Summary biography of Sir William Stanier FRS Produced by Tom Stanier, Memento Films Impressions of Sir William Stanier by people who actually knew him including close family members
Wonderful to hear the first hand accounts of the great man from his family. To my mind our greatest loco engineer, but his man management skills should not be overlooked. He was brought to the LMS to sort it out and he did that brilliantly.
A fantastic memorial to a fine engineer, what a real pity that the locomotive "Sir Williams Stanier FRS" was not preserved as a real tribute; it was the final development (overseen by Ivatt of course) of the Princess Coronation class.
Fantastic. When I was 7, my peers were into Marc Bolan or Man Utd, but my hero was Sir William Stanier. Stupid TH-cam algorithm can't tell that as train videos go, this one is rather special. Really nicely made by Tom Stanier. Great intrinsic value, with those family voices and memories which might be lost forever, and produced to a high standard. This deserves many more than 1,500 views. Expanding the title to something like "Sir Wiliam Stanier FRS: A brief family biography Iand mpressions of Sir William Stanier by people who knew him" might help. As for content, I have two slight regrets that it didn't mention his experiment with steam turbines in LMS No 6202, or the 8F, a rugged freight loco designated as a standard by the MoD during the war, as such run all over the country (including in LNER colours) and around the world, where in Turkey they were called "Churchills". Trivia fact: "Sir William Stanier FRS" was rolled out of the works alongside Ivatt's no 10 000, one of the first diesel-electrics on British rails.
It is said that Mr Stanier described his Black 5 as "a deuce of a good engine". I doubt many would disagree. Interesting that to be a good CME you had to be an organiser and administrator, as well as an HR enthusiast. A great man. Very glad you bothered to compile this.
What a wonderful insight, not just into the life and work of one of the nation's great engineers, but also into his personality, and a real tribute to the man to see just how warmly he was and is regarded. And yes, the Black 5: much as I love the Duchesses, I think that the Black 5 is the most functionally elegant and timeless steam locomotive (allowing for that oxymoron!) ever to have been designed, and its sheer utility is as outstanding as its visual perfection. Thank you so much for sharing this.
What a treasure to come across such a wonderful account of a great engineer. Sir William Stanier designed the most beautiful locomotives ever, especially the magnificent Coronation class.
A very well done, and exceptionally insightful, film. Thank you. As an aside: I think this is the first time I've seen the running issues of the 114 mph run being talked about properly. The both the Coronation and the Mallard record caused significant repair costs just confirms them as gimmicks..
Sir William Stanier, Sir Nigel Gresley, O V Bulleid CBE, and Charles Collett to name but a few are some of Britain's forgotten greats. We owe them a huge debt of gratitude for designing some of the greatest and most beautiful locomotives ever made, and also to those who saved and preserved many of them from the scrappers blowtorch.
Stanier's 8F, although built for the LMS was known as Swindon's finest. As a boy, I saw the loco named after him many times, when it was stored at Willesden loco depot.
I liked it when someone said that Stannier thought that that an engineer should consider the economics because my boss once said to me, and he was usually a very strait laced person, that a good engineer could do for a shilling what any fucking idiot could do for a pound.
The saddest thing about this most excellent documentary is it reminds us that the era of "The Great Engineer" now seems well and truly over. How many practising British engineers worthy to become an FRS can YOU name from the last 50 years? Most of them are academics.
Brilliant! What a pleasure and an honor it must have been, to work with this Engineer. Well done to the Grandchildren for producing this video. (PS Amethyst was a Jube not a Black 5) !! I didn't know Butterley had a Stanier Museum. How fitting that 46203 is being worked on there. Now on my Must Do list.
A very well put together film. I have only two complaints; 1, the Stanier 8F 2-8-0 is not mentioned, this is probably the greatest of Stanier's designs and 2, there is no mention of his rolling stock designs, His coaches were arguably the best general service stock produced in the 1930s and his electric trains designed for the Liverpool-Southport and Wirral lines were one of the greatest leaps forward in British carriage design, Stanier was a great railway all-rounder; they trained them well at Swindon.
