)

 

Locomotives in green, then (although I feel there should be distinction between goods, mixed, and passenger locomotives - is this correct? The more lowly the darker shade, perhaps?)

 

I was under the impression that some shade of red was the go-to for passenger stock, as I think we've discussed elsewhere that almost every major company gave it a go...but would that be right for a nominal date around 1860-70? The two-tone effect is very pleasing though...

 

Absolutely! On the Disc I have no issue at all with the development from High Fantasty to sharp satire matching a shift in tone informed by High Medieval myth and legend, with the Wizards and adventurers suiting a kind of faux-1250 aesthetic; the City Watch seems to start around 1550 and end up nearer 1750; and Raising Steam firmly in the mid-1800s I'd say.

 

However, it does make it a little tricky to reverse engineer from Disc-ish to real-world archetypes!

 

I think not, and woe betide any tree which had the temerity to fall across the line...!

 

For what it's worth, my own AM&SPHR musings tended me to:

 

- A green locomotive livery, and, yes, it was intended to be a darker green, so with you there. 

 

- I was not going to have different liveries for goods and passenger locomotives. One can, of course, but I'm not sure how much of a thing that would be for the 1850s/60s/70s. Perhaps we are over-influenced by Stroudley towards the end of this date range. I tend to think of companies making all locos equally opulent at this analogue period, though doubtless we could find exceptions. 

 

- Coach livery. I was not going for a two tone livery, as the analogue 1850s-70s period seems a little early, though I can think of exceptions. I was considering a dark red single colour as standard, so with you there also.  

[Skinnylinny]

If we're looking for a polished wood livery for carriage stock, may I suggest the wood from the Effing Forest? 
 

Quote

This is a scenic location presumably in the Greater Ankh-Morpork area, which serves as both a scenic beauty spot and a euphemism. The wood from its trees, by all accounts, makes superior furniture and interior building structures, allowing Sir Harry King to threaten to throw somebody down these Effing stairs without any actual use of profanity. Sir Harry is thus enabled to perform a meaningful act of violence without sullying the ears of Lady Effie. Perhaps an, er, Hellstree exists in the forest.

Source: https://wiki.lspace.org/Effing_Forest

I don't currently have the book to hand, but it seems that it is served by the AM&SPHR, and so it would be quite reasonable to use its, uh, products for coachbuilding purposes. The quality of the wood is already well known by Harry King, and so... 

 

[Schooner]

🤣 I'd forgotten about the Hellstree!

[Schooner]

So,

• locomotives in fussy green - the more polished brass and lining the better
• coaches in clear-finish wood or red. Probably not two-tone, but not impossible.
  • Are there any concrete examples of totally different liveries for different class accommodation, service types, or routes?

 

To what extent can we trust such colourisations?

 

On to goods liveries then:

 

Off the top of my head, wagon body colours settled down into

• brown, as per broad gauge GWR
• red (of a lighter shade than coaching stock - GWR wagon red vs. Midland crimson lake?), as per narrow GWR, SER etc
• grey, as per...well, everyone else

Grey then? With black strapping...?

 

 

Broad Gauge GWR - specifically thinking of the BER and SDR - gets a special mention as, in general aesthetic, it's what I see when thinking of the AM&SPHR. Partly this is down to my own biases, but images like

certainly don't do any harm!

 

The GWR went for all-over colours (prove me wrong), but were the GWR so are we safe to assume that standard practice was for one colour for (wooden) body and one for (metal) running gear? Protective paints of the period, and so presumably on the Disc, were black or oxide so these are our running gear colours. If we go for black body ironwork, it makes sense to use same for running gear.

 

Vans: Same as opens, or different?

 

NPCS: To match coaching stock, goods stock, or something in between?

 

Break Vans: Red end, or not red end seems to be the question.

 

Thanks all for input so far, enjoyable and informative :)

 

 

Edited April 14, 2023 by Schooner
Sp. + pics

[Hroth]

Taking copious notes....    🤔

 

[PeterStiles]

Wondering.. Is there not an argument in actually just using Black Grey and White to represent the liveries (and in fact the colour of everything) because, maybe all those photographs ARE in full colour, but In The Old Days things were only monochrome?

 

Possibly not.

 

I think a completely monochrome Victorian-style-era layout would look good. Or maybe sepia..

 

I'll go lie down now.

[PaulRhB]

8 minutes ago, PeterStiles said:

but In The Old Days things were only monochrome?

The imps in the cameras do colour too 😁

[PeterStiles]

1 minute ago, PaulRhB said:

imps in the cameras

oh I forget that. they do run out of Pink fairly quickly don't they?

[papagolfjuliet]

On 11/04/2023 at 02:42, BR60103 said:

The paper cutout of Iron Girder that I downloaded is in a dark grey with gold lining.

 

 

Interesting. Link?

[Hroth]

2 hours ago, PeterStiles said:

oh I forget that. they do run out of Pink fairly quickly don't they?

 

Only when Twoflower and Rincewind have been snapping the ladies of negotiable affection...

 

[Edwardian]

I recall I did light on the original Temple Meads as a good architectural start for the A M station, and I think that helps illustrate how the GW broad gauge aesthetic works pretty well and is possibly why we also both thought of a dark green loco livery. Swinetown after all.

[BR60103]

14 hours ago, papagolfjuliet said:

 

Interesting. Link?

I tried the site listed on the drawing and it's out of service.