If there is something the railways of Britain should be noted for, it is
bureaucracy. As a railway historian this is fascinating for me, as the
information systems established early in railway history have kept the
huge networks of rails, staff and stations operating. Consequently, I
have developed an almost compulsive urge for collecting the many rule
and instruction books that the railways before 1948 churned out in vast
numbers. The scope of my collecting is not limited to companies' main
rule books that were issued to every employee on their first day at
work, and then taken away on their last. But no, they are so ubiquitous
that my collection would be quite dull. Rather, I take great joy in
acquiring instructional texts that governed all the other facets of
railway work. So, here, I present a few pages of my latest acquisition, a
London Midland and Scottish Railway 'Instructions to goods and
passenger managers, goods agents, station masters, passenger and parcel
agents and others concerned at Stations in England, Wales and Ireland regarding missing and found goods and coaching traffic, passengers' lost property and money, disposal of salvage' from 1934.P.S. I hope to digitise and make available all my rule books when the PhD is over.
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