Ex-LNER Thompson 'B1' class 4-6-0 No. 61018 'Gnu'. Built at Darlington in February 1947 as LNER No. 1018 and withdrawn in November 1965.

This is a fine portrait of a record-breaker! Holding the title for the shortest locomotive name to see service in BR days. When built, 'Gnu' had been allocated to York but was transferred elsewhere not to return until September 1960. Its classmates attracted some of the most incomprehensible (and unpronounceable) names of various species of African antelopes. What on earth the traveling public made of 'Umesque', 'Puku' or 'Ourebi' and their like is beyond my ken!

© Stephen Barrett Archive-SA Collection