City of rails

RailFest celebrates many anniversaries. The most prominent one is a bicentennial: it is 200 years since the world's first steam locomotive, the Penydarren, fired into life. This small, black, seven-ton loco hauled 70 passengers, ten tons of iron and five wagons nine miles from the Penydarren iron works in Wales to the Merthyr-Cardiff Canal.

But that is not the only date being commemorated. It is a century since City of Truro reputedly became the first engine to travel at 100mph, and 400 years since Britain's first railway.

RailFest is expected to attract tens of thousands of railway enthusiasts from around the world. Star of the week-long event is undoubtedly the Flying Scotsman.

When it was put up for sale, this beautiful engine, designed by the great Sir Nigel Gresley, looked set to be lost for ever to a private, foreign buyer.

Thanks to a fantastic public appeal by the NRM, backed by Evening Press readers, enough cash was raised to keep the Scotsman in Britain. She will be flying into York from her home town of Doncaster this Friday: what a day it promises to be.

All the images on this page are culled from the museum's million-strong collection of images.

They show York at the hub of Britain's railway network, captured either by the bold lines of the poster artist, or the keen eye of the photographer.

No fewer than 7,000 railway posters are housed at the NRM, mostly measuring either 40ins by 50ins or 40ins by 25ins.

As you might expect, poster artists promoted York as "destination history", to encourage the newly invented British tourist to alight here.

In the 1930s, the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) used a Fred Taylor view of Victorian Stonegate to tempt shoppers to the city. Another Taylor scene depicted the interior of York Minster complete with choir.

Fred Taylor was a recognised artist on and off the railways. He was commissioned in 1930 to design four ceiling paintings for the Underwriting Room at Lloyd's of London. He also exhibited at the Royal Academy and other London galleries.

Another artist, EH Spencer, used historical figures to similar effect on his 1955 railway poster advertising York. They included a knight, a cardinal and a Roman centurion. Another beautiful work a year later was based around King George VI's quote: "The history of York is the history of England."

Visit www.nrm.org.uk for more information on RailFest or call the booking line 08707 01 02 08

What they wrote about York's railways

On George Hudson, the "Railway King"

"A fully balanced judgement of Hudson is virtually impossible to achieve. It has already been shown that he did not make all railways come to York. And it seems wrong to describe a man who used such obstructive tactics for his own ends as a great architect of the present-day railway system.

"Perhaps the best that can be said is that he was ahead of the crowd and gave what were to become the Midland and North Eastern Railways such a head-start that they remained pre-eminent into the 20th century.

"But Hudson achieved this head-start by laying the foundations of these lines in the impoverished early 1840s, and only did so by the use of financial methods which today would be regarded as criminal."

AJ Peacock and David King, authors of George Hudson Of York

"There is no doubt that George Hudson, the 19th century railway king, laid the foundations of York as a modern railway city.

"Thrown out of his North Yorkshire village of Howsham when he was only 15, for fathering an illegitimate child, he inherited £30,000 in the most dubious of circumstances 12 years later. That enabled him to reinvent himself as the Railway King and become, at the height of his fame and fortune, one of the very richest men in England. He made his money by forming his own railway companies and, in 1845, he was able to buy the Londesborough estate in East Yorkshire for £500,000.

"That was a huge amount of money in mid-Victorian Britain.

"By 1848 he controlled nearly a third of Britain's rail network and was a Conservative member in the House of Commons. He was three times Lord Mayor of York, and the city basked in his reflected glory as it became the leading railway centre in the north of England."

Robert Beaumont, the author of The Railway King, A Biography Of George Hudson

On York's old Railway Station, opened in 1841

"The main building is a large two-storey structure, and faces towards Tanner Row; it contained both passenger facilities and offices with the booking hall situated in the centre. The upper floor housed the Board Room, and the half-yearly meeting of the Y&NM Board held on January 29 1841 - presided over by George Hudson - was the first to take place there.

"The train shed behind the offices had a platform along each interior wall: the departure platform was situated immediately adjacent to the booking hall and offices, the arrival platform being on the opposite side.

"Whilst the facilities and amenities so far provided were doubtless sufficient for the level of activity prevailing in 1841, they soon were to become inadequate as the railway network around York grew from the mid-1840s onwards."

Ken Appleby, from Britain's Rail Super Centres

On York's new Railway Station, opened in 1877

"The architect when the work started on the new station was Thomas Prosser, but he retired in 1874 and was succeeded by Benjamin Burleigh: however, he too retired (in 1876) and the work was completed by William Peachey.

"A contemporary journal stated that it was 'the finest and largest structure of the kind in the world'! The roof was carried on cast iron columns and longitudinal wrought iron girders, with wrought iron ribs - a feature of the roof was the large glazed windscreens at each end...

"A contemporary account of the opening of the station on Sunday, June 25, 1877, it was stated that it had cost 'something like £400,000 and is the joint property of the several companies which have running powers into or their own lines in York'.

"In fact it never was joint property, being wholly owned by the North Eastern Railway, although the NER did provide facilities for other companies, which paid an appropriate rental."

Updated: 09:56 Monday, May 24, 2004