Thank you for uploading so fascinating a video. Coming from Preston, I remember the Black 5s and Big 8s (as we called them) with enormous affection, and can still bring to mind the distinctive sound of the Big 8s hauling their enormous coal trains. I also saw what I believe was one of the last runs of 46256, 'Sir William A. Stanier, FRS' through Farington on, I believe, a Saturday in late September, 1964, as she thundered north towards Preston. White plumes of smoke, a glorious red engine, and a matching rake of red coaches, all resplendent in the sunlight of a warm September, day. WONDERFUL!
Sadly, I wasn't quite old enough to have seen such sights in period although, as a fellow Prestonian, I can just remember being taken down to the station when I was about 5 (that would have been 1964) and seeing a Duchess, and which I was able to recognise because my eldest brother had the Hornby Dublo version. I've had to make do with 46233 thundering through Moreton-in-Marsh as I stood 6' away, painted LMS maroon and with a suitable rake of maroon coaches. - utterly magnificent!
Very interesting presentation. The great man came to our school in around about 1962 and gave a talk, this being facilitated by the fact that our headmaster, one RS Stanier, was a relative of his. I went to this talk, but unfortunately can remember very little of what he said!
He probably told you that steam locos were a thing of the past and needed to be scrapped as soon as possible and replaced by electric and diesels. A prophecy which would come true 6 years later
AS AN AMERICAN RAILROADER SINCE 1964 WITH MECHANICAL WORKINGS WITH BOTH DIESEL AND STEAM POWER I FOUND THIS VIDEO TO BE QUITE FASCINATING!! A GOOD BIT OF HOW, WHO, AND WHAT! ON OUR SIDE OF THE POND AT THE ATCHISON TOPEKA & SANTA FE, ORRIS BILGER WAS THE GO TO GUY , BEING MOST FAMOUS FOR UPGRADING ELDERLY LOCOMOTIVES WITH NEWER COMPONENTS TO KEEP THEM VIABLE UNTIL LATE IN OUR STEAM ERA! KEEP THEM ROLLING ,BROTHERS!! 👍👍
At my school, I was privileged to meet the great great grandchild of Sir William Stanier. Sadly, there aren’t many 13 year old steam train enthusiasts.
Absolutely wonderful..........what an incredible human being, I have many books about him and his work but this portrays a beautiful personal perspective. Ehank you ...........Mike
Superb and so lovely that he is so loved by the family and members are still interested in Railways. Myself have just welcomed into the workshop a beautifully made Black Five tender chassis for my 5 inch gauge models. Yes we are building 2 of them. I worked with a member of the Wittle family and was told of his association with Frank. The 8 F boiler is pure Hawksworth County so this is why they made so many for the war effort... Swindon was ready. Love David and Lily.
Its Nice to learn about Sir William Stanier and his beautiful Locomotives I had travelled behind his Black Fives filmed them plus his other engines he designed
A great documentary. I loved the 2 classes of heavy locomotives designed for express passenger trains and their marine livery.At Tamworth where there is a curve and at the spot where train spotters stood ,you could hear the locos rumbling away with a very distinctive sound so you knew what was coming before you saw it.I used to there with a friend on numerous occasions and have so many memories. of the time spent there.
Splendid! Thank you Tom. The mannequin seems an odd choice, perhaps it might be modified to talk (Thunderbirds) using old recordings of WS so lending a more meaningful sympathetic presentation.
A very enjoyable and interesting video about a great engineer. A small criticism is old film clips shot in 4:3 aspect ratio were stretched to fit on 16:9, giving oval boilers and very long, low engines - a pity.
I'm rather surprised that this documentary doesn't even mention the 8F, since it could easily be argued that this was one of William Stanier's most significant and important designs for the LMS, if not the most important. Over 800 were built. They were initially the standard freight locomotive during the war, and formed the basis for the WD 'austerity' design. They served overseas in many countries, and continued to do significant work right up to the end of steam on BR. Was William Stanier not as proud of these as of his other designs? That seems hard to credit.
My Grandfather worked for the GWR in the 1920s till late 1960s as fitter he always told interesting stories about the railway I have one of his GWR steam train manuals with fold out illustrations showing how to service the brakes etc from the 1930s
One point that may be relevant, I believe the LMS were sufficiently impressed by the GWR Castle locos that they wanted to licence the design, which the GW refused to do. So conceivably, since the LMS couldn't get the Castles, they took someone from the design team instead!
