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From this month's featured article
Charles Easton Spooner (1818-1889) was the Secretary and Engineer of the Festiniog Railway Company from 1856 until 1886. He was also Engineer to the North Wales Narrow Gauge Railways Company and was involved in the family company of Spooner & Co., which at times appeared to conflict with the FR.
Charles was the third son of James Spooner and was born in Maentwrog in 1818. As a teenager he, along with his oldest brother, James, assisted his father in laying out the Festiniog Railway. He and James continued to assist their father and Thomas Prichard during construction. Charles was thus trained as a civil engineer, gaining much practical experience that would stand him in good stead in his later life. During the early 1840s, Charles' training continued under both Joseph Locke and Isambard Kingdom Brunel. He continued to be involved with the railway under his father, who was Secretary to the Company. (more...)
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This month's featured picture
There have been two four wheel carriage trucks on the Ffestiniog Railway. The first was built in 1884 and later scrapped, whilst the second is a replica of that original vehicle completed in 2024. In 1884 Boston Lodge built a carriage truck at a cost of £18 10s (£18.50). Similar vehicles had been used by main line railways from the very earliest days when the gentry would have their favourite horse-drawn vehicle loaded, and then used it to travel in for their journey. It probably has some bearing on the use of carriage/coach as the terminology for passenger carrying railway vehicles. In early 2018 plans were drawn up to make a replica of the carriage truck. The replica was launched at the 2024 Bygones Weekend, where it ran loaded with a carriage of the type likely to have been carried by the original. Photo credit: Ed Heaps
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