50th BIRTHDAY PARTY FOR SCRAPPED SISTERS OF NEW STEAM LOCOMOTIVE
Significant progress on wheeling Tornado
The A1 Steam Locomotive Trust, the registered charity that is building the first new mainline steam locomotive in Britain for almost 40 years, is celebrating the 50th anniversary of the completion of the first Darlington Works built example of the same type - Peppercorn class A1 No. 60130 Kestrel - in September 1948 with a party for some of the railwaymen who built it. The first Peppercorn A1 was completed the previous month at Doncaster Works.
The party, to be hosted jointly with Darlington Council, is being held in the new Darlington Locomotive Works on Tuesday 8th September 1998 at 19:00hrs , where a new Peppercorn class A1 No. 60163 Tornado is currently being built. Present will be David Champion, Chairman of The A1 Steam Locomotive Trust and Vice President Mrs Dorothy Mather, whose late husband Arthur Peppercorn was the A1’s designer.
David Champion, Chairman of The A1 Steam Locomotive Trust, commented, “September 1998 marks the 50th anniversary of the completion of the first Darlington-built Peppercorn class A1. The Trust, which is aiming to complete the 50th member of this lost class of steam locomotive, is celebrating this anniversary with some of the class’s original builders and the designer’s widow. We are still actively seeking additional sponsors and covenantors to enable the locomotive to be completed by 2000.”
Work on the Wheelsets continues apace
Work to enable Tornado to be wheeled by Christmas continues as fast as funds will allow. It is
the first time that this very specialist and expensive job has been done since the completion of
British Railway’s last steam locomotive in 1960.