Sodor & Mainland Railway
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The Sodor & Mainland Railway (1853 - 1914) is a fictional railway that existed on the Island of Sodor in the The Railway Series books written by the Rev.W.Awdry. In the books it is known as the S&M. The railway line was supposedly built when railway-mania was still in force and was opened in 1853. The initial aim of the railway was to link Sodor with the British Mainland.
The Sodor & Mainland Railway ran from the docks at Kirkronan to the town of Ballahoo via Rolf's Castle and Crovan's Gate, but never actually reached the mainland due to lack of money and misfortunes. The plan to tunnel to the Mainland failed when early excavations through the Balahoo Ridge collapsed, and a scheme to build a bridge across the Walney Channel was halted by the Admiralty.
Many of the S&M staff originally came from Ireland or Scotland. It provided passenger services, but was primarily intended to be a goods line. Although plans were put in action to start a steamer ferry service from Kirkronan to Dublin, nothing much came of it.
The Sodor & Mainland Railway's finances collapsed in 1910 and finally the company amalgamated with other small railways on the island, in 1914, to form The North Western Railway (NWR), now under the direction of its CEO, Sir Topham Hatt, better known as The Fat Controller.
The S&M's dreams of a link between Sodor and the Mainland did eventually come to pass under the reign of Sir Topham Hatt, who constructed a rail bridge across the Walney Channel.
Only a small length of the S&M became part of the NWR mainline: namely the section between Kellsthorpe Road and a point just east of Crovan's Gate. Ballahoo was bypassed by the main line and became a junction for two branch lines.
The S&M did, at one time, plan to build a western extension into Sodor's mountain country to connect the expanding industrial town of Peel Godred to the railway network. This plan, like the others, came to nothing and Peel Godred's first railway was the narrow gauge Mid Sodor Railway line, and then later still the NWR's electric Peel Godred branch.
[edit] Locomotives
The Sodor & Mainland Railway had three engines, only one of which (Neil) appeared in the books. It is unknown what other engines worked for the railway, but all three had been scrapped by 1901.
[edit] Neil (S&M no. 2)
(See Photo). Neil is a small green tank engine with an unusual box shape and no cab. He is based on the early shunting engines seen in the 1860's around Northern England. He has a Scottish accent.
Neil appears in the book Very Old Engines, helping Skarloey off his truck after the little engine first arrived on the Island by ship. (The story is told by Skarloey as a memory of 100 years previous). Skarloey said Neil was ugly but kind, and they soon became friends. Little more is known about him.
In Christopher Awdry's book Sodor: Reading Between the Lines, he states that Neil's class is unknown. However, he looks a lot like a Neilson "box tank". This was a simple and robust class of engine built in Glasgow and sold all over the world. This would explain both his name and his accent.
[edit] Sources
- Awdry, Rev. W., Very Old Engines
- Awdry, Rev. W. and G., The Island of Sodor: Its People, History and Railways
- Awdry, Christopher, Sodor: Reading Between the Lines
- Clutterbuck, Martin, The Real Lives of Thomas the Tank Engine
- Sibley, Brian, The Thomas the Tank Engine Man
