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INTRODUCTION

By Charlie Bunce

There are some ideas for television programmes that, when you hear about them, you just know in your bones are destined for success. That was certainly the case when I was asked to produce a new series being developed for the BBC which was then called Adventures with Bradshaw.

The idea emerged from a brainstorming session with Liam Keelan, BBC Controller of Daytime and Camilla Lewis, Head of Factual Features at talkbackTHAMES. Liam was keen to find a programme that would work at 6.30 p.m. on BBC2. He wanted a travelogue by train, which had an historical angle. Liam knew the railways were rolling out across Britain during one of the most exciting and rapidly advancing periods of history when ordinary lives were being irrevocably changed.

Camilla had long been obsessed with finding a new way of investigating our social history. Her brother-in-law, an antiquarian bookseller slotted the last piece of the puzzle in place when he told her that George Bradshaw, the man who famously started producing monthly railway timetables in the mid-nineteenth century had also published a guide-book on travelling across the country by train.

After a £500 investment, a battered and broken copy of Bradshaw’s guide arrived at the office. A drab brown cover was misleading as its contents were anything but dull and dreary. Its well-thumbed pages offered a remarkable insight into the life and times of Victorian Britain.

The more I read Bradshaw’s guide, the more I could hear his voice. As I understood him better I began to see the age in which he lived and worked, and to see what excited him and why. His minute observations and comments gave me a sense of Victorian Britain different from anything I’d read before.

His rich words conveyed to us another age. A section about Sandwich in Kent is an ideal example. ‘The traveller, on entering this place, beholds himself in a sort of Kentish Herculaneum, a town of the martial dead. He gazes around him and looks upon the streets and edifices of a bygone age. He stares up at the beetling stories of the old pent-up buildings as he walks and peers curiously through latticed windows into the vast low-roofed, heavy-beamed, oak-panelled rooms of days he has read of in old plays.’

How could you not want to visit Sandwich and find what he had seen. Beyond lyrical descriptions, Bradshaw deposited on his pages a wealth of information about where his readers should stay, how to get money, what day the market took place, local sights of interest and on occasion where to sit to get the best view from the train. He revelled in detail, giving the span and height of bridges to the foot, or the length of station platforms. He loudly and proudly celebrated every British success.

Bradshaw described how the railways were a great leveller, literally and metaphorically. While the land was planed so the trains could run on as few inclines as possible, the barriers that divided a class-ridden society were at the same time pared down.

For the enterprising, railways represented a golden opportunity. Although they were initially seen as a way of transporting freight, it wasn’t long before moving people by rail was just as important, sometimes even more so. Commerce spread across neighbourhoods and regions. Trades that were once restricted to narrow localities could now take advantage of markets worldwide. The notion of commuting was born. Holidays, once the province of the rich, came within grasp of ordinary people.

It is difficult to imagine now just how fundamentally life changed and the speed at which those transformations came about. Where railway stations were made, hamlets mushroomed into towns while those settlements that were leapfrogged by railway lines were left in the doldrums.

It wasn’t all good news, though. Amid the euphoria that accompanied the age of steam there were many who fell victim to railway mania, including those who died laying tracks in hostile terrain and the unwary who invested heavily in lines or companies that failed to flourish.

As far as the programme was concerned, the idea was beguilingly simple. We would travel Britain by train with Bradshaw as our guide. Through it, we’d explore the impact of the railways on our cities, countryside and coast. Thanks to Bradshaw, we could celebrate triumphs of yesteryear and match fortunes past and present. We would see how the country had been transformed in a matter of a few short years and understand why, at the time, the British Empire was so successful at home and overseas. But, as importantly, we would search out what of Bradshaw’s Britain still remains today.

The next question was who should present it. In television, getting this agreed is often a monumental feat. On this occasion it wasn’t. Michael was suggested, and within 30 seconds of meeting him I knew he was the perfect candidate. The son of a Spanish refugee and a Scottish mother, Michael not only had a lifelong fascination for history but was also a former Minister of Transport. Years spent in both government and opposition did nothing to diminish his abiding passion for railway journeys. Forty-five episodes later I have never once regretted the decision to have him present the show. The energy and intelligence he brings to every situation make the series stand out.

Strangely, the most taxing bit of the whole process was coming up with the right title. List after list was emailed to everyone concerned with the project, only to be knocked back, judged not quite right. We must have gone through hundreds of suggestions before ending up with Great British Railway Journeys. In the end, it seemed to say very succinctly what the series is all about.

The last question was where those journeys should take us. We could not mimic Bradshaw minutely on our travels. His extraordinary thoroughness meant that was a task too far, and many of the stations he visited are now obsolete, thanks to the policies of the Sixties which saw thousands of miles of branch lines closed in a futile bid to save cash.

Nonetheless, I wanted the trips we recorded to reveal a country that many of us hardly know, or at least seem to have forgotten. With our copy of Bradshaw’s guide in hand we’ve now made nine big journeys exploring the country and discovering new sides to places I thought I knew well. Through making the programmes and writing the book, I have had the chance to tease out dusty nuggets of information to satisfy the most curious of minds. I wanted the chance to trumpet what had been great about Britain, and celebrate the enormous amount that still is. I hope the series and this book do just that.

Charlie Bunce

September 2010