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Great Western Railway Company

Great Western Railway
Coat of arms of the Great Western Railway.png
Coat-of-arms of the Great Western Railway, incorporating the shields, crests and mottoes of the cities of London (left) and Bristol (right)
History
1835 Act of Incorporation
1838 First train ran
1869–92 7 ft 14 in (2,140 mm) Brunel gauge
changed to
4 ft 8 12 in (1,435 mm) standard gauge
1903 Start of road motor services
1904 City of Truro sets speed record
1948 Nationalised
Constituent companies
See full list of constituents of the GWR
1854 Shrewsbury and Birmingham Ry
Shrewsbury and Chester Railway
1862 South Wales Railway
1863 West Midland Railway
1876 Bristol and Exeter Railway
South Devon Railway
1889 Cornwall Railway
1922 Rhymney Railway
Taff Vale Railway
Cambrian Railways
1923 Midland & S W Junction Railway
Successor organisation
1948 Western Region
of British Railways
Key locations
Headquarters Paddington station, London
Workshops Swindon
Wolverhampton
Major stations Birmingham Snow Hill
Bristol Temple Meads
Cardiff General
London Paddington
Reading General
Route mileage
Mileage shown as at end of year stated.
1841 171 miles (275 km)
1863 1,106 miles (1,780 km)
1876 2,023 miles (3,256 km)
1899 2,504 miles (4,030 km)
1921 2,900 miles (4,700 km)
1924 3,797 miles (6,111 km)

The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a British railway company that linked London with the south-west and west of England, the Midlands, and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, received its enabling Act of Parliament on 31 August 1835 and ran its first trains in 1838. It was engineered by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, who chose a broad gauge of 7 ft (2,134 mm)—later slightly widened to 7 ft 14 in (2,140 mm)—but, from 1854, a series of amalgamations saw it also operate 4 ft 8 12 in (1,435 mm) standard-gauge trains; the last broad-gauge services were operated in 1892. The GWR was the only company to keep its identity through the Railways Act 1921, which amalgamated it with the remaining independent railways within its territory, and it was finally merged at the end of 1947 when it was nationalised and became the Western Region of British Railways.

The GWR was called by some "God's Wonderful Railway" and by others the "Great Way Round" but it was famed as the "Holiday Line", taking many people to English and Bristol Channel resorts in the West Country as well as the far south-west of England such as Torquay in Devon, Minehead in Somerset, and Newquay and St Ives in Cornwall. The company's locomotives, many of which were built in the company's workshops at Swindon, were painted a Brunswick green colour while, for most of its existence, it used a two-tone "chocolate and cream" livery for its passenger coaches. Goods wagons were painted red but this was later changed to mid-grey.


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Wikipedia

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