Dettingen GCR might have been layout

[Caley Jim]

I would presume that this photo was taken in the 1914-18 period when women stepped in to replace the men who had gone off to fight for King and Country in the slaughter house that was The Great War.

Jim

[richard i]

Probiblly true but not necessarily. The gcr work force was 2% female prior to 1914 if the numbers I have in my head are right, I will check and edit if not.

Richard

[webbcompound]

Probiblly true but not necessarily. The gcr work force was 2% female prior to 1914 if the numbers I have in my head are right, I will check and edit if not.

Richard

Central stores in the LNWR engineering shop was exclusively run by women, and many stations (run by families) had female clerks. Don't know what percentage this came out as but likely to be at least similar to GCR

[richard i]

GCR had 417 women on the books in 1914 rising to 5395 by 1918 which did not entirely drop back to prewar numbers as 3633 were still employed in 1919

Lnwr had 2123 prewar and 9154 during war as a comparison.

By 1916 they were 7% of the railway workforce

Pre war there were approximately 13046 traceable women working on the railways out of a total work force of 625559. So women made up 2.08% of the workforce. Got to be honest got to be slightly chuffed that my top of the head guesstimate was 2%.

So if you have 50 railway workers one should be a woman. Pre war.

If showing ww1 then approximately 25% were women! This dropped to about 15 to 20 % post war. So rising to 1 in 4 or 5 figures on the layout doing railway jobs. For the GCR that included signal women fitters, cleaners on shed.

At the very least I feel a figure being converted to acknowledge this aspect of the railways.

Richard

[Compound2632]

GCR had 417 women on the books in 1914 rising to 5395 by 1918 which did not entirely drop back to prewar numbers as 3633 were still employed in 1919

Lnwr had 2123 prewar and 9154 during war as a comparison.

By 1916 they were 7% of the railway workforce

Pre war there were approximately 13046 traceable women working on the railways out of a total work force of 625559. So women made up 2.08% of the workforce. Got to be honest got to be slightly chuffed that my top of the head guesstimate was 2%.

So if you have 50 railway workers one should be a woman. Pre war.

If showing ww1 then approximately 25% were women! This dropped to about 15 to 20 % post war. So rising to 1 in 4 or 5 figures on the layout doing railway jobs. For the GCR that included signal women fitters, cleaners on shed.

At the very least I feel a figure being converted to acknowledge this aspect of the railways.

Richard

 

But these women weren't evenly distributed - e.g. webbcompound's comment about LNWR central stores. My guess would be that women as platform staff at a major station (is the photo at Marylebone?) would be a WW1 thing. Both the footplatemen look quite old - I guess the portly one is the driver and the tall thin and rather drawn looking fellow the fireman - too old to be conscripted. 

[Clive Mortimore]

Hi Richard

 

Pre WW1 most women working on the railways would have been in what we now term administration type jobs or as noted before in store rooms etc. not working with the trains, public or goods. During WW1 women were employed in the more traditional men's roles, usually the lower skill trades. A disproportional number of photos of women working where taken during WW1 mainly as propaganda to encourage more women to go to work, to boast morale of the population and photos of young ladies always look better than of those of old men.

 

The lady in the photograph is wearing a railway uniform from WW1 or just after judging by the length and cut of her skirt.

[Andy Hayter]

Clive,

I am not sure I agree with you that most women would have been in administrative jobs pre WW1.

 

I would have thought the vast majority would have been lowly cleaners - carriages and buildings, not locomotives. But maybe I have that wrong.

[webbcompound]

Clive,

I am not sure I agree with you that most women would have been in administrative jobs pre WW1.

 

I would have thought the vast majority would have been lowly cleaners - carriages and buildings, not locomotives. But maybe I have that wrong.

Well Chris I think you do. Cleaningcarriages was a mans job. Clerical jobs were certainly the majority. As for cleaning of stations etc this wasn't a seperate job, but was a requirement of the station staff, as was the case with engineers and engineering shops. Once they ceased to have responsibility for keeping their own workplaces clean and tidy things would start to slide.  

[Poggy1165]

I wish I could remember the source, but I seem to recall that women were employed on things like repairing coach upholstery. Others would certainly have been clerks, worked in refreshment rooms* and hotels, and so on

The interesting question is what role is the woman in the picture performing? Interacting with the footplatemen and taking notes? Surely not a guard?

 

There was an article in Forward once about a woman who served as a booking clerk, or maybe a porter - the old memory isn't working too well today - at a wayside station on the GC London Extension during the Great War. So one on the platform at Dettingen would not be out of place.

 

(* I believe I am right in saying that one quite senior LNWR officer married a lady he met when she was working in one of the company's refreshment rooms.)

[richard i]

All the above observations have some truth to them. The very good book "railway women" by Helena wojtczak is a good read and shows women as porters and crossing keepers as far back as the 1840s there were even a couple of navvies and signal women in pre ww1 days. However it is true that most were in catering or administration.

[Tom Burnham]

All the above observations have some truth to them. The very good book "railway women" by Helena wojtczak is a good read and shows women as porters and crossing keepers as far back as the 1840s there were even a couple of navvies and signal women in pre ww1 days. However it is true that most were in catering or administration.

In Charles Dickens' piece on "Mugby Junction" written in the 1860s I think, all the staff of the refreshment room were women apart from one token man.

