Catalogue description Crewe Locomotive Works collection of publicity photographs

This wide-ranging collection includes views of completed engines and rolling stock, workers, workshops scenes with detailed views of manufacturing processes, special visits, publicity events, stations, signalling, civil engineering and maritime scenes.

LNWR official photographs also feature in the 'LMS' collection.

Crewe Locomotive Works

• Railway transport

Handwritten registers, chronologically and alphabetically ordered. There are reference prints of large numbers of these images, available for consultation in the Reading Room by special request.

Crewe Locomotive Works was built in 1843 for the Grand Junction Railway, and was taken over by the London & North Western Railway three years later. The largest railway owned works in the world at the time, it was at the forefront of new technology, one of the first to introduce machine tools and a pioneer of the Bessemer steel process. In 1888 a world record had been established there, when the 0-6-0 freight locomotive No 2153 was assembled in only 25½ hours.

On grouping in 1923 Crewe Works was taken over by the London, Midland & Scottish Railway, building Stanier engines such as the prestigious Coronation Pacifics in the 1930s. In 1989 the works was privatised, as part of British Rail Engineering Ltd. The LNWR was very publicity conscious, and employed photographers at Crewe Works from the 1870s onwards.