Railway relics

Bryan Morgan's Railway Relics will be welcomed not only by transport-lovers and industrial historians but by all with an interest in the craftsmanship of the past and the varied face of Britain today.

The book's first section deals with the age of the tramways and lists every substantial trace of a pre-1830 system. Next, the author makes an informed selection from the fast-vanishing works of the railway era itself, mentioning not only famous viaducts and train-sheds but a host of lesser – yet still fascinating – stations, tunnel-portals, etc. The last third of the book locates a variety of other antiquities, including nearly 300 steam locomotives of which over half are preserved in working order.

Never before have so many facets of the railway scene been dealt with in one comprehensive and up-to-date guide. But though its gazetteer forms in itself an indispensable work of reference, Railway Relics is no dry-as-dust museum catalogue. Rather, it is bound to suggest to anyone with a love of Britain's surviving curiosities a hundred journeys of exploration – to the granite 'rails' of Dartmoor, the lions which guard the Menai Strait, or a fifty-year-old locomotive at work in a rectory garden.

One hundred photographs complement the text and – like the book itself – blend old friends with some surprising discoveries.