 

Regards,

Tom

[Clive Mortimore]

Most of the women employed would be unmarried. It was normal for a lady to give up work once she got herself a husband. The few married women would have been those who were employed at locations where their husbands lived and worked, the small station where Mr Stationmaster lived, Mrs Stationmaster could well be the booking clerk, or where Mr Crossing Keeper lived Mrs Crossing Keeper worked the early shift and he the late shift.

[richard i]

Most of the women employed would be unmarried. It was normal for a lady to give up work once she got herself a husband. The few married women would have been those who were employed at locations where their husbands lived and worked, the small station where Mr Stationmaster lived, Mrs Stationmaster could well be the booking clerk, or where Mr Crossing Keeper lived Mrs Crossing Keeper worked the early shift and he the late shift.

True, and not true. Station masters wives did work along side them. But crossing keepers were given quite often to railway widows as a way of keeping them going after husband been killed. Nice to see a bit of corporate responsibility going on. Wojtczak has over 400 examples of female crossing keepers on the system in 1913.

[billbedford]

One field of employment for women on the railways was as tracers in drawing offices. These were usually young girls and as with most female employment they were 'let go' as soon as they married. However at least one lady decided not to marry and was later promoted to draughtsman. This was at Swindon.

 

The introduction of dyeline copying machines, meant that girl tracers became redundant.

[TerryD1471]

Hi Richard

 

Apropos of your comment about unusual locos working over the GC line at various times (46251 in 1964), I have a copy of Dick Blenkinsop's "Big Four cameraman" which shows 60014 heading north on 12th May 1956 with the "Pennine Pullman" special working for Ian Allan. The first 2 vehicles are Pullmans. Thought this might be one for Dettingen!

If there are any others I will post to let you know.

 

Terry

 

Edit to advise that 46160 was seen hauling a football special M676 on 6th April 1961 to Wembley.

Edited January 13, 2017 by TerryD1471

[Poggy1165]

To go further back (for unusual workings) I remember coming across a reference to a Hull and Barnsley engine working to Leicester on a football excursion. Good luck finding a Hull and Barnsley loco kit though! I think Millholme used to do a H&B 0-6-0 kit, but otherwise they are pretty rare birds. (Which is a pity as the H&B was a very attractive little railway.)

 

On the question of odd workings, one of the LBSC coach books refers in passing to Cup Final workings from Marylebone back in the days when cup finals were held at Crystal Palace. Apparently they included LBSC and other Southern company saloons. I can only think the GC hired them as they hadn't enough of their own to meet demand - of course, the companies in question would be non-competitive for the traffic.

[Compound2632]

To go further back (for unusual workings) I remember coming across a reference to a Hull and Barnsley engine working to Leicester on a football excursion.

 

More likely to Leicester Midland via Cudworth? There was some discussion of Hull & Barnsley through workings in the Journal of the Midland Railway Society. There is hard evidence for Hull & Barnsley locos working through to L&Y and Midland destinations but not onto other companies' lines: at various periods there were passenger services worked through to Knottingley (L&Y) and Sheffield (Midland), regular Thursday and Saturday excursions to Leeds via the L&Y and Midland (Hull - Hensall - Methley - Leeds - photos of H&B 2-4-0s and 0-6-0s at Leeds Wellington), Aintree (via L&Y) on Grand National day, and football specials to West Riding destinations (again via L&Y). It was pointed out re. football excursions from Hull that the game in question was of course rugby football.

[Poggy1165]

I should have to delve for the source. However, whatever it was did refer to the GC, as I have very few books on the Midland apart from Essery's wagon books and Hudson's Limestone Hills.

[richard i]

The coal train slowly comes together.

I would show you but since changing to ios10 the photo files are to big, how do I resize files on an iPad?

Richard

[Caley Jim]

The coal train slowly comes together.

I would show you but since changing to ios10 the photo files are to big, how do I resize files on an iPad?

Richard

Not familiar in any way with Apple devices, but do you not have a photo editing app which will let you resize or compress the file.  Microsoft photo editor has both these features.

 

Jim

[richard i]

Not familiar in any way with Apple devices, but do you not have a photo editing app which will let you resize or compress the file.  Microsoft photo editor has both these features.

 

Jim

I may well do but have yet to work out 90% of the things this iPad will do . They are encouraging me to get the next one up. Then I could have 95% I don't understand.

[Andy Hayter]

You should be able to adjust the size on this site.

 

Top of the page (currently just under the yellow warning panel of the DMU) - apps and content -> image editor.

 

Not tried it with an apple device though.

[Richard Mawer]

The image editor on this site needs Flash. Flash is not supported on an ipad.

 

I take my photos on an iPhone. They are too large for here, so I email them to myself off the iphone and its lets me reduce the file size.

 

I have not tried doing off the ipad, but the logic should be the same I would have thought.

 

Rich

[Clive Mortimore]

The coal train slowly comes together.

I would show you but since changing to ios10 the photo files are to big, how do I resize files on an iPad?

Richard

 

The image editor on this site needs Flash. Flash is not supported on an ipad.

 

I take my photos on an iPhone. They are too large for here, so I email them to myself off the iphone and its lets me reduce the file size.

 

I have not tried doing off the ipad, but the logic should be the same I would have thought.

 

Rich

Hi Richard and all

 

Life was so much simpler when you took your roll of film along to Boots.....................only to find out a week later those 36 photos you took never really happened because you hadn't wound the film on correctly.

[richard i]

Hi Richard and all

 

Life was so much simpler when you took your roll of film along to Boots.....................only to find out a week later those 36 photos you took never really happened because you hadn't wound the film on correctly.

True but harder to put on the site.