I understood it that the LMS requested that the GWR built something 50 Castles for them, but the GWR didn't have the capacity to do so in the timescale required, and in any case there was legislation forbidding one railway company from building equipment for another (but they could buy from a manufacturer, as many did). There was, however, no legislation preventing one railway company from providing drawings of its finest products to another...
I'm not really a steam buff, but Stanier engines always appealed to me more than any others. So It's strange that people don't speak of him more often - the talk is rather of Gresley or even of Bulleid. It was an inspired move by the LMS to headhunt him for CME after grouping. He had what may be called a "dream career". Oh, and just a quick shout-out for the LMS permanent way department, which had installed such robust points and crossovers at Crewe that 400 tons of train could traverse them at twice the design speed without major incident.
An interesting programme, unfortunately spoiled by presenting archive film in an incorrect ratio (ie 4:3 streched out to wide screen). The usual mix-up also between Black Fives, "Jubilees" and 8Fs in the moving images.
Why are they called Black Fives? I've always understood that it was to distinguish them from the Red Fives - ie. Jubilees - which were introduced nearly simultaneously and were originally given the power classification 5XP (express passenger). Jubilees got LMS passenger red paint jobs, Black Fives less fancy black. Didn't work, of course, after Jubes were reclassified to 6P5F. (And a very nice film - thanks very much!)
Expanding the width of a 4:3 image to fill the screen so that circles become ovals distorts the picture. Please present your archival footage IN ITS ORIGINAL ASPECT RATIO! There is no shame in black borders...
The G W R was God's Wonderful Railway. Indeed it still would be, if it didn't treat passengers with contempt, expecting them to endure inter city journeys on suburban seats of Hitachi trains.
It was GODS ! WONDERFULL !! BECAUSE !! THE !! HELL !! OF !! A !! MESS !! WERE !! ALL !! FULL !! OF DIRT !! AND !! FLITH !!! RAILWAY !! THAT !! THE !! U.K !! EVER !! HAD !! FOR ! A !! RAILWAY !! COMPANY !!
WHAT !! STAINEIR !! DID ! TO ROBERT !! WHITELEGGS ;! LOCOMOTIVES !! WAS !! AN ! ABSOLUTE !! DISGRACE !! I WILL !! NEVER !! FORGIVE !! YOU ! IN !! ANY !!WAY !!! WHATSOEVER !!! STAINEIR !!!! YOU !! AND !! THE !! HELL !! OF !! A !! MESS !! RAILWAYS !!! TOO !!!
Wonderful to hear the first hand accounts of the great man from his family. To my mind our greatest loco engineer, but his man management skills should not be overlooked. He was brought to the LMS to sort it out and he did that brilliantly.
He's a great man
A fantastic memorial to a fine engineer, what a real pity that the locomotive "Sir Williams Stanier FRS" was not preserved as a real tribute; it was the final development (overseen by Ivatt of course) of the Princess Coronation class.
This is one of the most fascinating videos I have ever seen on TH-cam. Actually, I might say, *the* most. Thank you so very much for uploading it.
Fantastic. When I was 7, my peers were into Marc Bolan or Man Utd, but my hero was Sir William Stanier. Stupid TH-cam algorithm can't tell that as train videos go, this one is rather special. Really nicely made by Tom Stanier. Great intrinsic value, with those family voices and memories which might be lost forever, and produced to a high standard. This deserves many more than 1,500 views. Expanding the title to something like "Sir Wiliam Stanier FRS: A brief family biography Iand mpressions of Sir William Stanier by people who knew him" might help. As for content, I have two slight regrets that it didn't mention his experiment with steam turbines in LMS No 6202, or the 8F, a rugged freight loco designated as a standard by the MoD during the war, as such run all over the country (including in LNER colours) and around the world, where in Turkey they were called "Churchills". Trivia fact: "Sir William Stanier FRS" was rolled out of the works alongside Ivatt's no 10 000, one of the first diesel-electrics on British rails.
Well said: I agree wholeheartedly.
It is said that Mr Stanier described his Black 5 as "a deuce of a good engine". I doubt many would disagree. Interesting that to be a good CME you had to be an organiser and administrator, as well as an HR enthusiast. A great man. Very glad you bothered to compile this.
