British Railways - Glasgow Electrics - know your train by the head code

The Glasgow 'Blue Trains' were the only example other than BR's Southern Region that used and publicised head codes for trains. Here one of the new EMU's speeds along - BR quite rightly heavily publicised their newly electrified Glasgow and Clyde suburab network.

Railway Map of London - c1910

A simple little sketch map - almost diagrammatic in effect - of London's railways c1910. Lots to look at here - with the tube network having mushroomed in a century whilst various 'mainline' branches and lines have vanished in the century.

The simplicity of this - which although geographic in layout has removed the underlying topography except the River Thames - puts me in mind of the Stingemore tube diagrams of the 1920s and indeed Harry Beck's famous Tube Diagram of 1932/33.

Stratford & Forest Gate, East London - street plan, c1910

A page from a c1910 street atlas of London - this page showing the Lee (or Lea) Valley between Hackney and Stratford. The southern sector of the valley was heavily industrialised and utilised by many railway lines. It now forms the centre of the 2012 Olympic Games site. Very prominent are the old Great Eastern Railway's main workshops. The map also shows the then 'new' electric tramways threading their way through the many recent suburban streets of this part of London.

The New Britannia Excelsior Lamp box - carton panel, c1955

The Britannia Electric Lamp Works were based, I think, in London (Park Royal) and appear to have vanished at some point in the 1960s - I wonder who was behind them as they appear to have been founded in the 1920s when the British lamp industry was a rather tight cartel and 'going it alone' wasn't easy. The carton is duly patriotic - Britannia to the fore!

Am not at all a fan of ol' food adverts, but these really made me laugh... I wish I could get a loaf o bread wrapped in a paper like that.!

Hail Condiment the Fourth" - advert issued by HP Sauce, April 1934

OK - very corny - but an advert for the famous HP Sauce, then made at Aston in Birmingham by the Midland Vinegar Company. Not now - still available this most English of condiments is, apparently, mostly made in the Nederlands. Perhaps it stands for Huizen van het Parlement rather than Houses of Parliament.

Bermaline Bread - for Brighter Breakfasts - advert issued by Bermaline (Glasgow) - April 1934

Bermaline was one of various 'malted' type flours and loaves available - I remember the Bermaline Mills at Haddington, in East Lothian, as it was close to the 106 bus terminus when I was a conductor.

ALL IMAGES+INFO from mikeyashworth's Flickr page.

Some research ii.