Edward Thompson was the London & North Eastern Railways second Chief Mechanical Engineer, following the death of Sir Nigel Gresley in 1941. He was in office from 1941-1946, when he retired, after a long career as a mechanical engineer, working for several railway companies, including the North Eastern, Great Northern and after the grouping the London & North Eastern Railway. He was a very contraversial figure, often maligned by railway historians for his reconstruction of several classes of steam locomotive, including the Gresley prototype pacific Great Northern, which many people still feel was unnessasery. However there is more to Edward Thompson then his period as Chief Mechanical Engineer of the London & North Eastern Railway, in that he had a complex side to him, which might of originated from his experiances in the First World War, during which he served with distinction in France. This book for the first time, sets out to explain both the man and his philosophy, looking at the complex reasoning behind the way he came to his decisions over locomotive design and why he decided to reconstruct a number of Sir Nigel Gresleys locomotives. AUTHOR: Tim Hillier-Graves was born in North London in 1951. On leaving university he served with the Royal Navy seeing wide service on land and sea. For much of this time he specialised in weapon development projects, specifically missiles and heavyweight torpedoes, and worked alongside BAe, Marconi Space and Defence Systems and McDonnell Douglas in the process. In support of this work he undertook prolonged periods of study and research at the Royal Naval College, Greenwich, and the Royal Military College of Science, Shrivenham. Late in his career he changed specialisms and focussed on Human Resource Management and outsourcing, then as an Assistant Director took on responsibility of housing for military personnel. He retired in 2011 to concentrate more fully on writing. He has had a number of books and articles on the Navy, railway engineering, aviation and military history published since the 1970s. All the royalties from his books have been and will be donated to Cancer Research UK in memory of his many relatives and friends who have succumbed to these illnesses.
250 colour and b/w illustrations, locomotive weight diagrams