I'm not surprised that the black 5s are staniers most liked and successful engine
What a wonderful insight, not just into the life and work of one of the nation's great engineers, but also into his personality, and a real tribute to the man to see just how warmly he was and is regarded. And yes, the Black 5: much as I love the Duchesses, I think that the Black 5 is the most functionally elegant and timeless steam locomotive (allowing for that oxymoron!) ever to have been designed, and its sheer utility is as outstanding as its visual perfection. Thank you so much for sharing this.
What a treasure to come across such a wonderful account of a great engineer. Sir William Stanier designed the most beautiful locomotives ever, especially the magnificent Coronation class.
This is going to be an historical document, ! there can't be many films made by the family about a true English genius, many thanks indeed
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A very well done, and exceptionally insightful, film. Thank you.
As an aside: I think this is the first time I've seen the running issues of the 114 mph run being talked about properly. The both the Coronation and the Mallard record caused significant repair costs just confirms them as gimmicks..
That was lovely ,and really interesting to have an insight on the man, and not just his work.
Sir William Stanier, Sir Nigel Gresley, O V Bulleid CBE, and Charles Collett to name but a few are some of Britain's forgotten greats. We owe them a huge debt of gratitude for designing some of the greatest and most beautiful locomotives ever made, and also to those who saved and preserved many of them from the scrappers blowtorch.
Stanier's 8F, although built for the LMS was known as Swindon's finest. As a boy, I saw the loco named after him many times, when it was stored at Willesden loco depot.
It's wonderful that you could commemorate the life of your granduncle like this, for perpetuity.
I liked it when someone said that Stannier thought that that an engineer should consider the economics because my boss once said to me, and he was usually a very strait laced person, that a good engineer could do for a shilling what any fucking idiot could do for a pound.
Now that was a fantastic program!!!
The saddest thing about this most excellent documentary is it reminds us that the era of "The Great Engineer" now seems well and truly over. How many practising British engineers worthy to become an FRS can YOU name from the last 50 years? Most of them are academics.
Brilliant! What a pleasure and an honor it must have been, to work with this Engineer. Well done to the Grandchildren for producing this video. (PS Amethyst was a Jube not a Black 5) !! I didn't know Butterley had a Stanier Museum. How fitting that 46203 is being worked on there. Now on my Must Do list.
Butterley is well worth a visit. They run superb Midland Railway vintage trains on some days too - a great experience.
The man who perfected steam locos FACT...,jubes,Scots,duchess Black 5,8F..all legendry designed by a legend
True, thank god he was trained at Swindon.
That WHY ! THE SCOTSMAN !! IS !! SO MUCH !! BETTER !! THAN !! THE !! HELL !! OF ! A !! MESS !! EVER !! HAD !!
A very well put together film. I have only two complaints; 1, the Stanier 8F 2-8-0 is not mentioned, this is probably the greatest of Stanier's designs and 2, there is no mention of his rolling stock designs, His coaches were arguably the best general service stock produced in the 1930s and his electric trains designed for the Liverpool-Southport and Wirral lines were one of the greatest leaps forward in British carriage design, Stanier was a great railway all-rounder; they trained them well at Swindon.
Thank you for uploading so fascinating a video. Coming from Preston, I remember the Black 5s and Big 8s (as we called them) with enormous affection, and can still bring to mind the distinctive sound of the Big 8s hauling their enormous coal trains.
I also saw what I believe was one of the last runs of 46256, 'Sir William A. Stanier, FRS' through Farington on, I believe, a Saturday in late September, 1964, as she thundered north towards Preston.
White plumes of smoke, a glorious red engine, and a matching rake of red coaches, all resplendent in the sunlight of a warm September, day.
WONDERFUL!
Sadly, I wasn't quite old enough to have seen such sights in period although, as a fellow Prestonian, I can just remember being taken down to the station when I was about 5 (that would have been 1964) and seeing a Duchess, and which I was able to recognise because my eldest brother had the Hornby Dublo version. I've had to make do with 46233 thundering through Moreton-in-Marsh as I stood 6' away, painted LMS maroon and with a suitable rake of maroon coaches. - utterly magnificent!
Very interesting presentation. The great man came to our school in around about 1962 and gave a talk, this being facilitated by the fact that our headmaster, one RS Stanier, was a relative of his. I went to this talk, but unfortunately can remember very little of what he said!
