L. T. C. Rolt
| Tom Rolt | |
|---|---|
| Born | Lionel Thomas Caswall Rolt 11 February 1910 Chester |
| Died | 9 May 1974 (aged 64) |
| Resting place | Stanley Pontlarge |
| Occupation | Engineer, technical assistant, writer |
| Nationality | British |
| Education | Cheltenham College |
| Period | 1944–1974 |
| Genre | Industrial history, Biography, Ghost stories |
| Subject | Railways, waterways, industrial history |
| Notable works | Narrow Boat, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, George and Robert Stephenson, Thomas Telford, Red for Danger |
| Notable awards | Hon MA Newcastle University, Hon MSc University of Bath |
| Spouse | Angela Orred (1939-51) Sonia Smith (1952-1974) |
| Children | Richard (1953), Timothy (1955) |
| Website | |
| www |
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Lionel Thomas Caswall Rolt (usually abbreviated to Tom Rolt or L. T. C. Rolt) (11 February 1910 – 9 May 1974) was a prolific English writer and the biographer of major civil engineering figures including Isambard Kingdom Brunel and Thomas Telford. He is also regarded as one of the pioneers of the leisure cruising industry on Britain's inland waterways, and as an enthusiast for both vintage cars and heritage railways.
Tom Rolt was born in Chester to a line of Rolts "dedicated to hunting and procreation". His father Lionel had settled back in England in Hay-on-Wye after working on a cattle station in Australia, a plantation in India, and joining (unsuccessfully) in the Yukon gold rush of 1898. However Lionel Rolt lost most of his money in 1920 after investing his capital in a company which failed, and the family moved to a pair of stone cottages in Stanley Pontlarge in Gloucestershire.
Rolt studied at Cheltenham College and at 16 he took a job learning about steam traction, before starting an apprenticeship at the Kerr Stuart locomotive works in Stoke-on-Trent, where his uncle, Kyrle Willans was chief development engineer. His uncle bought a wooden horse-drawn narrow flyboat called Cressy and fitted it with a steam engine. Then (having discovered the steam made steering through tunnels impossible) he replaced that with a Ford Model T engine. This was Rolt's introduction to the canal system.
In the thirties depression Rolt became jobless and turned to vintage sports cars, taking part in the veteran run to Brighton, and acquiring a succession of cars including a 1924 Alvis 12/50 two seater 'ducks back' which he was to keep for the rest of his life.
Rolt bought into a motor garage partnership next to the Phoenix public house in Hartley Wintney in Hampshire (their breakdown vehicle was an adapted 1911 Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost) and together with the landlord of the Phoenix, Tim Carson, and others, formed the Vintage Sports-Car Club in 1934. He also founded and helped create the Prescott hill climb. His 1950 book Horseless Carriage contains a diatribe against the emergence of mass production in the English car industry, claiming that "mass production methods must develop towards the ultimate end [of automatic procreation of machines by machines], although by doing so, they involve either the supersession of men by machines or a continual expansion of production". His preference for traditional craftsmanship helps to explain his subsequent career.
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