He probably told you that steam locos were a thing of the past and needed to be scrapped as soon as possible and replaced by electric and diesels. A prophecy which would come true 6 years later
AS AN AMERICAN RAILROADER SINCE 1964 WITH MECHANICAL WORKINGS WITH BOTH DIESEL AND STEAM POWER I FOUND THIS VIDEO TO BE QUITE FASCINATING!!
A GOOD BIT OF HOW, WHO, AND WHAT!
ON OUR SIDE OF THE POND AT THE ATCHISON TOPEKA & SANTA FE, ORRIS BILGER WAS THE GO TO GUY , BEING MOST FAMOUS FOR UPGRADING ELDERLY LOCOMOTIVES WITH NEWER COMPONENTS TO KEEP THEM VIABLE UNTIL LATE IN OUR STEAM ERA!
KEEP THEM ROLLING ,BROTHERS!!
👍👍
Sir William Stanier left a great legacy to the British, and a great story.
At my school, I was privileged to meet the great great grandchild of Sir William Stanier. Sadly, there aren’t many 13 year old steam train enthusiasts.
Absolutely wonderful..........what an incredible human being, I have many books about him and his work but this portrays a beautiful personal perspective.
Ehank you ...........Mike
thanks for this great movie / document
Superb and so lovely that he is so loved by the family and members are still interested in Railways. Myself have just welcomed into the workshop a beautifully made Black Five tender chassis for my 5 inch gauge models. Yes we are building 2 of them. I worked with a member of the Wittle family and was told of his association with Frank. The 8 F boiler is pure Hawksworth County so this is why they made so many for the war effort... Swindon was ready. Love David and Lily.
The "Stanier" surname is actually a variant of the original occupational surname "Stonehewer". This brilliant man dealt in a different solid material.
great video tom your great uncle sir William stanier im opinion designed the best steam locos this country have produced
Delightful. Thank you.
Its Nice to learn about Sir William Stanier and his beautiful Locomotives I had travelled behind his Black Fives filmed them plus his other engines he designed
Well done! Very enjoyable!
Thank-you!
A nice surprise.
A great documentary. I loved the 2 classes of heavy locomotives designed for express passenger trains and their marine livery.At Tamworth where there is a curve and at the spot where train spotters stood ,you could hear the locos rumbling away with a very distinctive sound so you knew what was coming before you saw it.I used to there with a friend on numerous occasions and have so many memories. of the time spent there.
Well produced and fascinating
Splendid! Thank you Tom. The mannequin seems an odd choice, perhaps it might be modified to talk (Thunderbirds) using old recordings of WS so lending a more meaningful sympathetic presentation.
A truly excellent video.
A very enjoyable and interesting video about a great engineer. A small criticism is old film clips shot in 4:3 aspect ratio were stretched to fit on 16:9, giving oval boilers and very long, low engines - a pity.
The oval squashed boilers do look very odd.
Excellent video. Thank you for showing this
That was very interesting, thanks for putting it together. I have a Duchess and Blak 5 on my LMS model Railway.
Barry.Devon
I'm rather surprised that this documentary doesn't even mention the 8F, since it could easily be argued that this was one of William Stanier's most significant and important designs for the LMS, if not the most important. Over 800 were built. They were initially the standard freight locomotive during the war, and formed the basis for the WD 'austerity' design. They served overseas in many countries, and continued to do significant work right up to the end of steam on BR. Was William Stanier not as proud of these as of his other designs? That seems hard to credit.
Excellent documentary.
The Trains we travel today are thanks to people of this history story marvellous hard working folk
I always liked the Black 5s saw them at my Home Depot Edinburgh Waverley.
Charming: fascinating and charming.
An insightful biography, thank you.
(TH-cam's wonderful algorithm bought me here)
Can’t beat the Stanier stance of steam locomotive!
My Grandfather worked for the GWR in the 1920s till late 1960s as fitter he always told interesting stories about the railway I have one of his GWR steam train manuals with fold out illustrations showing how to service the brakes etc from the 1930s
In NZ I have only said it with a long "a"...now I know better :-)
AT LEAST YOUR GRANDAD !. WORKED FOR !.GODS ! WONDERFULL !!.UNLIKE !.THE !! HELL !! OF ! A !! MESS !! STANIEIER !! BELONGED !! TOO !!
Very good!
One point that may be relevant, I believe the LMS were sufficiently impressed by the GWR Castle locos that they wanted to licence the design, which the GW refused to do. So conceivably, since the LMS couldn't get the Castles, they took someone from the design team instead!
I understood it that the LMS requested that the GWR built something 50 Castles for them, but the GWR didn't have the capacity to do so in the timescale required, and in any case there was legislation forbidding one railway company from building equipment for another (but they could buy from a manufacturer, as many did). There was, however, no legislation preventing one railway company from providing drawings of its finest products to another...
Interesting to note that the 'a' in Stanier is short; as train spotters we always pronounced it with a long 'a'.
For those of us at a distance, LMS is the acronym of "London, Midlands and Scottish", indicating the rough areas of service for that railway!
I'm not really a steam buff, but Stanier engines always appealed to me more than any others. So It's strange that people don't speak of him more often - the talk is rather of Gresley or even of Bulleid. It was an inspired move by the LMS to headhunt him for CME after grouping. He had what may be called a "dream career". Oh, and just a quick shout-out for the LMS permanent way department, which had installed such robust points and crossovers at Crewe that 400 tons of train could traverse them at twice the design speed without major incident.
Thank you.
An interesting programme, unfortunately spoiled by presenting archive film in an incorrect ratio (ie 4:3 streched out to wide screen). The usual mix-up also between Black Fives, "Jubilees" and 8Fs in the moving images.
legend
Splendid stuff.
Why are they called Black Fives? I've always understood that it was to distinguish them from the Red Fives - ie. Jubilees - which were introduced nearly simultaneously and were originally given the power classification 5XP (express passenger). Jubilees got LMS passenger red paint jobs, Black Fives less fancy black. Didn't work, of course, after Jubes were reclassified to 6P5F.
(And a very nice film - thanks very much!)
I like and love the Black Five.
The jube was just that bit better mark
This is great, but generationally great as well. Good upon good.
The GW had refused to supply the LMS with Castle drawings; as a result they had the Scots built by North British Loco.
THE !!HELL OF !! A ! MESS ! CAN ! GO ! AND !! SHOVE !! IT !! IM GLAD ! GODS ! WONDERFULL ! STAYED ! THE ! WAY ! THEY ! WERE !!
Expanding the width of a 4:3 image to fill the screen so that circles become ovals distorts the picture. Please present your archival footage IN ITS ORIGINAL ASPECT RATIO! There is no shame in black borders...
👏👏🙂
Comment 100.
21:05 What is the name of the book on Economics of Engineering? It could be very useful today for fighting climate change.
Was it said how he became a 'sir'?
T F B
One assumes that he was knighted by King George 6th.
Does anyone know where he is buried?
No, but his home was "Newburn", Chorleywood Road, Rickmansworth.
@@RoyCousins
So he lived in metroland, wedged between the GWR and the LMS.
Very diplomatic!
The first question should be, You don't have a spare watch I could borrow? 😉
He wasn’t in Star Trek? 🙂
But what about Williams enemy’s
Made in Swindon.
But perfected at Crewe!
@@petermolloy6142 With original drawings.
Shame that when we are told about the Black Five we are shown a Jubilee, Amethyst.
Sorry to be pedantic.
Not to knock it or anything, but what was so great about the Great Western Railway?
The G W R was God's Wonderful Railway.
Indeed it still would be, if it didn't treat passengers with contempt, expecting them to endure inter city journeys on suburban seats of Hitachi trains.
It was GODS ! WONDERFULL !! BECAUSE !! THE !! HELL !! OF !! A !! MESS !! WERE !! ALL !! FULL !! OF DIRT !! AND !! FLITH !!! RAILWAY !! THAT !! THE !! U.K !! EVER !! HAD !! FOR ! A !! RAILWAY !! COMPANY !!
WHAT !! STAINEIR !! DID ! TO ROBERT !! WHITELEGGS ;! LOCOMOTIVES !! WAS !! AN ! ABSOLUTE !! DISGRACE !! I WILL !! NEVER !! FORGIVE !! YOU ! IN !! ANY !!WAY !!! WHATSOEVER !!! STAINEIR !!!! YOU !! AND !! THE !! HELL !! OF !! A !! MESS !! RAILWAYS !!! TOO !!!
What did he do?